THE ULTIMATE SUNDAY LUNCH

One of the most iconic British traditions is that of "Sunday Lunch", also known as the "Sunday Roast" or "Sunday Dinner."  Its a pretty good reason to look forward to Sundays, and can be great if you have a large family or group of people coming around that you want to sit down and share a meal with.  

Typically it will be eaten around 3 in the afternoon, although these days you will find more and more people sitting down to it around supper time, due to their big Sunday breakfast. Its also quite popular these days for people to go "out" to a carvery or a pub for Sunday lunch and give mom a day off.  

At one time it typically would have consisted mainly of Roast Beef and all the trimmings, but other meats are now becoming more popular, probably due to the rising cost of Beef.   

Historically Roman Catholics and Anglicans abstained from eating meat on certain days of the week. This made having the Sunday roast a bit of a celebration because on Sundays all meat and dairy products could be eaten.  It is widely believed that the first Sunday roasts were instigated during King Henry VII's rule in 1485. 

In fact Royal Body Guards became known as Beefeaters due to their love of eating Beef and you will still see Beefeaters guarding the Tower of London. 

A Sunday roast usually consists of roasted meat of some sort, the most traditional being Beef. It is not uncommon to also see people enjoying roast lamb, pork or chicken. All will be served with roasted potatoes, a variety of fresh vegetables, gravy and Yorkshire puddings, or batter puddings as they are also known. 

Interestingly, Yorkshire puddings historically began as a starter dish, served with lots of gravy.  I suppose the thought was that once people had filled up on the puddings, they wouldn't have as much room to stuff themselves with the meat, therefore helping it to stretch that much further. These days you will see them served along side of the meal.  To the British a roast dinner is not a roast dinner without a crisp and light Yorkshire pudding to enjoy! 

Ingredients for Sunday lunch can be picked up locally at any large supermarket, or (best scenario) your local Butchers and farm market.  

Saturday mornings will find the local Butcher in most British communities filled with customers and often a line-up of people wanting to pick up their Sunday roast spilling out onto the pavement.  There is something quite familial about picking up your meat at your local Butcher, which hearkens back to the days when people knew their neighbors and had a strong sense of community. 

Whatever is served, the most important thing is that Sunday lunch remains a wonderful time to gather together around a table, relax, and catch up on the going's on of everyone's week just gone.  Its a beautiful tradition that I hope never dies. 

Today I am sharing my Sunday Lunch favorites, for both main and side dishes!

THE MAINS

PERFECTLY COOKED ROAST BEEF - This is more of a technique than it is a recipe. There is a lot more to cooking a roast than just banging into an oven. Whilst it is also very simple to cook, there is a proper way to do it and helps and tips that can produce the perfect roast every time. (if you follow them!) You can use this technique for any roasting cut of beef. I used to cook the Prime Ribs for the people at the Manor in this way every time. 

ROAST PORK WITH CRISPY CRACKLING -  Crispy brown on the outside, the tender meat studded with slivers of garlic, and dusted with plenty of salt and pepper, this is a real favorite Sunday Lunch around here. Served with Crispy Roast Potatoes and all the traditional veg, not to mention a tasty gravy. If you can remember, take it out of it's wrapping the night before and store open to the air in the fridge. This helps to make a nice dry and crisp crackling!

PERFECT ROAST CHICKEN - A perfectly cooked roast chicken, with moist and succulent meat and a crispy skin.  This is my favorite way to roast a chicken. It turns out moist and delicious each and every time. There are plenty of tasty drippings to make a lush gravy with as well.

SLOW ROASTED LAMB SHOULDER - This succulent  piece of meat melts in the mouth it is so tender. This is my favorite cut of lamb.  Tender deliciousness that falls apart at the touch of a fork. Delicious and simple to make.

PERFECT ROASTED BONELESS LEG OF LAMB -These instructions depend on how large your piece of meat is and servings will vary accordingly.  You will want approximately 1/2 pound of lamb per person. Mellow and deliciously tender.

APRICOT GLAZED GAMMON - Perfectly glazed . . .  nice and sticky . . .  tender, perfectly cooked meat. Tender ham with a lovely fruity glaze.  Gammon is uncooked ham.  Once it is cooked it becomes ham. Or so I am told.

THE SIDES 

YORKSHIRE PUDDING - Lets begin with everyone's favorite. Yorkshire Pudding. Crisp and light as air, these are the perfect puddings. Its my late FIL's recipe. He was an army cook so you know they are beautifully delicious!  I've been making these for over 40 years now!  There is an art to getting nice puffed and tall ones, but I share all my secrets.

CLASSIC ROAST POTATOES - Next to the Yorkshire Pudding this is one of the favorite sides in a roast dinner. Also referred to as "Roasties" these potatoes are crisp and golden brown on the outsides and fluffy inside.  Parboiled, roughed up, and roasted to the perfect crisp finish in hot goosefat, dripping or hot oil.

CREAMY MASHED POTATOES - Light and fluffy with just the right amount of butter, milk and seasoning. I like to enjoy mine with a pat of butter in the middle, but a pool of gravy is just as nice! 

HONEY MUSTARD ROASTED PARSNIPS & CARROTS - Coated in a mix of melted butter, Dijon mustard and sweet honey. These are roasted to perfection, coming out sweetly glazed, beautifully caramelized in places and perfectly crispy tender. 

PERFECTLY COOKED CABBAGE -  Cabbage really only needs about 3 to 5 minutes of cooking time, just so long as you prepare it properly in the first place. Finely shredded, lightly salted and cooked quickly in boiling water, it comes out perfect every time.   

CREAMY PARMESAN BRUSSELS SPROUTS & BACON - Sure you could just boil your sprouts, but why settle for that when you can be enjoying crispy tender brussels sprouts in a creamy garlic sauce. This lovely side dish, topped with bubbling cheese and smoky bacon will be right at home with any roasted meat!  

SAUTEED SWEDE (TURNIP/RUTABAGA) - These are quite simply delicious.   There is no other word to describe them.  Buttery.   Slightly sweet.   Oh so tasty. I could sit down to a plate of these and nothing else, but they do make the most fantastic side dish with a roast dinner . . .  pork, beef or turkey or chicken.  Take your pick.   These simple old fashioned dishes are my favorite kinds of dishes.  They just never get old.

HONEY & DILL GLAZED CARROTS & TURNIPS - These are a little bit more special than just plain boiled vegetables. Being lightly glazed with some butter and honey, then flavoured with dill . . .  these arrive at the table glistening like jewels. 

MELTING ONIONS -These will be the star of the show! These delicious onions melt in your mouth.  Four simple ingredients. One fabulous dish.

ROASTED ONIONS WITH A PARMESAN CREAM - These are delicious and so simple to make.   You can have them as a side dish, or a vegetarian main with a grain and a few other vegetables.

SAGE & ONION STUFFING - This is my favorite of all the stuffings. It is Mary Berry's recipe. You can bake it in a flat dish, ready for scooping,  or roll it into balls and bake it that way.  Why settle for a mix when the real thing is so easy to make and a hundred times more delicious!

PERFECT GRAVY FROM SCRATCH - Why use Bisto when you can make a perfectly delicious gravy from the drippings. No drippings? You don't need them. You can make this gravy easily just using simple ingredients that you probably already have in the house. 

People also really enjoy a condiment with their roast dinners.  This could be horseradish sauce, apple sauce, English mustard, bread sauce, cranberry sauce, mint sauce, etc.  What you choose will largely depend on what meat you have chosen to roast.  

It is typical to enjoy horseradish sauce with beef, apple sauce with pork, mustard with gammon, bread sauce or cranberry sauce with poultry and mint sauce with lamb. This is not a die hard rule and you can just have whatever sauce you want to enjoy with whatever meat or no sauce at all!

I could not personally eat a pudding (the British term for dessert) after a Sunday Lunch, well not right away anyways. Maybe a bit later in the day. Many do however.  I will do a pudding post at another time.

In the meantime please enjoy my take on Sunday Lunch. I hope that it will inspire you to cook up a roast dinner for your family!  They will be over the moon if you do!  

Not all of the dishes need to be recipes. Quite often I will only cook a roast and then have boiled new potatoes, peas, carrots, and mashed swede with it along with some gravy.  Those are delicious dinners too. The important thing is to enjoy it.  Together. As a family!

As Julia would say Bon Appetit!

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Before I moved over to the UK in the year 2000, I was told that I would not like the food there. For some reason British food had a very bad reputation.  I really didn't know what to expect. 

I certainly was not expecting what I found. My experience was that I found some of the most delicious and appealing foods that I had ever eaten. Like anything they could either be very well done, or very poorly done. What I discovered was heart warming, filling and most satisfying to the palate!

In the UK I had at my fingertips some of the freshest and most delicious foods available in the world. Beautiful cheeses, meats, poultry and produce. I fell in love with all of it, and was quite happy to say at the end of my experience that what I had been told was totally and utterly wrong.  

Whoever had told me that the food was awful was grossly mistaken. Even at its simplest it was really very, very good.  But I suppose that all depends on where you eat.  You actually do get what you pay for. If I had any complaint at all it would be salad. They don't really do salads very well.

For them salad is a lettuce leave with a slice of tomato and cucumber on top.  And not always fresh. I learned never to order salad in a restaurant. The British don't do salad and you were more than likely to get a really minging piece of lettuce. I even got salad with fur growing on the tomato and cucumber. Bad. Bad. Bad. 

I thought it would be fun here today to explore the dishes which are the most popular to the actual British people in 2022. There is no denying that Great Britain is becoming a nation of great diversity when it comes to culture and to food, but there are some things that never change and that is the popularity of some foods.  

This list I am sharing today comes from a survey which was done and compiled by YouGov. The dishes are listed according to the percentages of adults who liked these foods. I actually have recipes for most of these dishes that I have cooked here in my kitchen, so if you are keen to cook some of these things yourself, read on!

1. CHIPS - 84% of British adults surveyed listed Chips as their favorite food. By this we are talking about what North Americans call French Fries.  Potato Chips are called "Crisps" in the UK.  The British take their chips very seriously.  Thick, hand cut and fried til golden brown with a proper potato.  Anything less would be sacrilege.  There are local chippies (places which sell fried chips) in ever neighborhood and they are always busy.  For a great recipe  see my fish and chips recipe below!

I don't think I was ever served a frozen French Fry with the exception of some of the fast food joints.  For the most part all I was ever given was hand cut, twice fried and delicious!

2. FISH & CHIPS - 83% of British list Fish & Chips as their favorite food and no surprise here as they are one of the tastiest things goin in the UK. This delicious dish has been a popular meal with the British since the 19th century.  

Known as a street food, even small Hamlets can boast of having their own fish and chips shop and it would not be a trip to the seaside without enjoying  a feast of fish and chips, wrapped in white paper as you sit on a bench watching the waves and beating off the sea gulls. (They love fish and chips as well.)  

Chip shops are always super busy on Friday nights with people getting in their favorite Friday teatime treat!

The fish, which usually Cod, Haddock or Plaice is dipped in a delicious batter and deep fried. Chips are almost always hand cut and twice fried.  You will always be asked if you want salt and vinegar on them and they will lavish them with salt and malt vinegar if the answer is yes.   This is the ultimate finger food!  

You can find my recipe for the most delicious Beer Battered Cod and Twice Fried Chips here. 

3. ROAST CHICKEN - 82% of adults surveyed chose roast chicken.  Now this is one which really surprised me.  The British do love a Sunday Roast and are known the world over for their Roast Dinners.  

A lot of people will eat out at a Carvery on a Sunday and treat themselves to a full on roast dinner with all the trimmings. On offer will be Beef,  Ham, and Turkey, but only very rarely chicken.

Chicken however, it seems is a full on favorite amongst the British and one has to wonder if it is because chicken in the UK is much more affordable than any of the other meats?  I don't know, but you can find my delicious recipe for a Roast Chicken with a Lemon & Herb Stuffing here.  It will not disappoint! 

4. ENGLISH BREAKFAST - This comes in fourth with 81% of adults surveyed listing it as their favorite food. I can remember when I first moved over to the UK, it was a real treat to go into town to the British Home Stores on a Saturday morning and treat ourselves to a full English.  With sausage, bacon, egg, grilled tomatoes, baked beans, mushrooms and fried bread, or buttered bread. 

It is the highlight of any B&B stay all over the UK with most B&B's taking great pride in the cooked breakfasts that they serve.  Some will offer a side of blood pudding as well, although it is a taste I never acquired. I do love a full English however, or fry up as it is also lovingly referred to.  You can find my recipe for a Traditional British Fry Up here.

5. MASHED POTATOES - The British do love their potatoes and Mash is one of their favorites, second only to chips.  They even have potatoes that are grown specifically to be used to make Mashed Potatoes.  75% chose mashed potatoes as a favorite food which really surprised me as I would have thought that Roast Potatoes would be more popular.  Apparently I was wrong!

For mashed potatoes you will want a floury or fluffy variety such as Maris Piper or King Edward, although the Potato Council suggests the smooth Desiree for velvety mash. These are UK varieties.

In North America, I would recommend a Yukon Gold or a Russet.  You can find my recipe for Perfect Creamy Mashed Potatoes here.   Its a real winner of a recipe!

6. SOUP - 74% of adults surveyed chose soup as one of their favorites.  There is no denying that a hot bowl of soup is indeed very satisfying on a cold and damp day, and since it does rain a lot in the UK, then I guess that soup being a favorite is really no surprise!

In the grocery stores you will see very extensive soup aisles containing tins of every variety of soup that you can imagine.  There are also loads of fresh soups available in the Chiller aisles.  

The British do love their soups and there is nothing more British than Pea Soup, or what is also lovingly referred to as The London Particular. You can find that delicious recipe here.  

7. BANGERS & MASH - 74% chose Bangers and Mash.  I am not surprised here. Nobody does sausage like the British and they are the perfect choice to serve with all of that lovely fluffy mash that they also enjoy.

Usually it will be served with an onion gravy, or Bisto.  The grocery aisle has a special section filled with gravy powders.  The British do love their gravy.  They pour it over almost everything and they especially love Bisto.  

Most do not make a gravy from scratch, preferring the convenience of powders, which actually surprises me because gravy is really quite easy to make. You will even see the powders being used in restaurants.  In any case if you are looking for a really great Bangers and Mash recipe why not try my Sage Roasted Bangers with Mash & Onion Gravy!  

8. ROAST BEEF -  I was really surprised that Roast Beef came this far down the list actually tying with Bangers and mash at 74%.  The British are known throughout the world for their Roast Beef. In fact the guards at the Tower of London are called Beef Eaters!

Roast Beef will usually be served with all of the trimmings. Perfect Roasted Potatoes, and tall and fluffy, crisp Yorkshire Puddings, or batter puddings as they are also called.

There will also be gravy and an assortment of cooked vegetables on the side and any number of condiments such as Horseradish Sauce, hot English Mustard or Apple Sauce.  Popular vegetables are cabbage, brussels sprouts, carrots, swede (rutabaga) and peas! 

You can find my recipe for Perfectly Cooked Roast Beef here.  I guarantee roast beef perfection each and every time. 

9.  BEANS ON TOAST - 73% of those surveyed declared their favorite meal to be Beans on Toast. No surprise there.  The British love their toast and have perfected the art of making toast, and they love, LOVE serving things on toast.  You will see anything from canned tomatoes or canned mushrooms to sardines served on toast!

I was not at all surprised to see that Beans on Toast made the top ten actually.  It is one of the most comforting dishes around and incredibly economical as well.

When you can't think of anything else to have a tin of beans (must be Heinz) spooned over some toast is amazingly satisfying.  You can fine my kicked up version of Beans on Toast here.

10. RIB EYE STEAK - This was the favorite meal choice for 70% of those surveyed.  No surprise there actually.  I would have thought curry would pip it but the beef in the UK is some of the best in the world. I never had a bad steak there.  Every steak I ever had was beautifully tender and delicious.

Mind you that had a lot to do with how it was cooked and most of the time it was myself who was doing the cooking, not to brag or anything. I do cook steaks brilliantly.

If you would like to cook a really tasty rib eye steak, check our my recipe for Steakhouse Steak and Chips here. Perfectly grilled and served with a delicious parsley chimichurri sauce! 

So that was the top ten.  I have to say I was really surprised at what made the top ten. I would have thought that you would have found a Kebab or a good curry in that list, but alas they were much further down the list.   Egg and chips is also very popular but not in the top ten I am afraid!

Have you ever travelled in the UK?  If so, what was your favorite dish that you had while you were there?  What was your worst?? 

If you are from the  UK, what is it that you really miss from your homeland??

I really want to know! Lets share!!