The great British menu is another TV cookery programme featuring professional chefs; each night over a week they prepare and are marked for one course of a themed meal and on the last night, one of them having been eliminated, the two remaining chefs present their four courses to a panel. Each group of chefs comes from a different region of the British Isles and is expected to have some regional slant on their menus. This year, the chefs who make it all the way through to win will cook a meal for veterans from the D-Day landings which took place in 1944 during the second world war. The meal has to have a connection to what the British forces did and should be a tribute to them in some way, reflecting something from the cookery of the time. The cookery of the time for the forces meant rations… my dad who served throughout the war ended up hating corned beef because that is what they mostly received. Another aspect of British wartime cooking is the rationing at home, where many foods were impossible to obtain or in very short supply. Substitutes had to be found for even the most common ingredients.
It is a very tricky thing to pull off; the contestants have to give a title to each of their meals which has some relevance or tell some story, ‘Digging For Victory’, a war-time slogan was the title of one course, for example… the only problem was the chef who cooked it had lots of lovely root vegetables and then a mackerel… can you dig a mackerel? He hadn’t quite thought it through!
A lot of the cooking is very, very technical and no amateur or home cook could attempt it, but I think if I were planning a menu I would think about what the families at home might be cooking at the time of the landings which was June 6th. Maybe those families might find some mushrooms so I would plan a starter using mushrooms and herbs; for a fish course I would imagine a family finding shell-fish and edible seaweed. A main course in those days would be more difficult but people were encouraged to keep pigs; half the meat went into the system, but the other half could be kept by the family. June is an early time for picking fruit, but there maybe some berries which are ripe and there are plenty of edible flowers which could be used to make a dessert. So although I would use readily available ingredients and ingredients which during the war would have been rationed, I think I would theme it by using foraged and home-grown treasures! What would I call it… I’m not sure, some play on a phrase like ‘Home thoughts from abroad’… maybe ‘Home thoughts of those abroad,a s many families would be thinking of their loved ones serving their country.
Lois Elsden 
Enjoyed reading about this and the information on the show, and the whole menu idea. Just wanted to ask why is there a picture of herbs to start with? Is that all used part of british cooking? Just curious on some information 🙂
LikeLike
We love to use herbs in cooking, and these are some I gathered from our garden last year. I couldn’t find another picture to match what I had written!
LikeLike
ok.
Its good to know you are growing fresh herbs. My girlfriend used to grow corriander and cilantro in our little garden. Fresh tastes awesome. 🙂
LikeLike
Fresh tastes best!
LikeLike
Jeepers! knew that the IMF and banks had screwed the UK but reducing the population to a diet of herbs is scary!
LikeLike
Since you mentioned mushrooms I remember years ago waking up to find a fairy ring of them had grown up literally overnight on my lawn. I hadn’t seen that type before so I decided against eating them until my cat came over and started chewing on them. The cat was just fine the next day so I used them in a salad and fried them with a steak. Maybe you should try hunting down fairy rings of mushrooms and give the lichens a break. You may even see the Fairies dancing among them. Good luck.
LikeLike
I will look out for fairies, David! My mum used to pick mushrooms as a girl, and as an adult she often dreamt of doing it again, of finding a field full of the most delicious looking mushrooms and gathering them in her skirt, as many as she could, but always more growing wherever she looked! many
LikeLike
If you walk into a Fairy Ring wear you’re hat on backwards to fool the Little People into thinking that you’re leaving,but leave a gift for them.
LikeLike
I don’t have a hat… would putting my jacket on backwards work do you think?
LikeLike
Not sure! Wouldn’t risk it though.
LikeLike
Maybe I should buy a hat, just to be prepared?
LikeLike