indian food vs. italian food

it doesn't suck now -- after four of five decades of foodie agitation (and haha indian and chinese takeaways) -- and there've always been good pockets, but it was hit REALLY hard by the industrial revolution basically, and everyone flooding to the cities; and plus the fine eating establishments after the french revolution were basically all run by french ex-pats who'd been chefs for the aristos who had their heads chopped off

during empire, "takeout" meant we sent a gunship out to eg india and took their cuisine (curry, kedgeree and so on)

fine eating establishments^^^ie in england (well, london)

i suppose my point is that theres nothing inherent in british-and-or-english cuisine that would make it suck, so long as its prepared well. but i believe that it spent a century sucking because of bad chefs/bad reputations/margaret thatcher

I am late to this but I just read this upthread:

I just want to remind everyone that if you agree with Aerosmith on this thread you are agreeing with a guy who thinks now and laters are the pinnacle of human culinary achievement, standing above only bit O honey

I mean, how can Now and Laters be the pinnacle of human culinary achievement if everything but Bit O Honey is better than them?

1. Now and Laters
2. Bit O Honey
3. Saag Paneer
4. Garlic Naan
5. Chick O Stick

every ethnic cuisine in the world has copped to the fact that spices and pickling and fermenting are good things and make food flavorful and tasty and great

but british food, british food

currently lobbying to have the above ranking replace the US Constitution in toto

Bill of Blights

read a british cookery book in the 1930s and it's all nervously trying to be "french" -- escoffier's fault mainly! (tho he was good at this style)

the turnabout came after ww2, when english writers like elizabeth david started looking at european peasant cookery as the source of quality, instead of high-falutin fancy cuinse that few could pull off -- rationing during the war and after was the end of the low (and its nadir, probably), and it began a long slow trudge of a climb back to interest in cheap(ish) quality

thatcher is not actually the villain here, for once (she's not the hero either, just irrelevant: brit neo-foodiness coincided with her...)

xp spices and pickling and fermenting <-- dude, chutney! pickled onions, walnuts, everyone in the uk makes/buys a fvckton of this!

oh i was just guessing that it was maggies fault, everything else seems to be

pickled eggs!

i am not helping myself here i suspect

wow chutney was a british invention??

cheese, beer, whisky, cider are all fermented

even bread! bread is fermented

and speaking of cheese, it rules, and you cant find any of it in china, so lets call it even

not enough cheese in indian food either tbh

no, stolen from india (this was part of the problem, militarised access to all the world's foods) but pickling and fermenting stuff generally is a long-standing rural DIY activity

aero it is vital that we get yr opinion on Lik-A-Maid

(ps: INDIAN FOOD 4 LYFE)

stilton is english, right? thank you england!

glad to see all of you are agreeing to go on the cheese and whisky diet, sounds great

http://upload.wikimedia.org/wikipedia/en/3/30/The_Tale_of_Ginger_and_Pickles_first_edition_cover.jpg

british cheeses are fantastic

also as a happy paneer addict I really don't understand criticizing Indian food for its lack of cheese

paneer is great, but there aren't a bunch of different varieties of indian cheese, is all i meant.

afaik anyway

I guess I'm just trying to understand why british food sucked for so long when france and italy were innovating up a storm during the same time period

really I'm just mad that america inherited the uk's shitty food legacy

we didn't need to innovate! during the upheaval of the industrial revolution, we could just help ourselves to an empire's-worth of excellence, plus many chefs fleeing from turbulent france/italy etc ended up in the uk also!

From wikipedia:
Dates of introduction of various foodstuffs and methods to Britain

1492 to 1914:
turkey: 1524[22]
cayenne pepper,[23]
parsley:[24] 1548
refined sugar: 1540s[19]
lemon: 1577 (first recorded cultivation)[25]
peach (cultivated): 16th century[25]
potato: 1586
horseradish:[26] 16th century
tea: 1610 or later[27]
banana (from Bermuda):[28] 1633
coffee: 1650[29]
chocolate: 1650s
ice cream: first recorded serving in 1672.[30]
broccoli: before 1724[31]
tomato (as food):[32] 1750s
sandwich: named in 18th century
curry: first appearance on a menu 1773; first Indian restaurant 1809[33]
rhubarb (as food): early 19th century[34]
three-course meal: about 1850 (developed from service à la Russe)[13]
fish and chips: 1858 or 1863[19]
Marmite: 1902[35]

Marmite: 1902[35]

I rest my case.

british cheeses do own

My Indian grandfather trying Marmite for the first time is literally the funniest thing i've ever seen in my life.

tomato (as food) made me lol, too: as opposed to what?

tomato (as food):[32] 1750s

was there some industrial use for tomatos?

xposts

tomato (as blood sausage)

people thought tomatoes were poisonous for ages iirc

tomato plants were used as garden plants I think?

number none OTM

those poor fools

tomatoes are a new world crop, along with the potato

always amazed me that italians have been working with tomatoes for only a few hudnred years

This thread has reminded me how much i hate when 'marinara sauce' is used by 'merkins to mean 'napoli sauce'. Anyway, this could boil down to How much time does everyone like spending in the toilet per day.

4 hours a day for me

was wondering where ur display name came from

lol

put a lot of work into it

"In certain areas of Italy, such as Florence, however, the fruit was used solely as a tabletop decoration* before it was incorporated into the local cuisine in the late 17th or early 18th century."

*ie by the Borgias

I like that they called it a day after marmite

This thread has reminded me how much i hate when 'marinara sauce' is used by 'merkins to mean 'napoli sauce'.

now we're gettin down to some kick-ass food pedantry

btw DJP Lik-M-Aid the powder ranks beneath the amazing Mexican sour sugar-and-chile powder "Brinquitos," but Lik-M-Aid sticks are generally considered an outstanding food