Famished, Angus finally orders room service at midnight. The street outside the hotel by this time as quiet as London can be.
Whoever knew wastepaper bins could be works of art ? :https://www.svenskttenn.com/se/en/range/accessories/office-accessories/wastebin-fornasetti/107729/
The Bostonians think this menu is the epitome of 'British' fine dining : https://rubenshotel.com/media/gxlpp0fq/teg-dinner-the-queen-s-platinum-jubilee.pdf Coronation Chicken is on the menu. This is something that Angus ( and his brothers ) were reared on. It was considered the height of modern living on an island where olive oil was dispense by the chemist as an aid to clearing ear wax. Olive oils use for cooking viewed with suspicion. Did Coronation chicken make it outside the UK ? I'm betting it appears even today in rural New Zealand or Australia.
11 comments:
I'm guessing that Angus's childhood Coronation chicken didn't contain quite the same ingredients as the one on this menu. Scottish tablet, the contribution from North of the Border, is a culinary delight that might surprise the uninitiated!
Cheers, Gail.
I am glad to say that Coronation chicken did not make to the kitchens of rural New Zealand, Chicken was very expensive in the the 1960's and 70's. However, I can remember olive oil for sale at the chemist and having to have a doctor's prescription to be able to buy margarine. In a country that produces so much dairy products, anyone wanting to buy artificial butter was treated with suspicion.
Gail - What Londoners will make of tablet is intriguing. It may well reinforce their view that there is nowhere on earth as 'foreign' as Scotland.
LH - I never knew about margarine in NZ . The 60's and 70's really were another world.
Anything by Svenskt Tenn is a work of art. Yes, the tiny bottle of olive oil from the chemist! And it was the "chemist", not the "pharmacy". I annoy my young adult children intensely by correcting them every time they utter the Americanism "pharmacy". And "driving licence", rather than "driver's license"...
My mother and her family were "displaced people" who came to New Zealand after World War 2. I grew up having "Lupi Olive Oil" (bought from the chemist in big green tins) on salads and used for cooking from the 1960s. My brother's best friend trained to be a chef here in the early 80s and thought it was something bought from the chemist to cure dandruff, so couldn't understand why our mum was feeding it to him! Times have changed, there are now many boutique EVOs here and others imported with different flavours, I even have a few olive trees, but I still always keep a bottle of Lupi EVO in my pantry to enjoy old recipes.
Interesting regarding "Life of Reily" comments about olive oil. My Italian mother in law came to Wanganui, New Zealand in 1947 and as you can imagine any of the foods from home were not available here. My husband remembers the Italian miners who were brought out in NZ in the late 1960's to work on major civil engineering works in the central North Island.
https://teara.govt.nz/en/photograph/15181/italian-tunnellers-tongariro
For some reason the miners ended up injured in Wanganui hospital the MIL was commandeered as an interpreter. The miners imported all their own food and husband remembers eating Italian cheeses, hams etc. All very new to the NZ palate. My MIL hated pasta and would never serve it to my husband when he was growing up. It is now that we realise that she was intolerant to wheat. Not something that was recognised in Italy when she was growing up in the 1920/30's
So glad the errant member is back in Sophie's fold. Splendid photo of low sun over the Isle of Wight, though if the flight was late you wouldn't have appreciated the view!
When I cleared out the kitchen in my mother's house, after she died, in the "medicinal" cupboard, I found two of those small bottles of olive oil! One contained dried dregs in the bottom, and the other was unopened. They had been there for years and must have dated back to the early 50's. Once we started taking touring holidays abroad, my mother always brought a couple of bottles of Italian olive oil back with her, though I've no idea what she used it for! Far too exotic for my mother's style of cooking.
Coronation chicken was a complete mystery to my Kiwi Humum when she arrived in UK from rural NZ - so suspect it never arrived, let along survived there. (good thing too she thinks).
I remember my first taste of coronation chicken at the Hilton Hotel in Sydney about 40 years ago. By coincidence, I made it for our lunch here in France yesterday. It is a summer favourite in our family.
Coronation chicken (a decidedly non-american sounding dish) has not made it to Southern California. Olive ol, on the other hand, abounds!
I have kept a recipe for Coronation chicken that was in People magazine years ago. Haven’t made it yet. As for olive oil, I remember Napoleon olive oil was only brand sold at grocers, in small bottles with great graphics. Some restaurants bought it in big oil can size tin containers. Mom used vegetable oil mostly and olive oil was considered fancy, even though it was not EVOO.
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