Great British Cooking: A Well-Kept Secret

by Jane Garmey

This book is a revelation to Americans who have never tasted real Cornish Pasties, Scotch Woodcock (a splendid version of scrambled eggs) or Brown Bread Ice Cream. From the sumptuous breakfasts that made England famous to the steamed puddings, trifles, meringues and syllabubs that are still renowned, no aspect of British cooking is overlooked. Soups, fish, meat and game, vegetables, sauces, high teas, scones, crumpets, hot cross buns, savories, preserves and sweets of all kinds are here in clear, precise recipes with ingredients and utensils translated into American terms.

Genres: Cookbooks, Cooking, Nonfiction, Food and Drink, Culinary, Food, British Literature

320 pages, Paperback

First published January 1, 1981

Reviews

[Manybooks · Rating 3 out of 5]

So yes, I do very much appreciate the oh so very many bits and pieces of interesting and enlightening nuggets and gems of British food history interspersed throughout Great British Cooking: A Well-Kept Secret (not only in the introduction but also in the lead-ins for each of the thirteen main chapters) and am also finding the list of featured recipes both personally appealing and delightfully diverse, including ALL of my favourite British dishes, and I am of course and indeed just totally thrilled at how jubilantly Jane Garmey does celebrate British food, how she very convincingly demonstrates that British cuisine does not at all deserve its problematic and often almost nasty reputation for tastelessness and mediocrity (and happily that Garmey has also used American/Canadian measurements in her recipes and has equally and appreciatively generally avoided the use of lard in Great British Cooking: A Well-Kept Secret replacing it instead with other fats such as olive oil, butter).

But while the general set-up (how the sections themselves are organised, how Jane Garmey has presented her cooking, her food preparation instructions) of Great British Cooking: A Well-Kept Secret is pretty decently user-friendly, I still have one huge and major issue which prevents me from both ranking Great British Cooking: A Well-Kept Secret with more than three stars and to also recommend it especially to and for novice cooks without caveats and reservations. For the lack of ANY accompanying photographs (or even illustrations) as to what the end products of the featured recipes should look like, this really is a huge and majorly annoying shortcoming for Great British Cooking: A Well-Kept Secret and is also a total personal pet peeve with regard to all cookbooks (as in my opinion, cookbooks should ALWAYS include photographs of the recipes, of the end products and really, for me, any book collection of recipes lacking accompanying photographs, not including pictures is really rather woefully and majorly incomplete).

[Julie · Rating 4 out of 5]

I really appreciate that this British cookbook includes American measurements. It's really nice to be able to make my British comfort foods without first having the pain of converting the measurements from ounces to American cup measurements. I have long forgotten how to cook by first weighing all the ingredients on a scale!

[Adriano Pereira · Rating 3 out of 5]

Interessante. Precisa-se tentar algumas das receitas para uma melhor opinião. Queria que minha edição (1981) trouxesse fotos. Há pratos que não imagino como sejam.

[Honest Mabel · Rating 4 out of 5]

if you want the basics collected in one book

It’s good if you get it discounted or used. This is a classic covers the basics of traditional British cooking. Each dish is iconically British. But it wasn’t anything one can’t find easily it is just nice to be collected in one source. Lost a star because no pics

[Rebecca Huston · Rating 4 out of 5]

I know, it sounds like an oxymoron. Actually English food can be very good, as I found out when reading this book. I managed to learn how to handle savoury pies and the fillings to go in them, and how to make Maid-of-honor tarts, along with other goodies.

For the complete review, please go here:
http://www.epinions.com/review/Great_...

[Amy · Rating 4 out of 5]

This had a lot of background on British cooking which was fun to read also.

[William Schram · Rating 4 out of 5]

I am not a chef. I can follow a recipe, but I don't have the skill necessary to prepare many dishes. Most cooking I've heard of is from locales like France, Italy, China, Japan, and India. One place not discussed is Great Britain. All I know about Great Britain and its cuisine is the fanciful names for regular foods and Gordon Ramsey.

You may ask why I chose to take out a cookbook, then. Well, I do need to improve myself, and cooking is a skill I want to polish. Furthermore, the title is intriguing. I know that British cuisine is often the brunt of jokes and japes, so I thought it would be nice to see things from a different perspective.

There are some aspects of the book that bother me, but it's not a serious issue. One example is how foods are named in Britain and the United States. Cookies in the USA are called Biscuits in Britain. Chips in the United States are called Crisps in Britain. When I need to translate the terms into the American language, it takes a second to understand what they want me to do.

The names are fanciful to me; that is another fact I cannot get around. Spotted Dick, Jam Roly-Poly, Bubble and Squeak, Singing Hinnies, and Kippers, all names of foods. All of the recipes use the Cup as a measurement. For those sensible people who use the metric system, a Cup is approximately 236.588ml.

I enjoyed the book. Thanks for reading my review, and see you next time.

[Amy]

I can't truly review this until I make some of the recipes, but it has been fun to read. Not all of her history is accurate (she blames "nannies" for why vegetables were overcooked, which is pretty silly considering only a small percentage of the population could afford to have a nanny) but the parts that are based on actual documents are quite fun. I enjoy reading about recipes that I have only seen mentioned in history books or historical literature. As a vegetarian, there are a couple veggie dishes and about a dozen desserts/tea items that I hope to try.

[Mrs. Dunwell · Rating 3 out of 5]

This is a very extensive cookbook; it's very lengthy with some really good historical information. The recipes for me, are lacking. If you don't like fish, you may not be interested. It's very meat heavy (including lamb and kidneys), which doesn't appeal to me. I also wish there were pictures.

[Corban Ford · Rating 4 out of 5]

This was a solid cookbook that thoroughly described British cooking, but also a bit of the history that plays a big part of their cuisine. I enjoyed flipping through certain sections, heavily reading others, and having an altogether insightful learning experience.