‘I think what’s going on with gorillas is pretty bad.
The fact is that you can buy gorilla meat in London any day you want it.’
(Adam Ant)
Dishes Invented in London
Scotch Eggs
The word ‘tartan’ is English and comes from the French ‘tire-tain’; kilts were originally Norse, not Gaelic, and Anatolian Hittites were playing tunes on bagpipes as long ago as 1000 BC. Perhaps it’s no surprise then that the Scotch egg isn’t Scottish either. The first was invented in 1738 by staff at Fortnum and Mason in Piccadilly, and inspired by a traditional Mughal dish of boiled eggs stuffed inside a shell of ground lamb mixed with several spices called ‘nargisi kofta’. (The store was also the first to sell baked beans, incidentally, having bought H. J. Heinz’s entire stock in 1866.)
Tinned Food
The means of preserving food in this way dates back to 1810 when a Hoxton merchant called Peter Durand patented a sealed metal canister after demonstrating that food could be safely sealed inside it for long periods. Unfortunately, his canisters had to be opened using a hammer – the invention of the can-opener was still more than fifty years away – and, in 1812, Durand sold his rights in the invention for £1,000.
Omelette Arnold Bennett
The popular early twentieth-century writer was a frequent guest at the Savoy, and on his behalf the kitchens created a rich egg dish of Parmesan cheese, smoked haddock and cream. While the name of the chef responsible has been lost – the celebrated Escoffier had been dismissed back in 1898, accused of conspiring with César Ritz to steal thousands of pounds’ worth of wine – the omelette has remained on the menu ever since.
Chicken Tikka Masala
A perennially popular takeaway dish but one that, in the words of the Daily Telegraph, ‘does not exist in Indian cuisine’. Chicken tikka masala is thought now to account for around 15 per cent of all the curries consumed in Britain, and while its inventor cannot be positively identified, the food writer Charles Campion has traced its origins to London in the 1970s. It was, he says, created ‘so that the ignorant could have gravy with their chicken tikka’.
Wedding Cake
The tradition of having a tiered cake to celebrate a couple’s nuptials is thought to have been inspired by the distinctive, stepped spire of St Bride’s, Fleet Street. At 226 ft, it is the second-tallest Wren church in London – only St Paul’s reaches higher.
It is a coincidence that female participants are known as ‘brides’, which is a word with German origins and nothing whatsoever to do with the diminutive of the Irish St Bridget.
Fish and Chips
Various rival claims have been made about who invented this most traditional of English meals but, in 1968, the National Federation of Fish Friers recognised that of Joseph Malin. Living in Cleveland Way, Whitechapel, in 1860, the Jewish émigré was the first to combine the staple of fried fish – brought into this country by Jewish refugees from seventeenth-century Spain and Portugal – with the newly fashionable chipped potato.
Twiglets
By 1929, Peek, Frean and Co. of Clements Road, Bermondsey, was one of the country’s most successful biscuit-makers. Keen to expand after more than seventy years in the business, the company charged its French technical manager, Rondalin Zwadoodie, with the responsibility of coming up with an entirely new line. Zwadoodie experimented with the firm’s Vitawheat dough and some yeast extract and, by Christmas that year, the savoury snack was perfected and on sale.
EXTRAORDINARY PLACES TO EAT
1820
When a new cross and ball were installed above the dome of St Paul’s, the architect C. R. Cockerell celebrated by hosting a small luncheon inside the ball.
1827
Hoping to prove his new Thames Tunnel was safe, Marc Brunel held a banquet for forty VIPs beneath the Thames with music provided by the Coldstream Guards. It wasn’t, however, and the tunnel flooded shortly afterwards.
1843
Before Nelson was finally hoisted into place, fourteen stonemasons sat down to a draughty, vertigo-inducing supper on top of the world’s tallest Corinthian column.
1853
The pioneering palaeontologist who first coined the term ‘dinosaur’, Professor Richard Owen was among the guests at a New Year’s Eve dinner held inside a life-size cement model of an iguanadon, which now stands in Crystal Palace Park.
1912
The sculpture of four horses and a chariot on top of the Wellington Arch at Hyde Park Corner is the work of Adrian Jones. On completing the monumental bronze – called Quadriga – he entertained seven guests to dinner inside it.
2009
Rootmaster, a so-called ‘bustaurant’, was a Brick Lane-based vegan eatery. It was housed on the top deck of a traditional red London bus, but has sadly closed.
2010
Located on Clerkenwell Green, the aptly named Dans le Noir invites diners to eat in pitch blackness, the room sealed off from all sources of light in order that the taste and texture of the food can be appreciated to the full.
Eating by Numbers
Each year at Wimbledon’s All England Tennis Club, spectators, players and officials consume more than 60,000 lb of strawberries over the course of a fortnight, together with 1,850 gallons of cream and 17,000 bottles of Champagne.
At a typical Buckingham Palace garden party, 400 staff are involved in serving approximately 27,000 cups of tea, 20,000 sandwiches and 20,000 slices of cake.
The capital’s largest-ever sporting event, the XXX Olympiad – a.k.a. London 2012 – posed even greater challenges and, during the course of the Games, deliveries to the athletes’ village included 25,000 loaves of bread, 232 tons of potatoes and 82 tons of seafood, more than 100 tons of meat, 19 tons of eggs and 21 tons of cheese. Fruit and veg accounted for another 360 tons of deliveries.
Wembley Stadium has a total of 34 bars, 8 restaurants, 98 different kitchens and 688 food and drink service points. On match days, approximately 40,000 pints of beer can be served at half-time, while soft drinks can be dispensed by machine at a rate of nearly 3,000 a minute.
London’s most expensive takeaway meal is thought to be an order of sushi from Ubon in Canary Wharf that was chauffeur-driven to Luton airport and flown out to the Azerbaijani capital Baku on one of Roman Abramovich’s private jets. The cost of this has been estimated at £40,000.
In 1925, the world’s largest banquet was held at Olympia in west London. According to a Pathé newsreel at the time, some 1,300 waitresses served 8,000 Freemasons seated at more than five miles of trestle tables arranged around the main exhibition hall.
Mayfair’s Le Gavroche found its way into the Guinness Book of World Records in 1997 when three guests racked up a bill of £13,000. This dwarfed the experience of the diner who did a runner from the Connaught when his bill came to £986, but is in turn modest by the standards of One for One Park Lane where a single bottle of Armand de Brignac Champagne – admittedly quite a large one – could set you back £80,000.
Written by David Long in "Bizarre London", Constable, London, 2013. Digitized, adapted and illustrated to be posted by Leopoldo Costa.