Stuff looks ghastly. They’re trying to persuade these chaps that British cuisine is not so bad after all.
Reminds me of the video Youtube chef Joshua Weissman did a few months back comparing the best sandwiches around the world.
Culinary terrorism is a thing
I think some of this stuff, is food on a dare, maybe some of this is good,
Re Mary Beard, a sort of social historian of Rome, referenced in a previous thread, well she got on my bad side in a screed she wrote as the fires were still burning on the towers, but the notion there would be North African in 1st Century Britain was patently ridiculous,
The default setting should be to avoid mixing meat, starch, vegetation, and dairy. Separate on your plate. Butter on vegetables or potatoes would be an exception. Bleu cheese and bacon bits on salad would be an exception. Mac and cheese would be an exception. Sandwiches would be an exception. Stews would be an exception. Please note that mac-and-cheese is the only exception you might bake.
==
Another rule would be to be sparing with anything sweet. Ice cream, cookies, pastries, pie, egg nog. Occasionals, not regular things.
==
Another rule would be to be cautious about sauces and gravies and avoid them on vegetables.
==
Another rule would be to be vary sparing with garlic and onions.
These people paid for a plane ticket from across the pond. Feeding them meatloaf is a crime. Feeding anyone meatloaf is an act of aggression. Ditto tuna fish.
Hey, I happen to really like meatloaf, provided it’s prepared to my liking.
That tuna casserole looks like a war crime though.
@miguel cervantes:the notion there would be North African in 1st Century Britain was patently ridiculous,
One or two there at various times isn’t ridiculous. Pretending that, because one or two showed up there at various times, the Roman Empire and specifically Roman Britain were “ethnically diverse” in the modern sense, is simply lying.
But there’s probably no time in the written history of the British Isles when no black people whatever weren’t there somewhere. A few people get around. The first Chinese known to have been in Britain was there in 1685. The first Chinese person to live there permanently came in 1779. But it would be wrong to make a documentary of 17th or 18th century Britain and focus it on a Chinese family as though they were typical or common.
@Art Deco:These people paid for a plane ticket from across the pond. Feeding them meatloaf is a crime.
Well, this clickbait stuff is how those Brits make their money, so they probably were delighted. They paid a lot for the production and marketing of their video, because they expect a positive return…
We’re Josh and Ollie, and we’re very Jolly 😀
On this channel you’ll find two best friends who get to travel the world together trying new food and introducing that food to friends back at home.
I often wonder how far afield some individuals or small groups of intrepid travelers from far flung lands would end up in the ancient world. For example, it wouldn’t be surprising to me if some individual pirate, slave, or wayword trader/merchant who was born in say, China ended up traveling to the British isles far earlier than the 17th century. Perhaps some poor sod was taken prisoner and enthralled in a viking raid somewhere in Eurasia or North Africa who was in the midst of some other errand that took him far across the silk road or something. Who can say? Lot’s of stuff happened and very little of it was necessarily ever written down.
But there’s probably no time in the written history of the British Isles when no black people whatever weren’t there somewhere.
Sorry, but I think you’re dead wrong about that.
The video is fabulous.
I was surprised that the “chef” hadn’t ever tried the tater-tot casserole. I grew up with much of that style of food. Especially during pot-luck affairs.
With my parent’s generation, there was a great deal of physical labor involved in maintaining a small soup-to-nuts farming operation. Feeding, tending, milking live stock and various crop tasks including a large garden. My mother’s family farm had an apple orchard. The point being is that people had a huge calorie intake because they burned it during the day. Nowadays, there is almost no muscular labor involved and exceedingly few farms are soup-to-nuts operations. Half or most Midwesterners are obese. Oops. Though no one in my family.
@Nonapod:I often wonder how far afield some individuals or small groups of intrepid travelers from far flung lands would end up in the ancient world.
Either Marcus Aurelius or his predecessor Antoninus Pius sent a Roman ambassador to China in 166. The Byzantine Empire (called in China “Fulin”) is first known to have sent one in 684.
In the year 97 China sent an ambassador to the Roman Empire (called in China “Daqin”), who was unable to reach it.
Very few people traveled the entire Silk Road but it did happen.
@IrishOtter49:Sorry, but I think you’re dead wrong about that.
Not even one? Good luck showing that. The Emperor Septimius Severus–who was himself born in Africa–met a black soldier at Hadrian’s Wall in the year 210. The skeleton of one living in England in the Middle Ages sometime between 800 and 1100 was dug up in 2013. From the reign of Henry VIII onward you’re going to find them there in every time period.
I’m not saying they were common, on the contrary, that they were extremely rare.
“Not even one …”
What is the air speed velocity of a flock of African Swallows? “Prove” me wrong!
It wasn’t just coconuts that were migratory. (sarc)
Vanishingly rare. Exceptions that prove the rule.
Well, the two Brits seemed to really enjoy the food and that is what matters.
@IrishOtter49:Vanishingly rare.
I never said anything different; and I said more than once exactly what I meant. But at least we now understand that we’re in agreement.
@JohnTyler:Well, the two Brits seemed to really enjoy the food and that is what matters.
Yes, because they get paid to appear to enjoy the food…
Well, the two Brits seemed to really enjoy the food and that is what matters.
==
They’re Brits. They don’t enjoy anything non-alcoholic. The only permissible emotional expression (when you’re not plastered) is peevishness.
The Carthaginian conquest of Spain began in the 3 rd Century BC. While the ruling class of Carthaginians were likely Phoenicians – and thus likely related distantly to the Greeks- they had North African troops in their armies. Hannibal certainly did when he invaded Italy. It’s not hard to imagine some trade eventually reaching the British Isles in that time period, including in persons.
I like most meatloaf. Depends on the recipe, but it can be very tasty. We used to have it a lot at our house when I was growing up – not in the Midwest – and I always looked forward to it.
And my guess is that those two British YouTubers like to eat food. New types of food in particular. That doesn’t mean they enjoy every bite, but they chose this gig as YouTubers.
@Jon Baker:they had North African troops in their armies
“North African”, sure but that’s not the same as “black”. St Augustine of Hippo was North African. I already mentioned the Emperor Septimius Severus, born in North Africa but not a black African (though he personally visited Britain and met a black African there). North Africa was one of the wealthiest parts of the Roman Empire, and lots of people traveled back and forth.
During the Roman Empire I imagine North Africans could be seen anywhere and everywhere, but black Africans would be, as IrishOtter49 put it, “vanishingly rare”, though not non-existent.
There are people who try to conflate “black” with “African” to make false claims about ancient “diversity”. Some include respectably credentialed historians, unfortunately.
I grew up on those foods too—and many more like them. I’d still eat any of them now if offered the opportunity, even the many-varied goulash (which had no relation to the Hungarian original). I grew up among Minnesota farmers and rural townsfolk. These days, I live in the city, and the closest we come to those dishes now is lasagna, baked mac-n-cheese and an occasional meatloaf. I really miss those chocolate-covered peanut butter Rice Krispie bars!
Yeah, for Youtubers everything is about creating content that is entertaining and engaging to please the ever mercurial Youtube Algorithm. It’s my understanding that The Algorithm is often a cruel and capricious god, punishing those it finds wanting by lowering their channels in users recommend videos index. But The Algorithm can also giveth in inexplicable ways, boosting some seemingly random video from obscurity on a whim. ‘Tis not for mere mortals to comprehend its ways. It must only be known that it demands engaging “content” in vast and endless streams.
I grew up in Iowa, the most midwestern state, but I’ve never had any of those dishes. Never even heard of them. I have to admit that they all sound good to me. Maybe it’s a kind of perversion common to midwestern people.
@Nonapod:The Algorithm can also giveth in inexplicable ways
Not so inexplicable, perhaps; the algorithm tends to reward Young People Ostentatiously Liking Stuff That Old People Like.
I was recalling a video which involved a European gourmet visiting a Waffle House and entering into the Waffle House spirit.
Couldn’t find it. But fortune smiled and I discovered our Two Brits had already made the pilgrimage. Noah is their slacker native guide:
____________________________________
Noah: Enjoy this. Your life is forever gonna change.
A friend who lives near Denton TX was telling me about Buc-ee’s. I couldn’t fathom it. But the Two Brits visited and their video of the experience brought it to life for me. They’re funny guys. They also have videos of American kids trying British food.
Meat loaf can be excellent. Jacques Pepin’s recipe is quite tasty, as is the mushroom sauce to accompany.
Art Deco’s Food Rules? Well, no Shepherd’s Pie for you!
but my mother never made it, so we never had it at home. Don’t know why.
==
Maybe she was fond of you.
==
One of the more engaging scenes in The Corrections was the mother’s scheme to punish her husband for not calling her when he was on an eleven day business trip. She fed him the Dinner of Revenge, which consisted of liver and rutabagas. The collateral damage was the well-being of her children, particular her middle child, who was left at the dinner table refusing to eat it.
==
What is the point of many foodstuffs (tuna fish in particular)? Revenge.
Re: Black People and the BBC in Rome, I know that mocumentary and it seriously overstated things.
There absolutely were some Blacks within the Roman Empire; we have solid evidence of that. But we have even more evidence of how utterly rare they were, even as far South as Rome. “Aethopians” or the like were noted out in general. You DID see a very few of them even as far North as Roman Britannia, but to say they were exponentially rare would be an understatement; we are talking easily fewer than one in a thousand. Seeing one could easily be a once in a lifetime event, especially that far North. “Tuaregs” and “Berbers” and so on like those indigenous to Northern Africa were far more common and we saw some admixtures in the Roman Elite, but again still uncommon.
The number of “Black” ancient “Greeks” and “Romans” and “Ancient Britons” in that BBC series is grotesquely out of proportion, made worse by race swapping known Roman Imperators. Like, once or thrice in a given episode MIGHT be useful to help us remember they existed (even if even that ratio’d be out of all proportion), but they went well beyond that and it’s easy to smell the foul reasons why. Similar to how you just know there aren’t going to be random Whites in say Shaka Zulu’s inter African groups or in Senogku Japan or Three Kingdoms China. Even if there WERE Whites around there (and often times there were, NC talks about the Roman efforts to trade with China) they’d be notable outsiders even in comparison to the others, and while there was more room for integration in Rome than in China or the Zulu, it’s still absurd to see them race swapping known historical people.
And I say this as someone who is both a history nerd and fictional writer, so I have gotten VERY USED to finding edge cases or considering hypotheticals. What’s possible, what isn’t, and to differentiating “Yeah fun fictional story, why not?” with what’s supposed to be real.
As for times in written history in Britain where there were no Blacks around, I’d wager around the time of Julius Caesar’s campaigns and earlier, at a minimum. After that it gets increasingly muddier due to cross channel trade even before the conquests. So there were several centuries in British history (albeit mostly when the islands’ histories were being written by passing Greeks and Romans) where there were no Black people. But it ended a lot earlier than we might think, and you don’t have to believe Londinium looked like modern day London or New York City in terms of Demographics and racial phenotypes (because it very obviously didn’t) in order to know that there were a few fascinating outliers, not unlike the few Greco-Romans in China. (Perhaps significantly more than those, but really reaaally not much more.)
Art Deco’s Food Rules? Well, no Shepherd’s Pie for you!
== https://www.celtichouseva.com/
==
I would recommend the fish fry and the seafood chowder. Tried the Shepherd’s Pie. It’ll pass, but there’s better stuff on the menu.
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Glenn Reynolds coins a phrase which I think should stick. He calls the bureaucrat/non-profit/NGO complex the “parasite class.”
https://nypost.com/2025/03/12/opinion/trump-is-deworming-dc-now-keep-the-parasites-out-for-good/
Stuff looks ghastly. They’re trying to persuade these chaps that British cuisine is not so bad after all.
Reminds me of the video Youtube chef Joshua Weissman did a few months back comparing the best sandwiches around the world.
Culinary terrorism is a thing
I think some of this stuff, is food on a dare, maybe some of this is good,
Re Mary Beard, a sort of social historian of Rome, referenced in a previous thread, well she got on my bad side in a screed she wrote as the fires were still burning on the towers, but the notion there would be North African in 1st Century Britain was patently ridiculous,
The default setting should be to avoid mixing meat, starch, vegetation, and dairy. Separate on your plate. Butter on vegetables or potatoes would be an exception. Bleu cheese and bacon bits on salad would be an exception. Mac and cheese would be an exception. Sandwiches would be an exception. Stews would be an exception. Please note that mac-and-cheese is the only exception you might bake.
==
Another rule would be to be sparing with anything sweet. Ice cream, cookies, pastries, pie, egg nog. Occasionals, not regular things.
==
Another rule would be to be cautious about sauces and gravies and avoid them on vegetables.
==
Another rule would be to be vary sparing with garlic and onions.
These people paid for a plane ticket from across the pond. Feeding them meatloaf is a crime. Feeding anyone meatloaf is an act of aggression. Ditto tuna fish.
Hey, I happen to really like meatloaf, provided it’s prepared to my liking.
That tuna casserole looks like a war crime though.
@miguel cervantes:the notion there would be North African in 1st Century Britain was patently ridiculous,
One or two there at various times isn’t ridiculous. Pretending that, because one or two showed up there at various times, the Roman Empire and specifically Roman Britain were “ethnically diverse” in the modern sense, is simply lying.
But there’s probably no time in the written history of the British Isles when no black people whatever weren’t there somewhere. A few people get around. The first Chinese known to have been in Britain was there in 1685. The first Chinese person to live there permanently came in 1779. But it would be wrong to make a documentary of 17th or 18th century Britain and focus it on a Chinese family as though they were typical or common.
@Art Deco:These people paid for a plane ticket from across the pond. Feeding them meatloaf is a crime.
Well, this clickbait stuff is how those Brits make their money, so they probably were delighted. They paid a lot for the production and marketing of their video, because they expect a positive return…
I often wonder how far afield some individuals or small groups of intrepid travelers from far flung lands would end up in the ancient world. For example, it wouldn’t be surprising to me if some individual pirate, slave, or wayword trader/merchant who was born in say, China ended up traveling to the British isles far earlier than the 17th century. Perhaps some poor sod was taken prisoner and enthralled in a viking raid somewhere in Eurasia or North Africa who was in the midst of some other errand that took him far across the silk road or something. Who can say? Lot’s of stuff happened and very little of it was necessarily ever written down.
But there’s probably no time in the written history of the British Isles when no black people whatever weren’t there somewhere.
Sorry, but I think you’re dead wrong about that.
The video is fabulous.
I was surprised that the “chef” hadn’t ever tried the tater-tot casserole. I grew up with much of that style of food. Especially during pot-luck affairs.
With my parent’s generation, there was a great deal of physical labor involved in maintaining a small soup-to-nuts farming operation. Feeding, tending, milking live stock and various crop tasks including a large garden. My mother’s family farm had an apple orchard. The point being is that people had a huge calorie intake because they burned it during the day. Nowadays, there is almost no muscular labor involved and exceedingly few farms are soup-to-nuts operations. Half or most Midwesterners are obese. Oops. Though no one in my family.
@Nonapod:I often wonder how far afield some individuals or small groups of intrepid travelers from far flung lands would end up in the ancient world.
Either Marcus Aurelius or his predecessor Antoninus Pius sent a Roman ambassador to China in 166. The Byzantine Empire (called in China “Fulin”) is first known to have sent one in 684.
In the year 97 China sent an ambassador to the Roman Empire (called in China “Daqin”), who was unable to reach it.
Very few people traveled the entire Silk Road but it did happen.
There were Greek kingdoms in India which adopted Buddhism early and spread it to China. The Chinese called them “Yuan”. Consequently Buddhist art in Japan depicts Buddha guarded by Hercules and with wine grapes.
@IrishOtter49:Sorry, but I think you’re dead wrong about that.
Not even one? Good luck showing that. The Emperor Septimius Severus–who was himself born in Africa–met a black soldier at Hadrian’s Wall in the year 210. The skeleton of one living in England in the Middle Ages sometime between 800 and 1100 was dug up in 2013. From the reign of Henry VIII onward you’re going to find them there in every time period.
I’m not saying they were common, on the contrary, that they were extremely rare.
“Not even one …”
What is the air speed velocity of a flock of African Swallows? “Prove” me wrong!
It wasn’t just coconuts that were migratory. (sarc)
Vanishingly rare. Exceptions that prove the rule.
Well, the two Brits seemed to really enjoy the food and that is what matters.
@IrishOtter49:Vanishingly rare.
I never said anything different; and I said more than once exactly what I meant. But at least we now understand that we’re in agreement.
@JohnTyler:Well, the two Brits seemed to really enjoy the food and that is what matters.
Yes, because they get paid to appear to enjoy the food…
Well, the two Brits seemed to really enjoy the food and that is what matters.
==
They’re Brits. They don’t enjoy anything non-alcoholic. The only permissible emotional expression (when you’re not plastered) is peevishness.
The Carthaginian conquest of Spain began in the 3 rd Century BC. While the ruling class of Carthaginians were likely Phoenicians – and thus likely related distantly to the Greeks- they had North African troops in their armies. Hannibal certainly did when he invaded Italy. It’s not hard to imagine some trade eventually reaching the British Isles in that time period, including in persons.
I like most meatloaf. Depends on the recipe, but it can be very tasty. We used to have it a lot at our house when I was growing up – not in the Midwest – and I always looked forward to it.
And my guess is that those two British YouTubers like to eat food. New types of food in particular. That doesn’t mean they enjoy every bite, but they chose this gig as YouTubers.
@Jon Baker:they had North African troops in their armies
“North African”, sure but that’s not the same as “black”. St Augustine of Hippo was North African. I already mentioned the Emperor Septimius Severus, born in North Africa but not a black African (though he personally visited Britain and met a black African there). North Africa was one of the wealthiest parts of the Roman Empire, and lots of people traveled back and forth.
During the Roman Empire I imagine North Africans could be seen anywhere and everywhere, but black Africans would be, as IrishOtter49 put it, “vanishingly rare”, though not non-existent.
There are people who try to conflate “black” with “African” to make false claims about ancient “diversity”. Some include respectably credentialed historians, unfortunately.
I grew up on those foods too—and many more like them. I’d still eat any of them now if offered the opportunity, even the many-varied goulash (which had no relation to the Hungarian original). I grew up among Minnesota farmers and rural townsfolk. These days, I live in the city, and the closest we come to those dishes now is lasagna, baked mac-n-cheese and an occasional meatloaf. I really miss those chocolate-covered peanut butter Rice Krispie bars!
Yeah, for Youtubers everything is about creating content that is entertaining and engaging to please the ever mercurial Youtube Algorithm. It’s my understanding that The Algorithm is often a cruel and capricious god, punishing those it finds wanting by lowering their channels in users recommend videos index. But The Algorithm can also giveth in inexplicable ways, boosting some seemingly random video from obscurity on a whim. ‘Tis not for mere mortals to comprehend its ways. It must only be known that it demands engaging “content” in vast and endless streams.
I grew up in Iowa, the most midwestern state, but I’ve never had any of those dishes. Never even heard of them. I have to admit that they all sound good to me. Maybe it’s a kind of perversion common to midwestern people.
@Nonapod:The Algorithm can also giveth in inexplicable ways
Not so inexplicable, perhaps; the algorithm tends to reward Young People Ostentatiously Liking Stuff That Old People Like.
Oh, noes! What will the man on the pony do?
https://redstate.com/bonchie/2025/03/13/new-trump-just-dropped-the-hammer-on-russia-as-negotiations-loom-n2186614
And what will Europe do?
The only thing better than a good meatloaf is a meat loaf sandwich!
https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=EVV9C2Ij35s
==
But would they enjoy the Polish sherry?
I was recalling a video which involved a European gourmet visiting a Waffle House and entering into the Waffle House spirit.
Couldn’t find it. But fortune smiled and I discovered our Two Brits had already made the pilgrimage. Noah is their slacker native guide:
____________________________________
Noah: Enjoy this. Your life is forever gonna change.
–“Two Brits try Waffle House for the first time!”
https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=-VQWuZU-AIE
____________________________________
We’re talkin’ ’bout a Southern institution here.
Whoops. I forgot about the meatloaf. Of course, I’ve had that, but my mother never made it, so we never had it at home. Don’t know why.
https://www.thecollegefix.com/fire-professors-who-oppose-gender-affirming-care-harvard-faculty-chair-says/
A friend who lives near Denton TX was telling me about Buc-ee’s. I couldn’t fathom it. But the Two Brits visited and their video of the experience brought it to life for me. They’re funny guys. They also have videos of American kids trying British food.
Meat loaf can be excellent. Jacques Pepin’s recipe is quite tasty, as is the mushroom sauce to accompany.
Art Deco’s Food Rules? Well, no Shepherd’s Pie for you!
but my mother never made it, so we never had it at home. Don’t know why.
==
Maybe she was fond of you.
==
One of the more engaging scenes in The Corrections was the mother’s scheme to punish her husband for not calling her when he was on an eleven day business trip. She fed him the Dinner of Revenge, which consisted of liver and rutabagas. The collateral damage was the well-being of her children, particular her middle child, who was left at the dinner table refusing to eat it.
==
What is the point of many foodstuffs (tuna fish in particular)? Revenge.
Re: Black People and the BBC in Rome, I know that mocumentary and it seriously overstated things.
There absolutely were some Blacks within the Roman Empire; we have solid evidence of that. But we have even more evidence of how utterly rare they were, even as far South as Rome. “Aethopians” or the like were noted out in general. You DID see a very few of them even as far North as Roman Britannia, but to say they were exponentially rare would be an understatement; we are talking easily fewer than one in a thousand. Seeing one could easily be a once in a lifetime event, especially that far North. “Tuaregs” and “Berbers” and so on like those indigenous to Northern Africa were far more common and we saw some admixtures in the Roman Elite, but again still uncommon.
The number of “Black” ancient “Greeks” and “Romans” and “Ancient Britons” in that BBC series is grotesquely out of proportion, made worse by race swapping known Roman Imperators. Like, once or thrice in a given episode MIGHT be useful to help us remember they existed (even if even that ratio’d be out of all proportion), but they went well beyond that and it’s easy to smell the foul reasons why. Similar to how you just know there aren’t going to be random Whites in say Shaka Zulu’s inter African groups or in Senogku Japan or Three Kingdoms China. Even if there WERE Whites around there (and often times there were, NC talks about the Roman efforts to trade with China) they’d be notable outsiders even in comparison to the others, and while there was more room for integration in Rome than in China or the Zulu, it’s still absurd to see them race swapping known historical people.
And I say this as someone who is both a history nerd and fictional writer, so I have gotten VERY USED to finding edge cases or considering hypotheticals. What’s possible, what isn’t, and to differentiating “Yeah fun fictional story, why not?” with what’s supposed to be real.
As for times in written history in Britain where there were no Blacks around, I’d wager around the time of Julius Caesar’s campaigns and earlier, at a minimum. After that it gets increasingly muddier due to cross channel trade even before the conquests. So there were several centuries in British history (albeit mostly when the islands’ histories were being written by passing Greeks and Romans) where there were no Black people. But it ended a lot earlier than we might think, and you don’t have to believe Londinium looked like modern day London or New York City in terms of Demographics and racial phenotypes (because it very obviously didn’t) in order to know that there were a few fascinating outliers, not unlike the few Greco-Romans in China. (Perhaps significantly more than those, but really reaaally not much more.)
Art Deco’s Food Rules? Well, no Shepherd’s Pie for you!
==
https://www.celtichouseva.com/
==
I would recommend the fish fry and the seafood chowder. Tried the Shepherd’s Pie. It’ll pass, but there’s better stuff on the menu.