That English cooking noone abroad knows....

(Extracted from the Expat Daily Telegraph - I advice to look for the photographs...)

Yorkshire pudding

The Yorkshire pudding, that lynchpin of the Sunday roast, was conceived in the 18th century as something to fill up those who could not afford much meat. The first recipe appeared in 1737 in The Whole Duty of a Woman. Described as a “dripping pudding”, cooks were instructed to “make a good batter as for pancakes”, cook it under a shoulder of mutton and keep it “light and savoury” by frequently shaking the handle of the pan. In Yorkshire, the pudding is traditionally served with gravy as a starter dish, with meat and vegetables to follow.

Grilled kippers

The smell of grilled kippers can linger in the kitchen for weeks, but it is well worth it to have as breakfast or tea with brown bread smothered with butter and a cup of tea. Some of the tastiest kippers are produced by L Robson and Sons smokehouse in the small fishing village of Craster, Northumberland. A fourth generation family business, they have been smoking kippers for over 130 years.

Bread and butter pudding

Redolent of school dinners, bread and butter pudding originated as a means of using up stale bread by the poor, who did not want to waste whatever precious bread they were able to obtain. They would steam the stale bread and add various ingredients, such as fruit or meat, before baking it in the oven. The pudding eventually evolved to include more exotic ingredients and at the start of the 17th century, it made its way into the mainstream. Once the working and middle classes could afford more luxurious foods such as eggs and milk, they created the first bread and butter pudding comprising slices of buttered bread, baked in an egg custard dotted with dried fruit.

Bubble and squeak

Made from mashed potato and a green vegetable, usually cabbage, and fried in butter, bubble and squeak has most often been made as a means of using up leftovers from the Sunday lunch. It’s thought to have derived its curious name from the sounds it makes when it cooks: the ingredients are first boiled – giving us the bubbles and then fried, producing a squeaky noise.

Cornish pasties

The first reference to Cornish pasties dates back to 1300 and by the end of the 18th century they had become the staple diet of working men across Cornwall, who took the portable pasty with them to work. A compact shape, it was easy to carry and the pastry case insulated the filing of meat and potato. Its distinctive D-shape is thought to have enabled tin miners to eat them underground, with the crimped edge being used as a handle which was then discarded due to the high levels of arsenic in many tin mines.

Beef Wellington

Beef tenderloin coated with pate, then wrapped in puff pastry and baked is better known as Beef Wellington. Although its label is a matter of contention, it is thought to be named after Arthur Wellesley, the First Duke of Wellington, who crushed Napoelon at Waterloo and is thought to have had a fondness for a dish of beef, truffles, mushrooms and pate cooked in pastry.

Devilled kidneys

Lamb’s kidneys flash fried in a spicy sauce of mustard and cayenne pepper – better known as devilled kidneys – were a popular staple of the Edwardian breakfast table. The spicy offal were allegedly a favourite dish of Lord Lucan, who cooked them late a night to lift his spirits after an unlucky evening at his favoured gambling establishment, the Clermont Club.

Black pudding

Sitting alongside eggs, bacon and sausages as part of a full English breakfast, black pudding is reviled and adored in equal measure. Made from blood, mostly from pig or cattle, it is cooked with a filler such as bread or oatmeal until it is thick enough to be cooled. Some of the best black pudding hails from Clonakilty in County Cork and Bury in Greater Manchester.

Haggis

Often served with neeps and tatties as part of a Burns night supper, Scotland’s national dish – haggis – contains sheep’s heart liver and lungs, minced with onion, oatmeal and spices, and traditionally boiled in the animal’s stomach. But for the more squeamish modern consumer, haggis is now more often prepared in a casing rather than an actual stomach. As well as eating haggis, it is also used in a sport called haggis hurling, which involves throwing a haggis as far as possible.

Kedgeree

A breakfast dish comprising curried rice, smoked fish, boiled eggs and parsley, the roots of kedgeree – or khichari – are bedded in Indian cooking. As the British Raj colonised the sub-continent, the dish was adapted to British tastes and brought home to these shores.

Spotted Dick

Theories abound about the etymology of this somewhat dubiously named pudding. Spotted Dick, known to have been served in Britain for around 200 years, is thought to have earned its ‘spotted’ label from the currants that dot the sponge; but as for the second half of its name, some suggest that it is a derivation of ‘pudding’, which was shortened to ‘puddinck’ and then to ‘puddick’ and then just ‘dick’. The pudding became more notorious yet when in 2002, prudish managers at a Gloucestershire hospital renamed the desert ‘Spotted Richard’, but it has since regained its previous, giggle-inducing name.

Banger

A meaty banger resting on a cloud of buttery mashed potato – and preferably doused in red onion gravy – is the ultimate in comfort food. Sausages were first conceived around 3000BC by the Sumarians who lived in what is present-day Iraq; they came up with the idea of using nutritious yet unappetising bits of animal and preserving them, probably by drying them in warm winds in casing made from animal guts. It was during the Second World War that sausages earned the name ‘banger’ when they contained so much water that during cooking, they could explode with a loud ‘bang’.

Shepherd’s Pie

Minced lamb topped with mashed potato, better known as “Shepherd’s Pie”, was first made as a means of using up leftover roasted meat and as well as having a potato crust, the dish was also lined with mashed potato. It acquired the name “Shepherd’s Pie” in the 1870s and is most definitely not to be confused with “Cottage Pie”, made with minced beef.

Toad in the hole

Debate rages about where the recipe for sausages baked in batter got the name of “toad in the hole”. Its earliest incarnation was in the 18th and 19th centuries when various cuts of meat, not just sausages, were used. The hole is thought to refer to the position of the meat in the pastry and the notion of secreting delicacies in holes in a batter pudding goes back to Roman times. The earliest reference to the recipe occurs in a provincial glossary of 1787, which cites Toad in the Hole as meat boiled in a crust.

Melton Mowbray pork pies

Roughly chopped pork and pork jelly encased in a hot water crust pastry has achieved almost legendary status. The Melton Mowbray pork pie uses uncured meat and its hand formed crust gives each pie a uniquely irregular shape. In 2008, following a 10-year fight, Melton Mowbray pork pies were given Protected Geographical Status by officials in Europe, which means that only producers making pork pies in the vicinity of Melton Mowbray can use the town’s name.

Fish and chips

Freshly bought from the chippy and steaming away quietly in their newspaper wrapping, fish and chips are unbeatable. Following the development of trawler fishing in the North Sea in the second half of the 19th century, fish and chips became a cheap, popular and filling food among the working classes. Chips are believed to have first appeared as a dish in England in the mid 19th century. In Charles Dickens’ A Tale of Two Cities, published in 1859, he refers to “Husky chips of potatoes, fried with some reluctant drops of oil”. The first chippy was opened in London the following year by a Jewish proprietor, Joseph Malin, who sold “fish fried in the Jewish fashion” with chips.