One of the pains of being “on the road” is the never ending string of Yet Another Chain Restaurant with the same old same old. Only made tolerable by the fact that trying something “new” can be an utter disaster. Especially some no-name hole in the wall of the local shopping mall.
But, from time to time, one of them is just a stellar experience.
So as a ‘risk taking personality’, I find myself sometimes just picking something that looks unpromising from the outside and “giving it a go”. Most of the time it’s just “OK”. Sometimes it’s a bit dreadful and I’ll bail out back to Taco Bell. Then, from time to time, you find these very surprising places. Things just “click” for me and it becomes a treasured find.
Well, I found one of them yesterday. It’s a little “Fish & Chips” (and more, much more…) place. I grew up with fish and chips, and there are times I just get to wanting some and simply must have fish and chips. Even if it is those dreadful frozen “fries” and industrially packaged frozen fish patties with that choking tartar sauce on the side. (How folks can eat tartar sauce when there is Malt Vinegar and Salt in the world is beyond me ;-) but I digress…
At any rate, I’d got the hankering for Fish and Chips and the sign SAID “Fish & Chips” so, well, in I went.
I think you will agree that at first glance it doesn’t look like a whole lot:
Grandma's Kitchen Fish & Chips near Disneyworld, Florida
Upon walking up to the window, it becomes more promising. A variety of foods on the menu, posted in the window. A selection of lunches in the $5.99 range. Several sizes of fish and chips. Then, off to the right, was a photo of a meal that was very familiar to me. “Sunday Roast”. Meat, mashed potatoes, roast vegetables and peas & carrots, Yorkshire Pudding. Gravy. But the note said something like “$11.99 – Sunday from Noon to 4 pm only”. Yesterday I went in and had the fish and chips. Today I went back for the “Sunday Roast”. It is offered in chicken, beef, and lamb. I love lamb… It’s a bit hard to find in America in general and in this part of Florida in particular. I had the lamb.
So back at yesterday…
When I first entered, I was a bit reticent. It was sparsely furnished (8 or 9 tables of utilitarian character, a ‘take out’ counter with a few chairs for waiting, a display case for more goods, a small shelf of specialty UK foods.) I was one of just a couple of folks in the place. But almost immediately I was greeted with a hearty “Welcome!” and in an accent from England. Up near the Scottish border on the Eastern side, I think. A bit broader and richer than Mom’s accent, but familiar all the same…
I said “Fish & Chips, please” and was immediately impressed by a selection of choices of fish… None of this “frozen fish patties” of mystery ‘white fish’ here. Haddock (which I chose), Cod, or Tilapia (widely farmed here). To make a long story short, after a brief wait I got a very generous chunk of fish with homemade batter, fried to perfection, on a generous bed of “chunky chips” like we used to make at home. Whole potatoes, peeled, and cut into finger sided (or thumb width, if you have small hands ;-) chunks. Neatly cooked through, but without dry or burned surfaces. Slow fried. Served with a great, authentic, Malt Vinegar. You can get fish and chips from about $5.99 to $9.99 (for the multi fish platter, though I only ordered the one chunk of one kind). I had an endless glass of Ice Tea with it. Just a perfect platter of Fish & Chips. They are now my “go to place” for fish and chips here.
So, not being content to be stuffed to near rotund, I ordered what I expected to be a small wafer of ‘short bread’ with a square of Cadbury chocolate on top, and add a request for ‘a bit of vanilla ice cream’ to top it. Figured about 2 ounces like most mini-scoups of desert topper. No such luck… I got a bowl about 8 inches across with a chunk of ‘short bread’ in it (the real English kind that is sort of like a very rich cookie) that had a layer of chocolate fused to the surface. About the size of the palm of my hand, and I have large hands… Topped with a very large scoop of vanilla ice cream. I spent the next 15 or 20 minutes working on it as I read the paper (also from England…) that was on offer. All up, it was a bit shy of $20 (mostly from what I think was ordering two desserts, the shortbread and the icecream…) That also includes the local sales tax at, IIRC, about 7% or so.
Today I went back for “Sunday Roast”. The lamb was just delicious. Tender and rich. With peas, carrots, a spot of stewed cabbage, some roast vegetable (either a very sweet mealy turnip or a rich potato, hard to tell mixed with the gravy, but good!). Oh, and about 1/2 litre of mashed potatoes. Well, maybe it just seemed like a half litre, but with the extra gravy served in a gravy boat on the side, it was quite a lot of food. In talking with the owner, who also waits tables, she talked about how they peeled all the potatoes by hand as it gave better results “Not even a machine!”… No instant potatoes here, Luv… Oh, and a nice Yorkshire Pudding. (I was offered a second when I’d finished the first one only 1/2 way through the meal…) I was, and am, “in heaven”. I’d not had “Sunday Roast Dinner” like that since I left home.
As a child, Mum would put a roast in the oven and we would go to Church. Made sitting in the pews past noon all that much the harder… as I’d get hungrier and the minister would ‘run over’ I’d get squirmy-er… On return home, the aroma would fill the house, and we’d have giant portions until we were stuffed. As most days of the week were a bit more “meager”, it was a treat. When I think of ‘life at home’, I often remember “Sunday roast”.
But there is even more to this restaurant story…
There were two kids, about 8 or 10 years old, ‘hanging around’. Seated fairly quietly, finding ways to busy themselves. This is a very family, Family Restaurant. That is almost exactly what I did in the folks restaurant when I was a kid. That the ambiance made it even more “homey” to me is an understatement. I WAS at home. Instantly.
There are only 8 or 9 tables, with wide spaces between them. At an average of about 3 seats each, I make that about 27 customers at a time. There were 3 folks working that I could count. Service was very prompt, and very very pleasant.
OK, I finished “Sunday Roast” and (barely) managed to clean the plate. Feeling a bit “rotund”, but happy. Then the ‘dessert’ question comes again… Being a slow learner, I said something brilliant like “Wasn’t there something with ‘custard’ in the name?” and I’m told “Oh, yes dear, the Apple pie and Custard”. Great, I think. Small slice of pie and bit of custard on it… SOLD!
What comes is another 8 or 9 inch bowl with about 1/6 of a pie in it smothered in about 300 ml of custard sauce ( like a warm unset pudding in American term). Now I expect to be greeted with the typical Sugar Shock on shoveling this into my mouth… But no, it’s very lightly sugared. Once again I’m transported back to old memories. Home made pies where you can actually taste the apples in them, not just a load of sugar. Creamy warm custards, not the cold ‘near jello experience’ of an American custard.
OK, I ask for the newspaper. It’s gonna be a while…
Over the next 20 minutes or so I work my way through the pie… and the paper.
All up, including tax and tip, about $22. Yeah, I could have been out the door for closer to $15 if I had skipped the dessert… With one of the sandwiches I could likely get it under $10 all up. But where is the Saturnalian Excess in that? 8-0
It’s now 3 hours after I started, and I’m still quite happy and full. I can only hope I’m hungry before 6 pm or so, as that about when Galloping Camel and I are due to head out for a local restaurant…
There are also Cornish Pasties on the menu, along with a list of other deserts. Folks at the other table today said “I’ve tried everything on the menu and it’s all good!”. I believe them. From Scones to “mushy peas”, it’s all real and as authentic as you can get. I’ll be working my way through the whole menu, one dish at a time, too. I’m now going to be a ‘regular’. But I think I’m going to schedule desert for an hour or two after the main meal ;-)
Talking with the owner they shared that they came over in 2008, so we’re looking at about “2 years off the boat”. That’s pretty authentic. No, it’s not some fru-fru high end Chefy kind of cooking. It’s way more touching than that… that taste of home. A real home. With Mum and Dad working the kitchen together and kids about. Just the thing for a Road Warrior who has been away from home for too long…
So where is it?
Take I-4 south (west) from central Orlando, exit on Hwy 535 and continue in a general southward direction toward highway 192 (that goes to Kissimmee Florida. Just as you reach highway 192 (just a couple of miles) on the left will be a shopping center. In easy view is a Smokey Bones BBQ and behind and to the right is a Publix supermarket. Hidden from view is “Grandma’s Kitchen”. If you see the Taco Bell on your right at the 192 intersection, it is just a bit behind you on the left… so make a U turn and go into the shopping center…
2925 Vineland Rd. , Poinciana, Kissimmee, FL, 34746
This link is supposed to pull up a map and street view:
http://www.cruzorlandoonline.com/maps/GrandMasKitchen/98562
But it mostly shows a direct shot of the Smokey Bones BBQ… so go past it for the Fish & Chips, OK?
Musings from the Chiefio 
I just had a “special” fish supper today before reading your article.Lovely fresh Haddock..mmmmmmmmmmm…..
I’m in Scotland,West Lothian,about halfway between Edinburgh and Glasgow.
If you want to tell if a Scotsman is from the West coast or the East coast,then ask him what he puts on his fish and chips…West coat people are “salt & vinegar” and east coast people are “salt & sauce”, strange but true. :-)
Ask for a “special” fish next time..(instead of batter,you get golden breadcrumbs)…Great website you have.
It sounds excellent. I wonder if they serve breakfast — a good and proper English Breakfast is rare treat indeed on this side of the Pond.
===|==============/ Keith DeHavelle
I have a few of those “go to” places, too. For example, having grown up on the East coast and being a Silicon Valley transplant, I miss a good Italian sub. You can’t find one on the West coast. Subway is crap, Togos is better, but still not an Italian sub. There is only one place in the San Francisco bay area that I know of where one can get a real Italian sub (and a REAL Philly cheese steak).
Jersey Joe’s in San Carlos. 21 El Camino Real
Alas, I’ve never found a breadcrumbed fish with egg sauce to match my mother’s – my wife is too wise even to attempt it. Mum’s Yorkshire pudding was delicious too, especially when she made a big one in an enamel pie-dish. Quite why British domestic food could be so good when the restaurant food was often poor beats me.
Tossed into the mod bucket again. Wish I could figure out what it is I do that causes that. Also there is an error in my posting anyway “I must a good Italian sub.” should read “I miss a good Italian sub”.
When I eat out, my hope is always for something I couldn’t or wouldn’t cook myself, or much better than I’d cook at home, but then I have a full family-sized kitchen at my disposal. I completely understand it that missing ‘home cooked food’. If I’m away, sometimes even for a few days, I can’t wait to get back home even though it means having to cook for the family again.
I am a sucker for good apple pie too – I like tart, sweet-sour apples and buttery pastry – and so often it disappoints. Sugar sweetness is overrated – it takes a bit of acidity to balance it.
Last week I made tomato soup – wonderful but really too acidic, that even adding sugar wasn’t going to make it pleasent, so I added a bit of bicarbonate – well too much actually. The result was a sweet insipid vaguely tomato flavour – it really missed the acidity and I had to add vinegar to make it more pleasent. However this initiated a great hour in the kitchen with my daughter, for a chemistry lesson with lemon juice, bicarb and sugar. We also ground some blueberries into an ‘indicator’.
Have a lovely meal with GC.
That was a fine restaurant review, E.M. I think you have a lot of readers who will drop by and try the place if they’re ever in the neighborhood. I will.
My mother-in-law is from Scotland (Glasgow) and my wife was born in London. Neither of them cook. As I’ve mentioned my wife’s technique for cooking canned green beans in another thread (cook uncovered on high until smoke alarm goes off), you can see that I’ve never had a taste of the “home cooking” that you were raised with.
@Keith DeHavelle:
Yes, they do ;-)
On the menu is “English Breakfast”…
@George:
A change of IP address can do it. If you have a network connect reset that does a new DHCP address, you go to moderation until such time as ALL of the IP addresses have been “approved”… so likely 250 or so of them, in rotation… Or if you post from a public network like a Starbucks as opposed to your usual ‘at home’ IP. Etc…
@Verity Jones:
Part of my enthusiasm likely comes my the modest frustration of 3 months on the road with little “kitchen time”… I can do an OK job of “hotel room cooking”, but it’s just not the same.
Just back from a very nice time with GC at a local Indian Restaurant. “Taste of Punjab” IIRC. Very nice lamb (something or other in Indian ;-) that was spicy enough, but not too much, on a nicely flavored Basmati rice. All washed down with an Indian beer that actually did work well with Indian food (as the waiter said it would!) GC is an interesting fellow with a fascinating life story. His family had a much nicer restaurant back in the UK (old public house with stables, pond, and acreage) but he went into optical science and tech. We swapped stories and had a great time.
Been invited to a Brew Pub in Melbourne (Florida) as soon as I can find another free weekend… (I figure about 3 weeks ;-)
@H.R.:
Thanks for the ‘review of the review’. I just hope I’ve “leveled” things properly so folks get a valid expectation set. Good food, so-so decoration, family atmosphere.
As I grew up in a Mormon town (who are well schooled in turning dry shoe leather and 20 year old canned beets into a delicious meal ;-) – a jab at their food storage habits … and had a friend who was a poor Mexican kid ( so Mama Celerina had to know how to make delicious food from nothing) I had lots of different styles of good “home cooking” as we all swapped dinners at each others homes. It’s very different from ‘commercial cooking’ and has a distinct character that Chef food just doesn’t capture. Some are subtle things, like the “chips” that were slightly irregular sizes and shapes. Not machine cut nor the precise sizes of a trained chef with a fast knife. That matters as some of the chips are a bit more cooked and some a bit less. Some more crisp and some more smooth / creamy. When that mixes in the mouth, the effect is special. Some are more brute force: Typical home cooking doesn’t have a lot of fancy sauces nor is there a chocolatier devoted just to that. But that “Sunday Roast” was honed over several generations to be “just right” week after week after week…
Sometimes one home cooking is not to the liking of other families. An Italian or Mexican is likely to find this food relatively bland. No hot spicy chilies here, nor any ‘zip’ from parmesan and fennel. But that rich honesty that an English Mum puts in front of their family. Carrots that had a strong clean taste of, well, carrots! NOT some cheese sauce or a honey glaze or… Just carrots well prepared “al dente” with a bit of peas and gravy… Similarly, an English kid is likely to find Mexican a bit “fire breathing” on first experience. Yet when I think of an enchilada, I remember making them by the dozen in Mama Celerina’s kitchen from scratch. The meat cooking for a very long time in the background with savory seasonings I’d never had at my home. I’ve had “fire breathing” enchiladas in restaurants, and nearly bland ones. But none quite like the “home made” ones. They just don’t take the number of hours to make them; nor typically does it have the fresh corn aroma of the corn husks just taken off the sweet corn…
Usually it’s just 3 or 4 dishes per family that are the special touch stones. The things that resonate. A restaurant typically will have dozens of dishes. It’s hard to have that many that have that detail put into them.
Then again, if the spouse can “burn water”, well, find a neighbor to visit… or invite Verity over ;-)
@George:
There, fished it out:
https://chiefio.wordpress.com/2011/09/25/grandmas-kitchen-with-food-like-moms/#comment-22753
FWIW, wasn’t the IP address. It was a word that I’ve now taken out of the ‘mod list’… (Don’t know why it was there…)
There used to be a great Jewish Deli in Silicon Valley, run by a guy from New York and his spouse. In a ‘refresh’ of the shopping center, his place got turned into a shoe store or some such. Haven’t found a ‘real deli’ there since…
@jb:
(Who was first to comment, but got stuck in the mod queue too…):
https://chiefio.wordpress.com/2011/09/25/grandmas-kitchen-with-food-like-moms/#comment-22750
I’ll ask if they have “special” next time I’m in.
Interesting about Scots accents…
Ah, at last, a topic we can all agree on!
My wife makes fish and chips from time to time; it is her second-best dish (her first is pate of chicken liver, a close approximation to the French pate de fois gras frais.) But, as for English and Scottish food, I am a skeptic. I lived in England, a long time ago. We used the Postgate Guide to find good country restaurants. The best of them were acceptable, but not much more. I remember being in the south of Spain much later and seeing a sign that said “We serve English food”, and my wife and I said “but Spanish food would be so much more tasty. Why brag about serving an inferior cuisine?” And that is the real question. English food (and Scottish food) can be tasty, but for really great cuisine try (in order) French, Italian, Spanish, Thai, Chinese,…
As for me, my specialities are bread, lobster, clams, steak, mussels, and a few other dishes. And wine…
Eat well. Enjoy life!
But it is always a miracle to discover a restaurant that is serious about the food they prepare, and never mind the style of cuisine…
Awesome information about Grandma’s restaurant. As an immigrant from the UK I am always on the lookout for authentic “Fish & Chips”. You really understand the finer things in life!
Fish & chips is on the menu at the many “Beef O’Brady’s” in central Florida but the fish is tasteless and there is too much batter. Not even malt vinegar can make it an enjoyable meal. The selection of beers is underwhelming too (Bud, Bud Light etc) with the notable exception of the draught Guinness. I still go to “Beef’s” as my kids love the spicy chicken wings and the Pittsburg Steelers. I am a Redskins fan so I have not had much to cheer lately.
Not wanting to leave a bad taste in the mouth, “Charlie & Jake’s” in Melbourne has awesome fish and chips but that is not all. Every Friday evening my wife and I eat there. Quite often we order a chicken salad that is enough for both of us; the “Pulled Pork” measures up to the best Carolina “Pig Picking”.
Then there is the draught beer brewed on the premises. If you are lucky you will meet the Brewmaster, a really cool bearded dude who wears sneakers. He is always smiling and who would’nt be with a job like that? His potions are absolutely fantastic for choice and quality. If you get there before 6 p.m. it is “Happy Hour” which means you get “Two-fers”. Great food and beer without busting your budget!
The Chiefio did not disappoint. He is a gentleman and a scholar. While I could never aspire to his amazing blogmanship we share an interest in aquaculture and computer technology. Then there are some contrasts; like my dad he understands investing while I am totally clueless. He still has his “Bump of Direction” while I lost mine about 5 years ago. If my Garmin goes crazy I don’t know what to do.
During our discussions I mentioned the wooden (black pine) nuclear reactor that Charlie Bowman (Duke university alumnus) built on his farm in Virginia in 2002. This was tested at TUNL (Triangle Universities Nuclear Laboratory) and later at LANL (Los Alamos Nuclear Laboratory). While this project did not attract the $20 million in funding needed for the next level, the project is not entirely dead thanks to L.N Chang at Virginia Tech, Blacksburg:
Click to access 091007_chang_virginia_tech.pdf
As neutrons get cheaper, ADRs (Accelerator Driven Reactors) look more interesting especially as they can be turned on and off at the touch of a switch. They are capable of “Load Following” because power output is directly proportional to the neutron input. They also consume those naughty higher actinides destined for Yucca mountain, converting them to valuable stable isotopes and electric power. One man’s “Nuclear Waste” is another man’s “Fuel”.
That L.N. Chang presentation mentions the “Green Energy Multiplier”. That sounds like the E-Cat energy multiplier from Rossi and Focardi.
One big difference. Chang’s multiplier actually works.
My sister has a unit in Poinciana (Coopersmith), and I’ve been up and down that road many times. I sorta know where that fish&chips place is- there should be a U-Haul near that corner. She now lives outside west London (UK) and has grown to like the ‘local food’, so I won’t have a chance ’till she comes back next summer for vacation.
Don’t forget- If you stay in that hotel for more than a month, get the GM to adjust off the local hotel/motel tax.
Last time I was in London with my wife visiting my sister-in-law I had a hankering for fish and chips. We walked down the street to a small joint run by some Pakistani’s (as is half of London) I picked out a nice fillet of haddock and they made a tremendous meal. We had the brown vinegar and some pickles as well.
I haven’t been in Orlando since ’83, going to nuke school. Don’t recall any restaurants but can name quite a few bars (probably all rotted away by now). Back then quality didn’t matter it was all about quantity.
Reactors can be load following but it is more efficient to design for 100% load and keep them there. The subs I was on the reactors all followed load (with operator input of course). The commercial plants were all base load and there is nothing wrong with that. It is easier and safer as parameters throughout the fuel cycle are known and deviations can be detected earlier.
I just bought a house in Punta Gorda. Unbelievable the deals there.
OK gentlemen, it is 3:45 am, I was about to go back to sleep, and now I am hungry.
SWMBO and I walk into Dickens, near Paddington Station. We’re told that although we can have a table and of course whatever we’d like to drink, food is likely to be over an hour because of a sudden spate of orders.
The menu has two Moroccan dishes which we order from the bar along with the bitter that I’d developed a passion for.
Ten minutes later, the food is on our table. Cook is Moroccan and he assumed we must be lantsmen. Very good, too.
Our luck with pub food touring UK was not uniform, mostly good, but not always. We drove heathrow, portsmouth, oxford, bath, malvern, wales(can’t spell the name off top of my head), ironbridge, chester, york, edinborough, small town south of inverness, inverness, small town north of glasgow, glasgow, and a few more.
the plan was to find a b&b for the night within a walk (stagger?) of a pub. So we had a lot of evenings of pub food.
I have no idea whether this is a reasonable (and hopefully not impolite) question, but is there any dish which can be ordered at an otherwise nondescript pub which has more than chance likelihood of being tasty?
We have a very wide latitude of acceptability. Our wine requirement is that it not taste bad -assuming it wasn’t pricey. In the US, I tend to revert to cheeseburger if i find myself in a restaurant which has adjectives in the menu, unless I can get local knowledge.
Based on your comments, can I assume you are NOT a fan of McDonald’s “Fillet O’ Fish”??
I do happen to like Tarter sauce (mostly on saltine crackers).
I definitely agree with the restaurant owner about the mashed potatoes. I HATE THOSE WHIPPED POTATO FLAKES !!!
As a child, our usual Sunday dinner was a slow cooked chuck roast.
My family never had lamb, but my in-laws are Armenian and we do occasionally have lamb chops at their place. There are several lamb recipes I would like to try, but lamb ain’t cheap !!
Humans are funny people. They tend to remember the good over the bad, or perhaps it’s just that one is preferred rather than the other. Strange how it is that the longer it’s been since we last had something, the better it gets.
The variety and scale of a British breakfast makes a ‘continental’ breakfast look and feel like… well… honest, there’s no comparison whatsoever. (Little wonder Yanks and Brits have high colesteral levels, but ooooooh does it hit the spot of the moment and keep you going all day;-)
@ j ferguson and others interested
If you are touring the UK and looking for a decent pub with pub food get a copy of The Good Pub Guide, edited by Alisdair Aird and Fiona Stapley. I have found this a reliable guide when touring. It is an unfortunate fact that pubs are closing at an alarming rate – cause: smoking ban in public buildings – and they must rely bar or restaurant food to survive.
If you are looking for bed and breakfast get Alastair Sawday`s British Bed and breakfast Guide This also has been a reliable guide for us when touring- he does a hotel guide too, but that is more expensive.
Re “English breakfasts” – for more than two years I had project with a company that was 3+ hours drive from home as long as you got past a particular junction located 2+ hours in before the morning traffic built up. After a while we settled into a pattern whereby the periodic managment meetings were timed to start at 10:00am. This allowed a 05:30 start (on an empty stomach so as to avoid pit-stops), arriving about 09:00 at a local family-run hotel which did a fabulous cooked breakfast and bottomless tea or coffee. I still remember how good it tasted.
The huge breakfast meant that after a two hour meeting and one hour site inspection it was possible to jump in the car and drive back without lunch. This meant we got home about 4:30pm before the local traffic built up and felt like we were ‘home early’. Much preferred by everyone
Verity Jones @ 11:07
I rarely eat deserts, but when I do, my favorite is cherry pie or lemon meringue. The cherry pie needs to be very tart and the lemon pie needs to have about 6-8X the usual amount of lemon in it. The worst thing is to eat a pie as you mentioned and have it taste like a Hostess Fruit “Pie”.
I tend toward a larger breakfast anyway; five eggs scrambled or fried and accessories. For a midnight snack, I’ll have another five eggs — but with fewer accessories.
This keeps my cholesterol down. I’m in the bottom 10% of humans now (running between 66 and 88 total) having started at 242 before launching on my major egg-eating regime.
Of course, once cannot live by eggs alone. I supplement with other health-conscious foods such as rib-eye steaks, standing roasts and hamburgers.
But the English breakfast I have fond memories of from trips there years ago — from the British idea of bacon to the various other accouterments that made the meal complete. In the US, I’ve never found a completely happy equivalent.
===|==============/ Keith DeHavelle
Wikipedia has some mouthwatering pictures and interesting regional variations. http://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Full_breakfast
From recent experience Irish bacon is fabulous, and soda bread fried in the bacon fat is devine. Just wouldn’t want to have it daily ;-)
@Matthew W:
I largely gave up on the dry breaded bricks they call “fish sandwiches” in most fast food places long before I found out they usually had corn meal in the coating (to make them look golden even if wrongly cooked). They are just a waste of time.
@Verity:
I would ;-)
My mother never was satisfied with “American Bacon” so my Dad would get bacon special cut at the local butcher. Thick. Lean. Sometimes he would just buy a slab and we’d slice it ourselves on the ham slicer in the restaurant…. Being from a farm in Iowa, Dad knew how to find, buy, or make just about any kind of pork, ham, or bacon product you could want. I grew up on ‘greasy bacon’ and only later learned to eat the American Burned Bacon… (i.e. ‘crispy’…)
Had some loverly English Breakfasts at a place in London who’s name escapes me (if I ever new it… Hotel Grosvenor? Something like that…) with one cherry tomato on each plate, individual 1 ounce or so jars of jams, and superb bacon. (Anyone can make decent eggs, IMHO). And the toast with real butter was perfect. Sigh… Just across the corner from the tube station…
I have a sudden urge for a Bacon Sandwich on bread toasted in the bacon grease… with fried green tomatoes on the side… (I DID mention that Dad was from Iowa… ;-)
Can anyone give a good recipe for fried green tomatoes? I’ve never had or done them and I have an excellent crop of beefsteaks and expect to have many green tomatoes left over this fall. pg
@ E.M. “with fried green tomatoes on the side…”
If you ever find yourself in the NE corner of Florida around Jacksonville, there is a local restaurant chain there named “Famous Amos.” Best fried tomatoes and grits around!
@ E.M.
I made a mistake in my earlier comment (my sister corrected me). In Florida, you must stay a total of 6 months (continuous) and only after that is local use tax exempt. In Georgia (where I live), it is one month. I should have double checked with her before I shot my mouth off- she’s licensed in Florida, I am in Georgia. :(
As a brit, one of the mysteries of the US is “what do they do with the bits of the pig that we make bacon out of?” Much as I love a US breakfast, the bacon is not up to much. The same thing with cream. Double, clotted, all the cream we have, what do Americans do with it, leaving only whipped fluff and half and half?
Of course, there are many thing in the US which are better than we get here, but those two things are a mystery to me.
@Adrian Camp; Most of the “bits” are ground for pork meat fillers in processed meats. American butchering is streamlined to break down a carcase to major cuts and grind the rest. American bacon is the side meat off of the ribs.
AS to milk and cream. American dairy herds are made up of breeds that yield high milk and low cream production as the producers are paid for pounds of milk produced. Cream is secondary. pg
@ P.G. Sharrow
This video for fried green tomatoes looks pretty much like what my wifey-thing does.
You can also fry non-green tomatoes, as long as they are firm and fleshy. You may need to drain them a bit longer.
Since there seems a quorum of bacon experts (US variety) maybe I can get a question answered wrt the form bacon now reaches the breakfast table.
The bacon we ate when i was a kid in the ’40s had small islands of gristle (bone) in the strips. They were about .125 inch in diameter and there might have been several in a strip cooked to one inch by 7 inches.
I haven’t seen these things is many years. How can that be? And no smart remarks about my failing vision. I’m convinced they are no longer there.
If there is anything I really miss about the UK it is Ulster smoked bacon. The last time I brought a few pounds back in my luggage the customs folks in Boston tried to take it away but I decided to risk missing my connecting flight rather than meekly hand it over.
I have found something that is almost as good and easily available here in Florida (Walmart & Publix). May I recommend “Kentucky Legend” sliced ham. Make sure you get the “Original” smoked kind as the honey cured and sugar cured styles turn black in the skillet (frying pan) owing to the sugar content.
My Mom’s from Sheffield, all my cousins from Rotherham. There is nothing in the world like a good Yorkshire pudding. Fish and chips and “mooshy” peas are great, but there’s nothing like Yorkshire pudding. Thanks for reminding me.
@Jason Calley, thank you for the link. I will try this tomorrow night.
@j ferguson, have no fear, you are not going blind. The “bones” are vestage rib bones. They are more common in some breeds then others. Styles of carcase break down have changed and these are now trimmed. You are correct that they were very common years ago and now rarely seen.
Great food excellent service… one of a kind everyone that visits kissimmee should check this place out! Really cool!