A HARTE APPETITE: DROOL BRITANNIA

* Much-maligned English cooking is shedding its reputation for preparing dogs' dinners.

To eat well in Britain, Somerset Maugham once remarked, you must have breakfast three times a day. That observation, of course, was less a tribute to the traditional English morning meal, a rather substantial repast, than it was a commentary on the state of British cooking. Maugham was simply echoing a common sentiment, for historically English cuisine has been thought to be the antithesis of culinary sophistication. For example, a couple of hundred years before Maugham's indictment, the French philosopher Voltaire decried, "In England there are sixty different religions, but only once sauce."

Even its own subjects often had to agree that British cooking was not the nation's proudest achievement. Thus, the food writer for the Observer, Nigel Slater, admits that Britain's national dish of roast beef "is a bit of a dog's dinner."

Or, in championing the country's culinary honor, others were forced into defenses which ring a bit hollow. Thus, Adrian Bailey, in his contribution to the classic Time-Life series on foods of the world, says about British cuisine, "There are no gastronomic flourishes to upset the delicate balance of digestion."

It's ironic, then, that today London is one of the hottest Epicurean destinations on the planet, proclaimed not long ago by "Bon Appetit" magazine as the culinary capital of the New Europe. Fiona Beckett, restaurant critic for the Daily Mail, proclaims that "the dark days when British food was a byword for stodge" are over and boasts, "London has emerged from its chrysalis to be the dazzling star of European cuisine...." Matthew Fort, food and drink editor of the Guardian, declares that London has been transformed from a culinary wasteland into a culinary Mecca. No wonder that recently the country's leading chefs' society declared that British cooking had come of age and dropped its French name in favor (or should I say favour?) of an English one, The Academy of Culinary Arts. Who would have ever thought that the day would arrive in London when it would be harder to get restaurant reservations than theatre tickets! But it has.

Some of us saw this coming. I remember well the day over 15 years ago when I stumbled upon the first issue of the British food magazine "A la carte" while visiting a newsstand at a rest stop on the M3 highway out of London. The layout, photographs and above all the recipes in this slick, oversize publication rival anything you'll see in "Gourmet" or "Bon Appetit" today. Indeed, if the magazine were bound in hardcover instead of paperback, you'd think it was a coffee-table book. One look at its contents told me that what I had heard about English food was not entirely correct. (I immediately took out a subscription, though, alas, legal challenges to the magazine's name now prevent it from being mailed to this country).

Many years later, when I had the opportunity to live in London for several months, I encountered further signs that there was more to British food than overcooked mutton and mushy tinned peas. For example, one day while shopping at the Portobello market I chanced upon Books for Cooks, the world's first bookshop specializing in nothing but cookbooks. Unique to the store is the five-table restaurant in the back which each day features dishes from cookbooks selected from among the thousands in stock. The existence of such a shop was a clear indication that things were happening on the food scene in Great Britain.

There were other signs as well. A visit to the local Sainsbury's grocery store or the food halls of Harrods proved that Londoners were not oblivious to modern trends in food preparation and dining. The evidence was right there on the shelves. On television I'd see contestants eagerly vying for top honors on a popular BBC game show called "Masterchefs," a program far more exhilarating, in my judgment, than almost any episode of Masterpiece Theatre. And then there were the ethnic restaurants, a reminder that the British have always been willing to embrace ingredients and cooking techniques from other cultures, often a requisite for culinary inspiration. (Their national drink, after all, is made from the leaves of a plant that won't even grow in their own climate.) Thus, there are more Indian restaurants in London than in Delhi and Bombay combined and curry has become a national dish. In fact, the spice industry now employs more Britons than coal mining and shipbuilding put together.

Outside the capital there was also evidence that British cooking had come a long way. Once on a trip to South Wales my wife and I happened upon Fairy Hill, a stately country house hotel near the Gower Peninsula that specialized in all manner of gourmet delicacies and used only fresh picked seasonal produce. A little farther west was Wolfcastle, another country house with a refined dining room serving beautifully prepared food. On an earlier trip as we passed through Devon on our way to Cornwall we sought out Gidleigh Park, a luxurious hotel with a restaurant that offered a menu as sophisticated as anything we'd seen in New York or Los Angeles.

So over the years there have been mounting clues that England was about to shed its reputation for what Fort calls "gastronomic gormlessness" (or slow-wittedness). And the truth is, that reputation was probably ill-deserved in the first place, the result of unfortunate timing. As Slater points out, "If my friends were to look through some early 18th-century British cookery books, they would see that our cooking was anything but bland and dull. Anchovies, artichokes, ginger, truffles, oregano, lemons, fennel and basil were all used regularly then. But somehow our cooking went off the rails for a couple of hundred years, for which we can probably thank the Victorians and the wars. Unfortunately," he concludes, "it was at this point that the rest of the world formed its opinion of British food. Only now are we returning to the lively flavours that once characterized our national cooking."

He might have added too that even during those derailed days, there was still plenty about quintessential British cooking to proudly savor, whether strictly haute cuisine or not: combinations like bacon and eggs, beef and Yorkshire pudding, and fish and chips; ingredients like watercress, rhubarb, gooseberries and greengages; and concoctions like gingerbread, treacle tart and trifle, not to mention Christmas pudding, Worcestershire sauce and piccalilli.

So whether your view is that the time has finally come to celebrate British food or that such celebration is long overdue, the following recipes are designed to help you drool Britannia.

Banoffi Pie

Desserts, or puddings as the English call them, have always been the crowning glory of British cuisine, and this one, featuring one of the country's most beloved flavors, toffee, is no exception. The recipe is courtesy of Dr. Tammy Baldwin, a confirmed Anglophile and professor of mass communication at Southeast Missouri State University who has visited Britain frequently and taught classes in London many times. She was first served this rich concoction in Scotland where, incredibly, her hosts asked if she'd like cream with it. As Tammy says, "They know how to do desserts!"

Ingredients:

2 1/2 sticks butter, divided

9 oz. crushed ginger cookies

1 can (14 oz.) sweetened condensed milk (not evaporated milk)

3/4 cup sugar

2 bananas, sliced

1/2 pint heavy cream

1 oz. grated chocolate

Directions:

Melt one stick butter and combine with cookies. Press into base and sides of a 7-inch lose bottomed fluted flan tin. Chill. Melt remaining butter with sugar and add condensed milk. Heat, stirring constantly, until simmering and cook on low boil for exactly five minutes. Pour over cookie base and allow to cool in refrigerator. Place a layer of bananas over top. Lightly whip cream and spread over bananas. Decorate with remaining bananas and chocolate.

Bubble and Squeak

The traditional English dish bubble and squeak is so named because it does just that while frying. It's not the only British dish named for the noises it makes while cooking. Singing hinny (hinny is northern English dialect for honey) is a spice cake that sings while baking on a griddle and the famous English breakfast sausages, bangers, get their name from the fact that they tend to explode like a firecracker (a banger in England) if they are not pricked before cooking. This recipe for the classic potato and cabbage dish is based on the one in "Cooking with the Two Fat Ladies" by Clarissa Dickson Wright and the late Jennifer Patterson, British stars of a BBC cooking series shown in this country on the Food Network.

Ingredients:

3 cups chopped cold cooked potatoes

1/4 cup lard

1 minced onion

1 1/2 cups chopped cooked cabbage

Directions:

In heavy frying pan melt half the fat and fry the onion in it. Slightly crush the potatoes and add to pan along with the cabbage. Add a bit more lard and press the mixture into the hot fat and fry over moderate heat until browned. Turn over, add remaining lard and fry until other side is browned.

Cold Roast Beef Salad with Red Currant and Orange Dressing

The British are beefeaters, even those who don't work at the Tower of London. As Nigel Slater says, "There's chicken, of course, but that always seems French, no matter what you do with it." This contemporary approach to roast beef is based on one served at the Fifth Floor Cafe adjacent to the food hall at Harvey Nichols, the fashionable department store located in Knightsbridge and frequented by the late Princess Diana.

Ingredients:

1 pound roasted beef tenderloin, sliced

2 cups orange juice

3/4 cup red currant jelly

1 tablespoon minced fresh ginger

1 tablespoon grated orange peel

1/3 cup olive oil

2 tablespoons red wine vinegar

8 cups mixed greens

Directions:

Combine juice, jelly, ginger, and peel and simmer until reduced to 2/3 cup. Cool and whisk in oil and vinegar. Season with salt and pepper. Arrange greens on platter, overlap sliced beef on top and spoon dressing over.

A Harte Appetite is now on the air. Listen every Saturday at 11:59 a.m. following "Whad'ya Know" on KRCU, 90.9 on your FM dial. Send suggestions for this column to A Harte Appetite, c/o The Southeast Missourian, P.O. Box 699, Cape Girardeau, Mo., 63702-0699 or by e-mail to tharte@semovm.semo.edu.