The saddest dessert in the world.

Here’s a list of All-time favourite British Recipes that I discovered in a book titled, “British Cuisine”; a cookbook that valiantly delves into the shallow pond of British fare.

Cauliflower Cheese.
Macaroni and Cheese.
Mashed potato and sausages.
Bacon, Sausages, Eggs and Mushrooms.

Not exactly inspiring. Comfort food for the most part. Fried meat. Boiled starch. Gravy. It’s your basic retirement home menu. They try to dress up some of the more lifeless dishes with interesting names such as Toad in the ‘ole and Bubble & Squeak (which from what I can tell, is refried leftovers), but even the most recklessly exotic dishes were little more than the kind of careful, easy to boil food you’d make on a camping trip.

And then, just when I thought I’d hit the utter bedrock of dreariness with Unseasoned Lamb Cutlets, I turned to the dessert chapter and found, without a doubt, the most awesomely uninspiring dessert I have ever heard of.

Bread and Butter Pudding

Allow me to clarify. This recipe actually calls for six slices of stale bread.
That’s not a dessert. That’s a health code violation.

And don’t think for a moment that this dessert comes with lashings of chocolate cream or heaped spoonfuls of vanilla custard.

Oh no.

Once you butter the STALE BREAD, you pop it in the oven and pour some milk on top.
If you’re feeling particularly crazy, and this is probably limited to 21st Birthday parties and Silver Wedding Anniversaries, you might, might, add a spoonful of raisins.

British moms don’t love their children. It's that simple.
The proof is in the bread and butter pudding.

The book continues with some pretty detailed instructions on how to do difficult things like fry bacon (???) and how to, I swear this is true, Butter toast as well as an assorted grab bag of quotes from British food chewers.

“The best reward for finishing my maths homework was a big plate of cauliflower cheese. Even now when I eat it, I know I’ve been a good girl”.

This quote is so sad it makes me want to cry.
She’s probably 47 years old.

I think my favourite quote was from a man in Surrey, which in my mind, sums up the utterly hopeless case for British cuisine.

When asked what his all time favourite British recipe was, the one thing that recalled his younger days, his Blue Day Food, the one dish that always puts a smile on his face, he replied,

“I really like buttered toast.”