Question to the French speaking: what's with a l'anglaise?

[kensuguro]

I'm going to culinary school, learning french cuisine, and notice that there are many things ending in a l'anglaise. I don't speak a word of french, let alone remember enough about world history to understand the historical relationship between the English and the French. (royal family friends?) But I do get the sense the it is used with things that are "quick". Did the french view the english as quick and hasty? I think they can change that to vegetable ala New Yorker, or even ala facebook.

[garyb]

royal family maybe(william the conqueror from Normandy and all), but friends? mmmm....i mean 100 years war and everything....

can't stand fancy cooking myself, nor blood pudding, so i'm out of this fight. it is ironic that many of the great french chefs have been english....

rhe english language is full of french words...

[Neil B]

Some of it is just one-upmanship, or being posh.
For instance "creme anglaise". We call it custard in England, but I suppose if some posh restaurant wants you to cough up your life savings for a dessert with a couple of spoonfuls of yellow, milk based custard, they'll make it sound fancy.

Relationship between UK & France is similar to USA & France - arms length for the most part.
Lots of history, lots of backbiting & snubs (I think they call it being human)

But food? Nah, it's all about where recipes originated, what sounds posh and things like that.

Don't get me started on (lack of) border control at French ports, so all the unwanted refugees somehow manage to cross the channel and get welfare benefits in the UK
Don't get me started on........ nah, just don't get me started.
Enjoy your culinary courses.

Gary - I couldn't eat "black" (blood) pudding either. And relationships are far more recent than the 100 years war.
BTW - the famous "V" sign to someone you dislike, as in F*** OFF - well that came from the battle of Agincourt when we Brits massacred the French due to our archers and longbows. The "V" sign was to say "you ain't got a chance, we're using these 2 fingers to draw the bows -"

[garyb]

history is fun.

there are a lot of french words in english.

i'm sorry for always being such a silly man. if i could be cool, i would be.

btw-why is speaking french posh? french speaking nobles...or not.

http://www.youtube.com/watch?v=zNpWBMNyC0w

[Neil B]

btw-why is speaking french posh?

Perhaps not posh, perhaps pretentious.

To quote Basil Fawlty - "pretentious? Moi?"

And then there was that thing of selling Super Etenards and Exocet guided missiles to Argentina during the Falklands crisis............. you know, the one that the USA kept a very low profile all teh way through (for their special friends the Brits)

I said don't get me started..........

[garyb]

wow! stirred it up this time...sorry.

yeah the rivalries are continuous, and yet there is a love affair, too.

http://www.youtube.com/watch?v=ULuHJgCos7A

there are a lot of french words in english...

[Neil B]

Seriously Gary, I'm just joking. No harm intended. Just being flippant.
I remember having similar fun with the Scots on here a few years back.

First thing you're taught when you go to college in Scotland to train to work in the hotel business.

The first thing you should always say to a guest as they arrive is "Och, you should have been here last week. The weather was lovely"


OOPS SORRY KEN - didn't mean to hijack this thread.

Now, back to French/English cuisine......

[garyb]

seriously, though...
both french and english cooking tends to be disgusting, except for fish and chips and french fries of course.

i'm sorry too. Ken.

[kensuguro]

no prob. What brought this up for me was that apart from the names of dishes, the a l'anglaise part seems to point to a specific technique used in cooking, and most of these techniques involve speed. So was just wondering if that was a coincidence. Place of origin seems to make sense tho, if those techniques were borrowed or were characteristic of English cooking at the time. (at least from the French chefs' perspective)

[Nestor]

seriously, though...
both french and english cooking tends to be disgusting, except for fish and chips and french fries of course.

i'm sorry too. Ken.

No way! If you know where to go, in France you can eat the about the best food of the world. And in the Uk today, there are many amazing restaurants, it is no longer like it used to be about 40 years ago, where this bad fame comes from.

[Nestor]

Ken, à l'anglaise is used most of all when you boil something which is "boiled à l'anglaise", meaning the chosen food has to be cooked in a large volume of salted boiling water. This is done with a relation of about one "big spoon" of salt per every litter of water

Now, folloging Gary's additions, you can always learn from here:

http://www.youtube.com/watch?v=B7UmUX68KtE

[Neil B]

Thanks for enlightening us all Nestor.
Must say, bering English, I've never cooked a l'anglaise

Got to agree with Nestor, Gary, there is some amazing food in France and England.
I think that the French have the attitude too towards food. Preparing a meal means the joy of shopping for the tastiest local produce, the love of preparation and presentation and the laidback hours of eating and drinking with friends and family.
I'd love to go to one of their local markets for fruit & vegetables, for instance.

UK food has improved, but mainly because of external influences - food from other cultures basically.

It's wrong to judge other's food as awful because your palate depends really on your upbringing and where you normally eat.

But you could always try Scottish food - haggis (basically a sheeps stomach with herbs and oats)
Fish & Chips? Too expensive nowadays. Our fish stocks are very low and so there are quotas and therefore the price of fish is very high. All our fish has been stolen by the Spanish, Portugese, Russian and Icelandic fleets so again, we have to look to the Scots for an alternative to fish. They have deep fried pizza and chips or deep fried Mars Bars & chips (I kid you not)

Ken - why not share some of your recipes with us when you have got to the bottom of l'anglaise ???

[garyb]

i'm just not into fancy food.

i like quality ingredients, though. no pigs, no wierd stuff. i like it basic, plain and mostly uncooked, except for meat. cook the meat well. i'm a problem, i know it....

classic french cuisine(another french word in english!) is no.
the british isles classic dishes are no.

i like middle eastern, african, and asian food, for the most part, but none of the "delicacies". i am not adventurous about eating. it's like being a cripple.

[hubird]

i'm just not into fancy food.

i like quality ingredients, though. no pigs, no wierd stuff. i like it basic, plain and mostly uncooked, except for meat. cook the meat well.
...
i like middle eastern, african, and asian food, for the most part, ...

lucky one...
it costs a bit of money tho, pure commerciality these moneymakers of course.

The girl in the last picture left just gave the guy her cash desk ticket with the meal order.
I like the critical eyes of that voluptuous kitchen mama rightmost.
Wide angle lens on my Rocoh GR helped also I'm afraid.

[kensuguro]

lol, gary , if you like middle eastern, african and asian food, that's much more adventurous than many I know here in NY! There once was a guy who literally ate potatoes and chicken for his entire life. Entire life! I kind of doubt it, but he claims it's true.

French cuisine is changing a lot, esp because of the Spanish modern cooking. It's interesting how sauces are becoming more matter of fact (less binding, more concentration) without being drenched in butter or cream, though we learn the traditional methods at school.

I don't think it's all that important to be adventurous about which ingredients you eat, unless you're excluding vital herbs or aromatics.. but what does make a difference is using the correct techniques to extract the maximum flavor from what ingredients you are using. Something plain like a carrot can taste very different between how I cook it (novice), and how a master chef cooks it, even if it's with the same technique. There's so much detail and effort, it's astounding. In a very short amount of time, I've learned so much about green peas, carrots, mushrooms, potatoes, milk, butter, cream, salt, pepper.. all very plain things that turn furiously delicious only when all parameters are dialed in correctly. This doesn't happen often in daily cooking, or even at restaurants, so they get looked down as "boring" ingredients. What we eat daily can be turned delicious, but it takes lots of effort, and concentration... and practice. It's just like an instrument.

[garyb]

Ken, you are so right.

Hubird, lmao. i'll hold off on the sun god worship food. sooner or later that's going to require a burnt human or the appropriate effigy.
by the way, i know folks that do those kinds of food booths at music festivals. it is a living for them, but of course that's not commercial. i love playing for those types of crowds, but i NEVER want to be in the middle of one as a spectator ever again....

[Mr Arkadin]

i'm just not into fancy food.

no pigs, no wierd stuff.

Wow, pigs are weird? I can't get enough pig. Brilliant animal. Bacon and quality sausage for breakfast (but watch out for the cheap sausages), roast pork on a Sunday. Honry roast ham sandwiches anytime. As for pork bellies... yum, must be nice and crispy. Not keen on pig's trotters though. There's something weird about seeing a foot when you're eating.

[Nestor]

Oh Neil, I would say the same you said before: “don’t get me started!” you have touched my culinary sensibility there. Hey, I was a chef in France! No, I’m not kidding, it was a crappy restaurant but I actually did work as a cook of Italian food and handmade pizzas for a few months to pay my studies. The pizzas were made with real wood coal, but understand me well, we did not buy the coal, we had to do it every day in the morning with some big pieces of wood we would cut by hand with an ax. Wow! Best possible pizzas come from those old mud ovens! Man, I want to eat one of them right now…

Glasgow. This is the typical way they will serve you Fish and Chips in the streets of Glasgow, the question is, did they read the news before serving it to your hands? In Scotland you may find the best chips you have ever eaten in your life, their potatoes are just fabulous:





No, Neil’s not joking, it’s true, Mars Bars and Chips, actually, quite nice, except for the extreme amounts of calories:



Wine in France is something really special! You need time and relaxation, sit down under the sun of the French champagne and enjoy some of the best cheeses of the world, and definitely, also some of the best charcuterie of the world! Man, they have such an assortment of amazing products!







Hey Gary, I understand that neither Neil nor me are talking about complicated refined food from England and France, we are rather talking about very tasty food that most people, at least when I was in Europe, could easily get for a few pounds and that it is easy made at home too. It’s not fancy food at all, if you were to tell a Scott that say Fish and Chips is “fancy food”, they will laugh at you and joke about, as it is the most rudimentary food you can eat in there. I remember fondly that some people would get quite drunk at the weekends and then would go and get some Fish and Chips wrapped in a piece of newspapar, and because of the very cold weather, your nose starts snot dripping like water, and…, well…, yes, you mix it with your lovely Fish and Chips for a perfect ingredient been drunk , there are many jokes about it in Glasgow.





Pig is no longer good, it's true, if you see them in farms you will feel such a disgust that you will no longer want to eat them, I understand that, now in those days I was there, French, Sapanish and Uk pigs and charcuteries proceses were risen in plain pure air and animals would be in their natural places and eat totally natural food, no longer today today. We tend not to eat almost any pig food anymore with my wife because of that.

Ken, I think one of the best ways to get the full taste of any vegetable is not boiling it, but cooking with steam, sort of with this item, look:



Everything tastes fuller, richer, and it is much more nutritious for your body too because water does not take away nutrients. One of my favorite tastes for mushrooms comes from steam cooking; they taste much stronger than boiled. I’m sure you will become a good cooker dear Ken, most artists men tend to be good at cooking, curiously.

In Spain there is something called “Jamón Cerrano Pata Negra”, it is amazing mmmmm, quite expensive by the way because pigs for this “Jamón” are risen in a special way and with a unique kind of food, as a matter of face, "acorn". They would eat the whole of their life only acorns and drink water, this is what gives its fantastic texture and taste:





Now, a classic that nobody should pass by ever, a big “Asado Argentino” (Argentinean barbecue), oh man…, this is soooooo good! If you have not eaten one of those yet, you are half alive:







Anyway, I got totally carried away with this one but even if food is wonderful, nutrition is more important, and we have to take care of our health people, we have to be careful particularly with the 3 ingredients that most people abuse from and cause most illness: sodium (salt) fat and sugar.

Now I'm hungry ... This is exactly what I'm going to do tonight, this is made with giant Squid meat...

[garyb]

yeah Nestor, i like that regular stuff. i'm off the pig, though.

that stuff that is like little works of art on the plate doesn't work for me, though. i can certainly admire and enjoy the artistry, i just wouldn't try to live off of that type of cooking.

wasn't there an old chinese story about a man from out in the woods that was like 150 years old and still spry as a young man who caught the attention of the emperor? the emperor brought him to the palace and gave him a grand feast of his finest and richest food to honor him. when the emperor asked the man how he stayed so strong and lived so long, the man replied, "excercise, breathing and simple food". then he died eating the emperor's feast. or something like that....

[hubird]

Hubird, lmao. i'll hold off on the sun god worship food. sooner or later that's going to require a burnt human or the appropriate effigy.

?
A burnt human? Worship?
a poor response, given the pictures and your preferences.
Specially as given after the Asado Argentino pics...