I Miss English Food

I’ve been living in Japan for almost 3 years now, and I haven’t visited home that often in the time that I’ve been here. There are several things I miss about my home country, but the thing that I’d like to talk about here is English food.

Something I’ve discovered since coming to Japan is that English food actually has quite a bad reputation. Honestly, this is something I don’t understand because I personally love English food. Maybe this is because I grew up eating it so I’m accustomed to the styles and flavors. However, it seems that a lot of people dislike English food. I have a theory about this, though.

I think that the best English food is homemade, the kind of food that your parents or grandparents would make fresh. I think that kind of food tastes very different from the kind of food you get at restaurants. Some restaurants have decent English food, but generally I think that if you traveled to England and only ate English food at restaurants, your impression of English food would probably not be that good.

Maybe the reason English food has such a bad reputation is that people are only eating the lesser version of English food. Or maybe I am just in denial and can’t accept that people don’t like my home country’s food.

There could be another reason why people often don’t like English food. Some other European countries like France and Italy are very famous for their cuisine. I think food is a large part of both France and Italy’s cultures. For England, though, food is not as much a part of the culture. English people still love food, of course, but if we go to a restaurant, it’s likely to be for non-English food. English people often eat Italian food, Chinese food, and Indian food.

When people come to England, they might expect that the food will be extremely good like how French food and Italian food is, as England is also a European country. When they then eat English food at restaurants, they’re probably quite disappointed.

To me, English food is not about the fantastic, unique, interesting flavors that you would travel the world to try. It’s more about comfort and simplicity. Fish & chips, beans on toast, roast dinners covered in gravy… These dishes aren’t on the same level as famous dishes from other countries, but they don’t have to be. Instead, they’re often affordable, easy to cook, and can be eaten repeatedly without becoming too boring.
Luckily for me, a lot of the ingredients used to make English food can be bought in Japan, so I can still make some English food (because it’s easy to cook, like I mentioned before). One of the hardest things for me to find in Japan though has been gravy. Gravy sauce is a key component of many English meals, so I would like it if it were more commonly sold in Japan.

To wrap up this article, I’d like to recommend that if you travel to England, you should try home-cooked English food. I think it’s tastier than what you’d find in many restaurants!

Thomas

Vocabulary

accustomed (adjective) – the feeling when you are used to something; acclimated
lesser (adjective) – smaller, not as great as
denial (noun) – a state of not accepting the truth of something
cuisine (noun) – a style of cooking
key component (compound noun) – a very important part of something