On Mon, 07 Mar 2005 13:48:17 +0000, The Reids
I don't think you'd have found many male cooks among the Spanish miners. (How far back does the modern fancy idea of tapas go, BTW? I remember a travelogue in which one bar's idea of tapas was bread and lard.)
Food isn't the only British "mystery". There's music. In the late middle ages and Renaissance England, then underpopulated and backward, rivalled sophisticated, urbanised Italy as a centre of music. After the rest of Purcell (168 plus 15), England failed to produce a single composer of international repute for nearly two hundred years. Yet foreign visitors in that time found the country to be alive with music at the grbutt roots - and foreign composers held high esteem. The reformation obviously played some part in destroying the monastic tradition of patronising music. But on the continent sternly protestant princes happily continued to sponsor musicians and pay for private bands. So what happened here? I suspect there's an analogy with food.
OTOH there's gardens. England has traditionally enjoyed very high esteem as a centre of ornamental gardening at all levels. Yet what could be less puritannical and functional than pretty flowers? Even now England in summer is alive with flowers compared to most other countries. Climate is part of it - but our climate isn't unique. If the reverse were the case it would no doubt be "explained" that flowers were disapproved of by those stern puritannical Victorians (or something). The Victorians also loved bright household colours, contrary to popular belief. It was only when Victoria was in mourning that drabness came into fashion. -- Phil C.
