Feeding frenzy...

As mentioned in my last epistle, food on the New Planet plays a big part in every one's lives, so I'll continue on this delectable topic for now...

Once a traveller has mastered that great institution known as 'the pub', and fallen prey to the monstrous carvery with its soggy carrots, undercooked meat and runny gravy, one can explore the other delights that the New Planet has to offer. Seldom will a being leave a Sunday lunch at the pub with enough energy to do anything more than collapse on the couch with trousers (not pants because these are what one wears under clothes) undone and stare at the telly. Last (or first depending on how you look at things) Day of the Week dinner is a big thing on this planet and you can’t get more traditional than roast beef and potatoes, Yorkshire pudding, peas, sprouts, carrots and gravy, followed by the ubiquitous sticky toffee or banoffee pie pudding. Of course, there are still some brave enough to actually cook this meal 'from scratch' and serve it up from the comfort of their own homes. Even one such as myself, who grew up in the Southernmost Colony, was inducted into this ancestral right back on the old planet as old and new ways merged to create a new species of being, the Britbok. Obviously this was before discovering the delights of charring dead animal flesh on a open fire built inside half an oil drum, an activity that would not be well received by the ''ealf an' safety' dictators (or the 'No, you shall Never Have Any Fun Again or Use Common Sense to Prevent a Ridiculous Accident Police', as I like to call them) that reign supreme here.

Of course there are the usual speedy-cuisine outlets, the golden arches, the genial grey-haired man with his deep-fried, cholesterol raising fowl and assorted places that serve dead animal flesh skewered on a strip of metal, but let us not forget that famous New Planetarian institution, the faithful 'chippy', often creatively named (In Cod we Trust, Almighty Cod, The Frying Machine). Ah yes, white fishy flesh wrapped in a heart attack, I mean batter, and slices of deep-fried root vegetable wrapped in newspaper…actually in a polystyrene non-biodegradable container or soggy packet, smothered in salt and vinegar and loaded with fat. Yum.

There is a very odd tradition here that I have yet to make sense of, the fondness for what they call "mushy peas". This is not as exotic as it sounds. They are really squashed and battered peas with the same texture as green peanut butter and the same coarse, dry stick-to-the-top-of-my-mouth-making-me-feel-like-I’ll-never-be-able-to- talk-again properties as the brown stuff. Usually a large dollop is served up on top of the strips of root vegetable, turning them green and leaving little lime coloured rivulets of liquid for the cod or hake to wallow in. I’m sorry, but I can’t take them seriously.