British Billy tucks into a Sunday roast

  • Published
  • By British Billy
  • 48th Fighter WingPublic Affairs
ROYAL AIR FORCE Lakenheath, England --  I'm one of those fortunate individuals who doesn't have to worry about my weight. My svelte physique is maintained by my personalised fitness regime which involves a strict routine of sprinting and hunting. As a lifelong carnivore, just the smell of a roast in the oven causes me to purr with ecstasy. I can be at my most endearing and irresistible when there is a morsel of meat up for the begging.

The Sunday roast dinner is still a tradition in many British families, when they all sit down together to eat a veritable feast of roasted meat served with roast potatoes, vegetables and all the trimmings.

To understand where the tradition originated, let me take you back several hundred years. In medieval times, the village serfs served the squire for six days a week. Sundays, however, were a day of rest, and after the morning church service, serfs would assemble in a field and practice their battle techniques. They were rewarded with mugs of ale and a feast of oxen roasted on a spit.

The tradition has survived because the meat can be put in the oven to roast before the family goes to church and be ready to eat when they return.

Typical meats for roasting are joints of beef, pork, lamb or a whole chicken. More rarely, duck, goose, gammon, turkey or game are eaten.

The more popular roasts are often served with traditional accompaniments. Roast beef is generally served with Yorkshire pudding and horseradish sauce or English mustard as relishes. Roast pork is served with crackling (the crispy skin of the pork), stuffing, apple sauce and English mustard. You should eat your roast lamb with mint sauce and roast chicken with stuffing and bread sauce. There are regional variations to all of these.

Any self-respecting Sunday roast should also be accompanied by gravy made from the meat juices.

Some say that mint sauce became the essential accompaniment to roast lamb in Britain thanks to Queen Elizabeth I. Apparently the wool industry was going through some rough times, and in order to curb her subjects' appetite for lamb and mutton, she decreed that the meat could only be served with bitter herbs. Enterprising cooks soon discovered that mint made the meat taste better, not worse.

Another theory is that the association of mint with lamb suggests it is a legacy of the roast lamb and bitter herbs eaten by the Israelites on the eve of their Exodus from Egypt.

I prefer catnip myself, of course.

As you travel around, you will find that many pubs and restaurants will offer a carvery for Sunday lunch, where the chef will slice however much meat you would like directly from the roast. Many of my American chums have made this a regular habit during their time here.

If you haven't already tried it, I would highly recommend a traditional Sunday roast lunch, followed by a post-prandial nap on a comfy chair. You can always start your fitness regime again on Monday morning.