Observer/Guardian blog asks, “What is British food?”

Good question. The post consists of a video interview with three British food bloggers, who are asked by the interviewer to suggest a quintessentially British menu. They were apparently caught off guard, though, so be sure to read the commenters’ suggestions.

My hasty (and probably overly cynical) contribution:

Starter: a drink or three
Main: the wood pigeon in my garden, baked in a pie
Pud: something made with suet and dried fruit and maybe a little more booze, steamed, and doused in cream, custard, or both.

Le Caprice: Posh British food, now in Manhattan

Today’s NYTimes reviews a recently opened branch of London institution Le Caprice, a restaurant that provides as much a social experience involving rock stars and MPs than a dining experience. Sam Sifton passed along the story of Ian Dury making a scene and getting punched in the face by Omar Sharif; this story is also told (warning: gratuitous plug) in the excellent new Ian Dury biopic, Sex & Drugs & Rock & Roll. Sifton describes the New York branch as serving “mostly nursery food with colonial accents”; you can order, for example, sticky toffee pudding, and the best dish, he says, is a smoked haddock tart (rare in America? yes, I suppose it would be). The American version of Le Caprice, though, lacks the celebrity edge and depravity, but you can find that elsewhere in New York.