Sunday was always the day......Sunday dinner. Roasts in ovens all over England. (probably the rest of the British Isles as well, but I can only speak for England). It meant family dinner. During the week both parents worked at my house. Saturday my dad would do garden chores and mum would clean the house. Sunday then was the time to relax, go for a Sunday drive and have Sunday dinner. When I was a child roast beef was the cheapest meal, as opposed to lamb or chicken or pork. That's what we usually had. We did sometimes have a leg of lamb. I was not so fond of that but it was still a wonderful meal. My mother did like to cook. It seems now she didn't really get a day off but that's life when you are in a family. Sometimes my Grandparents would come over but usually it was just us.
Sunday dinner..........Roast beef, Yorkshire pudding, Brussel sprouts, roast potatoes and gravy. The best meal ever and the only one now to compare is our Thanksgiving or Christmas Dinners. Every week was a variation of that theme. Neighbours would pop in for a cup of tea and mum would say " have you got your roast in" and that would begin a discussion on what Mr Pratt the butcher had worked out for them.
Back then you went into the butcher shop and asked for a roast for the number of people you wanted to serve. He would then take a fresh joint of meat and cut it to the size required. It was rolled and held together with metal skewers and held tight with string.
With the roast would be roasted potatoes tasting extra good cooked with the beef roast.
The Yorkshire pudding was at one time a "filler" just flour and eggs mainly but when cooked with the roast it is just awesome.
Its a real shame that now people go out to eat more and more. A lot of pubs do a traditional English Sunday roast, but its not really the same is it. It was more the fact that before all the cell phones, the ipads and even daytime TV families would do something together after Sunday lunch, the roast would be in and the house smelled heavenly and a game of dominoes or scrabble maybe................snakes and ladders for me if I could get Dad to play. Sigh those were the days
Sunday dinner..........Roast beef, Yorkshire pudding, Brussel sprouts, roast potatoes and gravy. The best meal ever and the only one now to compare is our Thanksgiving or Christmas Dinners. Every week was a variation of that theme. Neighbours would pop in for a cup of tea and mum would say " have you got your roast in" and that would begin a discussion on what Mr Pratt the butcher had worked out for them.
Back then you went into the butcher shop and asked for a roast for the number of people you wanted to serve. He would then take a fresh joint of meat and cut it to the size required. It was rolled and held together with metal skewers and held tight with string.
With the roast would be roasted potatoes tasting extra good cooked with the beef roast.
The Yorkshire pudding was at one time a "filler" just flour and eggs mainly but when cooked with the roast it is just awesome.
Its a real shame that now people go out to eat more and more. A lot of pubs do a traditional English Sunday roast, but its not really the same is it. It was more the fact that before all the cell phones, the ipads and even daytime TV families would do something together after Sunday lunch, the roast would be in and the house smelled heavenly and a game of dominoes or scrabble maybe................snakes and ladders for me if I could get Dad to play. Sigh those were the days
