SPOTTED WHAT?

 

1. Stoaty gives away spotted dick as prizes for her dead pool.

   As for the recipe ... no one in the USA will be able to make this. Suet is what we feed the birds; casters go under chairs, not in sugar; currants have something to do with electricity or the waves at the beach, and clotted cream sounds like some dried up old spooge. Also, what is a “litre” and what is a “pudding basin”, a “steamer basket”, a “jug”, or “dropping consistency”?

   We do have lard, white sugar, two shades of brown sugar plus turbinado sugar and bartenders’s sugar, raisins, and we can half whip some heavy cream (which is what the English call “skim milk” I believe). We have medium mixing bowls and small ones too, and can moisten a dry bunch of ingredients until they are like pancake batter or even thicker. We have parchment paper instead of greaseproof, but I think what’s called for here is cheesecloth. But I doubt if 1 home in 10,000 has a functional food scale in the kitchen, accurate to the nearest gram. That’s why we measure things by volume, usually in cups, pints, and parts thereof; although some of us have noticed that those measuring cups are also marked in “liters”, which we ignore.

   So there isn’t any real point in changing the pantomime. We wouldn’t get those jokes anyway. Hell, we don’t even know what a pantomime is. That’s that thing with the 2 pencils and the arms you use to copy a drawing to twice the size, right?

   On the other hand, Fanny is a woman’s name over here, and a fanny pack is some sort of small purse you strap to your belt. We never say the “C word” in decent company, or to any woman at all actually, especially not to our mothers, who are not our Mums. Mums are flowers.

   Two cultures separated by a common language, indeed.

   Posted by Drew458       01/16/2012  at  05:03 PM  



2. And I think you’d be hard pressed to find 1,000 Americans who know who Dick Whittington was. I only know because I saw a parody of the story in a Mr. Natural comic about 11 lifetimes ago, and I remember that sort of crap.

   Posted by Drew458       01/16/2012  at  05:12 PM  



3. Drew is spot on. Travel is supposed to broaden one. If a culture Americanizes itself then there’s no point for us Yanks to leave home.

   And if a culture muslimizes itself then the war is lost without a shot being fired.

   Posted by CenTexTim       01/16/2012  at  05:52 PM  



4. Most Americans haven’t a clue when you mention “panto”.

   Some of the more intellectual ones guess that “panto” is the Ebonic singular for “pants” (i.e. trousers)

   Posted by New Jersey Yankee       01/17/2012  at  05:47 AM  



5. I used to be able to get my clotted (double) cream in at least two places - can’t find it anywhere right now and the Vanilla double cream just did not cut it for the Chocolate Pots (the vanilla overwhelmed the chocolate flavor) - alas I was forced to consume all the left over chocolate pots that none of the girls would eat.

   I learned my lesson after searching for and paying a pretty penny to go to my cookbooks and translate - icing sugar is confectioners sugar. Castor sugar is superfine (Dominos sells one) sugar. Or you can make your own by putting sugar in a blender or food processor.

   As for the metric translation - there are magnets out there (3 bucks) that do it for you and even many cookbooks now put it in there.

   As my daughter would say - Wikipedia, my husband - Google it.

   After the military life for 23 (me, 29) years - it is second nature to 1) want to recreate many of the varied and delicious recipes we have eaten and 2) find a way to translate it into American.

   Spotted Dick sounds more like a bird recipe to me. But then that’s just me.

   Posted by wardmama4       01/17/2012  at  07:53 AM  



6. No pussy jokes???  PBS has shown “Are You Being Served?” for decades with Mrs. Slocum making jokes about her pussy in almost every episode…

   Posted by TimO       01/17/2012  at  09:16 AM  



7. Double cream will still pour. Just. But clotted cream, which is awesomely good, has to be spooned. It’s way too thick to pour. Then there’s extra thick double cream. 
   The Brits do cream very well. Much comes from Devon, known for it’s dairy products. Come to think of it, Cornwall too.
   I couldn’t resist posting that article it was so stupid.

   I still haven’t come to terms with the euro measures that have been forced on us. Hate litres and milliliters and grams etc.  We have a small scale for that nonsense.

   Posted by peiper       01/17/2012  at  11:15 AM  



8. we measure things by volume, usually in cups, pints, and parts thereof; although some of us have noticed that those measuring cups are also marked in “liters”, which we ignore.

   Hear ya.  Mostly older folks understand that BUT. Over here they’re teaching the kids the euro way and so they grow up not having a clue if you say something in pounds. Inches, miles etc.
   Used to be the Brits weighed things in stone(s). Which baffled me. Someone weighs 10 stone.
   Huh?  But a stone is 14lbs so I didn’t used to have a big problem but now that’s changed too.

   Posted by peiper       01/17/2012  at  11:22 AM  

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