Our food columnist spends a lot of time defending Britain from outdated culinary stereotypes. King Charles’s special coronation dish does not make things easier
Start with its selling points. It is vegetarian, and the planet would be healthier if people ate less meat. Charles has a long interest inand sustainability and, according to a former Royal Family chef, is very fond of eggs and cheese. Camilla has been patron of The Big Lunch, which brings neighbours “together to share friendship, food and fun”, for a decade.
This particular quiche, however, seems both stodgy and rather light on flavour. Beans can be delicious, but they can also, as here, be starchy and bland. Suspending them in an exceptionally rich custard with cooked spinach and just a whisper of tarragon produces a deadeningly heavy, uninviting dish. The 15-minute blind bake seems far too short for a filling with this much milk, cream, eggs and cheese, increasing the risk that the Big Lunch will end up a Big Mess.
Indeed, the quiche seems a throwback to the patchouli-scented vegetarianism of the 1970s and 80s, when vegetarians wanted to make sure everyone knew they eschewed meat not because well-prepared vegetables are delicious, but because they were above such quotidian, selfish concerns as wanting food to actually taste good. There can be few better places anywhere for vegetarians to eat than London, with its profusion of South and East Asian restaurants, and socially conscious chefs and diners.
Charles’s mother’s celebratory dish, chicken in a curried cream sauce, was much worldlier and more imaginative. In its classical French preparation and name (
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