Trending
The full English breakfast isn’t actually English, academic claims
Our traditional Christmas dinner isn’t quite as British as we’d thought, either…
Passionate patriots and fry up enthusiasts, you may want to look away now.
According to a Cambridge academic, the humble full English breakfast isn’t actually that English at all.
Dr. Ha-Joon Chang, an institutional economist from South Korea, has taken the time to research the origins of each tasty component of the traditional fry up, none of which are actually considered to be English.
According to Dr. Chang, bacon comes from Denmark, eggs can ‘come from anywhere’ and hash browns are actually American in origin.
Nonsap Visuals / Unsplash
He said that while he loves a fry up, bacon ‘is a result of the Danes industrialising the process of rearing pigs in the 19th century’.
Dr. Chang added: “Hash browns are very American. They are also, from the point of view of the restaurant, the easiest dish to cook because they’re frozen and ready-made.”
And it turns out a number of other British delicacies aren’t too patriotic, either, including fish and chips and, shockingly, the beloved Christmas dinner.
He explained: “Fish and chips came to Britain through Sephardic Jewish people from Spain and Portugal.”
Ajeet Panesar / Unsplash
“As for the Christmas dinner, the potatoes are from Peru, turkeys are from Mexico, the carrots are from Afghanistan, and the Brussel sprouts are from Belgium.”
This comes after an American woman living in the UK revealed what exactly people on the other side of the pond think of our fry ups… and, spoiler, it isn’t positive.
Lisa Dollan, who moved to Leeds from her hometown in Georgia back in 2014, described ‘things that would freak the Americans out about the UK’, adding that one of them is ‘what y’all eat for breakfast’.
She said: “O.M.G. If they [Americans] saw the mushrooms, the tomatoes, the baked beans, all of this, the full English, they would absolutely flip out.”