British Recipes & Food Ideas

We're still dreaming about the toffee sauce.

The pillowy turmeric mashed potatoes are irresistible.

Even fruitcake skeptics will approve.

The shortbread is buttery and tender, the caramel soft but not gooey.

English breakfast, Irish breakfast, Scottish breakfast … why are they served at breakfast, and is there really any difference between them? According to Frank Sanchez of Upton Tea Imports, each breakfast tea blend has it owns flavor profile and different caffeine levels. Breakfast teas are black tea blends intended to accompany a hearty, rich morning meal (think of the full English breakfast or fry-up) and are therefore more robust than afternoon tea blends.

Long live the Queen — and long live happy accidents that turn into delicious recipes!

Bring it to your next cookout and watch it disappear.

Layers upon layers of cake, sweet fruit, and cheesecake-like cream.

Simple and comforting.

It's been around since the 1800s.

Making it from scratch is easier than you might think.

Beef Wellington is the fancy-pants dinner we all deserve.

Ground beef, veggies, mashed potatoes, and a rich gravy.

Whether you're serving tea or lunch, these cucumber sandwiches are a simple, elegant addition.

Perfect for savory breakfast-lovers.

It's even better than the bottled stuff.

They're the U.K. equivalent to pigs in a blanket.

It's a showstopping plant-based Thanksgiving main.

It's ridiculously good — and surprisingly easy to make.

Turns out coddled eggs are easier (and more delicious) than poached eggs.

Move over, apple cider doughnuts — there's a new breakfast favorite this fall.

They have major Tollhouse vibes.

This sandwich is so popular throughout the United Kingdom that Prince Harry even organized a “survivor’s breakfast” complete with bacon butties the morning after Prince William’s wedding to Kate Middleton.

Don't skip the air fryer (frozen) french fries.

It's like a cross between a pancake, crumpet, and British scone.

They're lighter and spongier. (Read: even better.)

Our tip? Make a double batch.

You'll never make them any other way.

It's the perfect centerpiece for a dinner table or dessert party.

Spoiler: It worked wonders on dirty backsplash grout!

Great news: Some of these ARE available stateside!

It's all thanks to one smart ingredient.

Perfect for a relaxing meal after a hectic Thanksgiving.

The goal: Cracker-like on the outside and super fluffy on the inside.

You only need three very basic ingredients to make them.

Whether you call it a pudding or a popover, this eggy cloud-like side dish is as delicious as it is impressive.

It's like a messier (and way easier) strawberry shortcake.

And why do carolers always want some?

As you probably know, Instagram can lead you down quite the rabbit hole. A rabbit hole of fancy, high-end kitchens that can make you feel even worse about your own kitchen. We discovered this first-hand recently, while Insta-stalking DeVol, a UK-based kitchen design firm. We don’t even know how we got to the account, but once we started, we just couldn’t stop. The good news, though?

A few smart shortcuts make this the easiest shepherd's pie we know.

The Great British Bake Off is coming back to U.S. television — but this time around it will be without Mary Berry (we’ll miss her kindly fibs!) and the original hosts, Mel and Sue. Paul Hollywood (oh he of goateed glory) and new co-judge Prue Leith will be joined by comedian hosts Noel Fielding and Sandi Toksvig. None of this is new knowledge — after all, this all-new cast already aired last fall when the beloved show moved from the BBC to Channel 4 in England.

I have been in and out of Manchester, England several times this spring and I can say, with 100 percent certainty, that the staff at the Manchester airport will always ensure that you’re having a pleasant experience — even when a uniformed stranger is searching through your suitcase for a full-sized tube of toothpaste you forgot that you packed. There’s also a better-than-average restaurant called The Lion and Antelope that is always busy (even at 6:45 a.m.

Ridiculously creamy, light-bodied lemon curd that comes from a high-speed blender seems too good to be true, right? Since this custard-like curd is usually cooked slowly and gently on the stove to avoid the risk of curdling, you’d think so. But it’s not too good to be true! And the results are more lush and dreamy than you may have ever thought possible. Here’s how to make your dream a reality. I am the first to tell you I was skeptical.

One of the oddest things for an American watching British television competitions is how small some of the prizes are. U.S. shows tend to feature high-stakes drama and contestants battling over things like a Tesla full of diamonds or, at the very least, a novelty check for $100,000. The winners of The Great British Bake Off get a cake stand. People enter The Great British Bake Off because they love to bake, not to win a huge pile of prize money.

Continuing the love-fest for all things British, we reached out to our Brit friends to see what kitchen brands we may be missing out on. Fortunately, thanks to the wonders of the world wide web and international shipping, most British and European brands are fairly accessible Stateside. But there are a few that are pretty rare over here. Here are the five brands that came up the most in our informal poll.

My favorite way to use Airbnb has nothing to with actually booking trips: I just like to peek into people’s perfectly styled homes and see how people live. You can almost always get a good idea or three just from looking at photos. Here are seven organizing tricks we learned during a recent trip through some British Airbnbs. Open shelves full of food packaging look messy — but put dry goods into containers (either glass or opaque) and, all of a sudden, they become artful.

I’ve always loved to cook, but for a long time I felt restrained by the rigidity of baking. To me, cooking allowed for more creativity and improvisation (and I could add extra garlic or hot sauce to almost everything without serious consequence).

When a Brit tells you they're baking, you can generally assume that a cake is about to come out of the oven.

Royal weddings have always fascinated people around the world, and Prince Harry and Meghan Markle’s upcoming wedding has been no different. Wedding experts, historians, “sources close to the palace,” and Instagram sleuths alike have been speculating on the details of the nuptials since the engagement was announced last November. This particular royal wedding is extra special, considering the British-American union.

The Great British Bake Off can be a portal into a magical world of British food shows. My British television journey kicked off with years of Nigella and Sophie Dahl wandering through spiffy kitchens, making squidgy sweets, and introducing me to a universe of treacle and golden syrup and self-deprecating British humor.

Every country has its own particular foods, and you can get as much of a local sampling by hitting the grocery store as you can from a street food vendor. I haven’t been to London in almost 10 years, but I remember the thrill of discovering that “crisps” were potato chips — and that they came in an array of flavors I’d never heard of before. These days, you obviously don’t even have to take a flight if you want to try out the fun snacks from any given country.

Perhaps you’ve not heard, but it seems there’s a royal wedding this weekend. It’s rather a big to-do, as Prince Henry Charles Albert David of Wales and Miss Rachel Meghan Markle prepare to walk down the aisle. As the happy couple gets ready to settle into a lifetime of marital bliss, there’s one question we’re all undoubtedly dying to know the answer to: What will Harry and Meghan cook for dinner?

Before the Victoria sponge, British sponge cakes were leavened only by eggs hand-whisked with sugar until foamy and thick. Sometime in the mid-1800s, an unheralded genius realized that the recent invention of baking powder meant butter could be creamed in with the sugar, resulting in a firmer, longer-lasting, less temperamental sponge. And that’s how we ended up with cake we know today: a toothsome, bouncy sponge that is comparatively easy to whip up and has a rich, buttery flavor.

Between the rich coffee essence and toasty walnut flavor, this sophisticated layer cake is what to turn to when a celebration is in order.

A lemon drizzle cake is more of a concept than an actual recipe. Although there is a time and a place for Madeira-type plain lemon sponge, sometimes just a bit more pizzazz and sugar is required. A drizzle cake is just a lemon sponge cake that’s soaked while still warm with a glaze made of lemon juice and sugar, which adds a crisp crust as it cools.

A Madeira cake is the sort of plain cake that looks like it might be dull and dry, but instead turns out to be exceptionally moreish.

A simple yet festive chocolate cake you can use for birthdays or just serve as a luxurious after-dinner dessert.

Instead of picking up pastries or a coffee cake at the grocery store or bakery, add these lemony blueberry scones to your Easter brunch menu. Loaded with plump blueberries and lemon zest, these tender, golden-brown scones use buttermilk instead of heavy cream and are drizzled with a lemony glaze at the end for an extra hit of citrus flavor. Best of all, the scone dough can be made, frozen, and baked so they can be served fresh without any fuss or stress.

You can get "jacket potatoes" for just $2.

With a history going back to the Middle Ages, and traditionally served as an accompaniment to fowl of all kinds — chicken, turkey, and game birds — bread sauce is to a British Christmas dinner what a green bean casserole is to an American Thanksgiving.