Hungry? Hungover? Overtaken by a craving for bacon, egg, baked beans, sausage and a fried slice? There was a time when the remedy was readily to be found at the local greasy spoon. Steamy windows, formica-topped tables, a cosy fug of frying bacon, strong tea and damp work clothes – so cherished a British institution were these humble establishments that in 2013 the American magazine Food & Wine published a round-up of “London’s Best Greasy Spoons”.
It was unfamiliar territory for readers of the publication that introduced American foodies to “Perrier, the purple Peruvian potato and Patagonian toothfish”, and the article began with a baffled attempt to define the strange charm of the greasy spoon: “Roughly analogous to an American diner – but without the free refills … most customers just call them caffs – i.e. café without pronouncing the ‘e’.” The unwary transatlantic visitor “might see dishes that you thought had died out in the 1950s, such as boiled bacon or liver and onions. You will not get salad…” The Brits, it added, were strangers to crispy bacon: “Many British people like a soggy rasher.”
Thus forewarned, it seems unlikely that any but the most intrepid American tourist would have braved a soggy rasher, let alone the black pudding, dripping toast and mug of Camp Coffee that were the specialities of George’s, the caff that sustained my student years.
Now, however, even those who fancy an alternative to an Egg McMuffin may struggle to find it, for the greasy spoon has become an endangered species.
The hammer-blow of lockdown, combined with rising rents, the inexorable advance of chain coffee shops and a health-conscious aversion to the old-fashioned fry-up, has seen a lengthening list of greasy spoons close their doors, or reinvent themselves as hipster hangouts.
Given the cyclical nature of fashion, the greasy spoon will probably rise again, albeit with organic sausages, craft beers and prices to match. But something irreplaceable will have been lost with the passing of those cheap, nourishing and infinitely democratic establishments: the original caffs without an “e”.
No more sherry vases
In one of my favourite television shows, Friday Night Lights, the long-suffering wife of a high-school football coach in Texas is to be seen knocking back ever-vaster goblets of wine. Her cornucopias of chardonnay brought to mind Auberon Waugh’s recollection of his mother, Laura, a devout Catholic, who allowed herself a single daily glass of sherry during Lent, sipped from “a receptacle which others might have identified as an exceptionally large flower vase”.
But for wine o’clock, as for fry-ups, the future looks uncertain. In 2017, the British Medical Journal reported that the size of wine glasses had increased sevenfold over the past three centuries, from 66ml in 1700 to 449ml in 2017. Now a belated hangover has set in: sales of small wine glasses (250ml or less) at John Lewis have risen by 13 per cent over the past year.
For years, as I dutifully follow Rowley Leigh’s infallible timetable for cooking Christmas lunch without tears, I have obeyed his injunction to “treat yourself to another drink”. As we approach what the BMJ cheerily described as “the culturally legitimised deviancy of festive drinking”, I look forward with dismay to wrangling the turkey in a state of irreproachable sobriety.
