Kerala

Fission chips. 6/10. Perfectly OK. I'm at the Queen's Medical Centre in Nottingham. A few years ago I was at a medics pub quiz and the best team name was The Queen's Gynaecologists.

Sausages, I think. I asked the lady behind the counter. "Yes, my love! Fried bread is deep fried. We can do you toast if you'd like?" I sent for the healthy option today: a hash brown!

Apparently not necessarily*deep* fried.

Yes, the young woman was confused. Definitely nothing French about that bread.

@Smithy Fried bread is literally deep-fried sliced white bread. Conventionally it would be deep-fried in lard. It's a very traditional part of a cooked breakfast in the UK, but deeply unfashionable. Nowadays it's usually replaced by buttered toast. I've only had it a very few times in my life, on trekking holidays etc. Funny seeing it on an NHS hospital breakfast menu, but that breakfast would be deeply tempting after an overnight on-call.

Hospital cafeteria food, as a visitor. It's never good to be in a position to eat here. Breakfast of champions. Scrambled eggs, sausage, bacon, baked beans, fried bread. The standard is strictly mediocre, like a railway caff or a roadside van. You could say it is as it should be. One of the customers kept calling it French toast. Lunch: (chicken) katsu sando. That's what they called it! Chips were my addition. Salt and lots of pepper. I'm rather cross with the universe at the moment, so I'm somewhat in the mood for self-sabotage.

Looks delicious, as your breakfasts always do. I was somewhere in the same vicinity this morning: Sourdough bread, frikadelle, gruyere, coleslaw, peperoncini paste. There's tea in the mug.

Oh, I do love anchovies! No one else at home eats them, so it's not that often I open a tin or bottle. I don't like the olive oil clagging up in the fridge, so I'll search out some packed in salt.

That's an air fryer jacket potato on the plate with the sardines. These were very good with a dab of peperoncino preserve, mashed into the spud. I used the olive oil from the tin instead of butter.

Shepherd's pie.

I'm in Norfolk on the coast this weekend. Bit of a splurge at Gurneys Fish Shop.

We moved to a more upmarket area as my career progressed a few years ago. I was impressed to find pigs ears in the local Co-Op. Ooh! It took me a few beats to realise I was in the dog food section.

I'm not really posh, so I use the fork concave side up for peas and baked beans. If I'm in posh company I would most definitely use concave side up to stay true to my working class roots. Welcome to the British class system. The overhand grip on the knife is the generally accepted technique in the United Kingdom. The "English hold from below grip" sounds like a pen grip? It's not standard in the UK but people do use it. I would sneer at this grip, and acknowledge my horrible bourgeois programming. While continuing to use my fork upside down.

@haresfur yes, we mix the sloppy bits with the rice. We may or may not have a piece of meat or vegetable in the portion we bring to our mouth. When we eat rice, we use our fingertips, and the palm remains clean. My grandfather from Tamil Nadu, the state just to the East, would use his whole hand. Other people form balls of rice and gravy before passing food to their lips. The action to form the balls by tossing and rolling the semi-solid amalgam of rice and curry is something we don't see much in the west in any context and is difficult to explain. There is a lot of variation across India and even within Kerala. Chappathi is North Indian but completely normal in Kerala. I've never had naan in Kerala. Parottas in Kerala are not paratha of N India, although similar. With all of these, we'd scoop up the gravy and maybe grab a piece of meat to pop in our mouth. Licking your fingers after eating - variable acceptability! Naturally, everyone thinks their way is the right way. @haresfur do you hold the roti in your right hand or left when you load it with a fork? Right hand- many Indians would do this if they're eating at a restaurant when abroad. Left hand- no one is judging you; thank you for your custom. I hold the roti in my left hand... I know I'm being judged. Equally, I'm sure the Chinese waiter doesn't give a hoot how cack-handedly I hold my chopsticks! On the other hand, we're all pretty judgemental about how someone holds their knife and fork, aren't we? Are we?

In Kerala we use our fingers. Yoghurt, rasam and sambar are mixed with rice and eaten by hand. Payasam is eaten off the leaf by hand, but in recent decades may be served in small bowls and eaten with a spoon. I sustained a gory injury to my right arm when I was a house officer 35 years ago and the median nerve didn't grow back quite right. Not only do I lack the fine dexterity to eat rice elegantly with my fingers, but I also suffer sensitivity to hot food on my fingertips. Sadly I now eat Indian food in the English manner. Chopsticks are impossible for me to grasp properly since the accident, so I use them cack-handedly. I just endure the ignominy. Worst of all, I sometimes eat Indian food with my left hand. I'm sure people think I lost my culture growing up in the UK!