Food and Drink


Abbey Beer
Abbey Beers are strong fruity beers brewed in Belgium under licence from religious communities. They are based upon the style of beers brewed by the monasteries.

Affenthaler
Affenthaler is a red wine which takes its name from the Village of Affenthaler in Baden.

Ale
Ale is a vague term applied to any top-fermented beer.

Alginate
Alginate is an apparently safe derivative of kelp, it is used as a food additive to maintain the desired texture in dairy products, canned frosting, and other factory-made foods. Propylene glycol alginate, a chemically-modified algin, thickens acidic foods (soda pop, salad dressing) and stabilises the head in beer.

Altbier
Altbier is a style of bitter German beer produced in the ancient style of brewing using top-fermentation. It produces copper-coloured aromatic ales.

Arrack
Arrack is a coarse liquor manufactured in the East Indies from a large variety of substances, for example fermented rice or coconut juice. Arrack is transparent and the colour of straw and has a peculiar but agreeable taste and contains bewteen 52 and 54% alcohol.

Arundel Footslogger
Arundel Footslogger is a pale, straw-coloured beer from the Arundel Brewery.

Bacon
Bacon is the side or back of pork which has been preserved by salting and drying.

Bannock
A bannock is a flat, round cake made of oat or barley meal, or a mixture of both, moistened with water and toasted upon a girdle.

Barley Wine
Barley Wine is an English name for a very powerful, thick strong ale.

Beamish
Beamish is an Irish stout brewed only in Ireland, in Cork. It has a distinctive flavour achieved through the use of malted wheat as well as barley in the mash.

Beer
Beer is a drink of fermented hops, malt and barley.

Benedictine
Benedictine is a green liqueur.

Biere de Garde
Biere de Garde is a French style of top-fermented beer originally brewed in north-west France farms, but now produced commercially.

Bitter
Bitter is an English style of draught ale served in pubs.

Bitters
Bitters is an alcoholic beverage of sugar herbs and alcohol. The herbs used are naturally bitter, hence the name, and may include gentian, quassia, angelica, bog-bean, camomile, hops, centuary and others.

Black Beer
Black Beer is a strong-tasting bitter-chocolate lager brewed in Germany. In Yorkshire, Black Beers are treacly malt extracts bottled for mixing with lemonade to produce distinctive shandies.

Black Velvet
Black velvet is a drink consisting of equal proportions of stout and champagne.

Bock
Bock (Bockbier) is a German beer made with more malt and less hops than ordinary German beer, and is as a result sweeter and stronger. It was originally brewed for colder months as a 'winter warmer'.

Bockbier
see "Bock"

Bouquet
Bouquet is the characteristic flavour and aroma of a wine, due partly to the presence of volatile organic ethers, such as acetic, propylic, butylic and amylic, and partly to the ferments such as yeasts used in fermenting the must.

Bousa
Bousa is a native Ethiopian beer which is brewed by spontaneous fermentation.

Brains SA
Brains SA is a medium strength British bottled ale. It is brewed with Fuggles and Golding hops and has a fruity taste.

Bran
Bran is the outer covering of wheat grains. During milling the bran is removed from the finer flour.

Brandy
Brandy is an alcoholic beverage of distilled wine.

Brawn
Brawn is a food preparation produced from pig flesh freed from all bones, formed into a roll, boiled and pressed.

Brown Ale
Brown Ale is a sweetish, bottled mild ale, dark in colour and low in alcohol. In north-east England stronger brown ales are brewed.

Bunny Hug
A Bunny Hug is a cocktail comprised of equal parts of gin, Scotch whisky and pastis shaken together and then strained into a glass.

Canning
Canning is the commercial operation of food preserving which involves the use of heat and sealing the food in airtight containers.

Casareep
Casareep is the concentrated juice of the roots of the cassava flavoured with aromatics and boiled to remove the toxins. It is then used as a relish in soups and other dishes. It is the basis of the Jamaican dish ''pepper-pot''. Casareep is also a powerful antiseptic and was used for preserving meat in tropical countries.

Cassareep
Cassareep is a brown syrup made from grated cassava boiled down with salt, brown sugar, cinnamon and cloves.

Caudle
Caudle is a warm, thin spiced gruel made with wine and sugar which was given to invalids and women after childbirth.

Chablis
Chablis is a white burgundy wine produced near the town of the same name in the Yonne departement of central France.

Chambertin
Chambertin is a high quality red Burgundy wine named after the place where it is produced. It was a favourite with Louis XIV and Napoleon.

Cheese
Cheese is a food made from the curds (solids) of soured milk from cows, sheep, or goats, separated from the whey (liquid), then salted, put into moulds, and pressed into firm blocks. Cheese is ripened with bacteria or surface fungi, and kept for a time to mature before eating. There are six main types of cheese. Soft cheeses may be ripe or unripe, and include cottage cheese and high-fat soft cheeses such as Bel Paese, Camembert, and Neufchatel. Semi-hard cheeses are ripened by bacteria (Munster) or by bacteria and surface fungi (Port Salut, Gouda, St Paulin); they may also have penicillin moulds injected into them (Roquefort, Gorgonzola, Blue Stilton, Wensleydale). Hard cheeses are ripened by bacteria, and include Cheddar, Cheshire, and Cucciocavallo; some have large cavities within them, such as Swiss Emmental and Gruyere. Very hard cheeses, such as Parmesan and Spalen, are made with skimmed milk. Processed cheese is made with dried skim-milk powder and additives, and whey cheese is made by heat coagulation of the proteins from whey; examples are Mysost and Primost. From 1980 in France a cheese has the same appellation controlee status as wine if it is made only in a special defined area – for example, Cantal and Roquefort are appellation controlee cheeses, but not Camembert and Brie, which are made in more than one region.

Cider
Cider is an alcoholic beverage made from fermented apple juice. The manufacture consists in crushing the apples and squeezing out the juice. The juice is poured into casks, where it ferments and clears itself of impurities. The strength and flavour of the cider is dependant upon the variety of apple used.

Clotted Cream
Clotted Cream is made by allowing milk to stand in shallow pans for 12 hours at 60 degrees farenheight and then gently heating it to 180 degrees farenheight until the surface becomes wrinkled. More cream is separated by this system and it is more easily churned, and the scalding cures taints. Clotted cream contains about 67.5 per cent butterfat.

Coca Wine
Coca Wine (vinum cocoe) was a wine used for stimulating purposes around 1905, consisting of one part coca and eight parts sherry. It was strongly medicated, containing half a grain of alkaloid in the ounce. It was largely consumbed by drunks who bought it from licensed grocers. A weaker preparation was sold by wine merchants. It was probably the inspiration for the non-alcoholic drink Coca-Cola.

Coca-Cola
Coca-Cola is the trade name of a sweetened, carbonated drink, originally made with coca leaves and flavoured with cola nuts, and containing caramel and caffeine. It was invented in 1886 and sold in every state of the USA by 1895 and in 155 countries by 1987.

Collops
Collops is a British dish of minced meat fried with onions and then slowly cooked in stock.

Coniston Bluebird
Coniston Bluebird is a medium strength British bottled malt pale ale brewed with English challenger hops giving a floral perfume to the beer.

Cooking
Cooking is the art of preparing food for the table by subjecting it to heat in various ways. In its higher developments, cooking also involves making the food attractive to the eye.

Coquimol
Coquimol is a Cuban coconut cream sauce served with desserts.

Corn Syrup
Corn syrup is a sweet, thick liquid made by treating cornstarch with acids or enzymes. It may be dried and used as corn syrup solids in coffee whiteners, and other dry products. Corn syrup contains no nutritional value other than calories, promotes tooth decay, and is used mainly in foods with little intrinsic nutritional value.

Corned Beef
Beef meat which has been ''corned'', that is soaked in water with salt and a little potassium nitrate, for about 10 days.

Cream Ale
Cream Ale is a smooth, golden ale brewed in America, originally as a result of brewers trying to imitate the Pilsner style.

Croquettes
Croquettes is a savoury mixture of meat, fowl, fish, cheese, nut egg etc. bound together with a sauce and then coated with egg and breadcrumbs and fried.

Cup
A cup is an alcoholic beverage consisting of the lighter wines, such as claret, sherry, cider, hock, champagne, etc. mixed with soda-water, and sweetened with sugar. Fruit juices and slices of fruit and spices are sometimes added.

Curry
Curry is an Indian dish composed of various solids - fish, meat, fowl or eggs - served in a hot flavoured sauce. The sauces vary, but are based upon chilli, black pepper, coriander and turmeric.

Custard
Custard is a sweet sauce made from eggs, sugar, milk and vanilla essence. The eggs are beaten with the sugar and then milk and the vanilla essence are added. The dish may also be steamed and served set as a desert.

Cutlet
A cutlet is a small slice of veal, mutton or lamb, trimmed into shape and usually part of the rib.

Dew-Cup
The dew-cup was the first allowance of beer to harvestmen in England.

Diat Pils
Diat Pils is a lager which undergoes a thorough fermentation which removes almost all the sugars from the botom-fermented, Pilsner-derived beer. It was originally brewed for diabetics.

Dietetics
Dietetics is the study of food in relation to the promotion and maintenance of health. Despite the attempts of some authors to claim it is a new science, it has been known and practised for centuries, and the term dietetics precedes the Second World War.

Doppelbock
Doppelbock is a extra-strong style of bock beer, usually around 7.5% alcohol.

Dunkel
Dunkel is a German style of dark, soft, malty brown lager.

Dylans Ale
Dylans Ale is an English ale brewed by the Brain, Crown Buckley brewery of Cardiff to celebrate the poetry of Dylan Thomas. It is a full-bodied mature ale with a mellow flavour and a subtle hop aroma.

Eisbock
Eisbock is an extra-strength style of bock beer. During brewing it is frozen and some of the ice removed to increase the potency. Eisbock was the forerunner of modern ice-beers.

Entree
An entree is a complete dish consisting of meat, poultry or fish with vegetable and a sauce. It is served before the ''roast'' course in a formal menu and may be either hot or cold.

Export
In beer terms, Export was applied to better quality beers considered worthy of exporting.

Faro
Faro is astyle of Belgian beer. It is a weak lambic sweetened with sugar.

Fowl down-in-rice
Fowl down-in-rice is the Barbados version of chicken served with rice which is so popular throughout the Caribbean.

Framboise
Framboise is a Belgian fruit beer originally made with raspberries, but more recently with other fruits.

Fricasse
Fricasse is a dish consisting of small pieces of white meat in a flavoured white sauce made from the stock in which the meat was cooked, with the addition of milk.

Galantine
Galantine is a dish which consists usually of a white meat, well flavoured and made into a roll. It is served cold and has a glazed surface.

Ghee
Ghee is the clarified butter-fat obtained from buffalo butter. It is widely used in the Punjab area of India for cooking, and amongst Punjabi cooks outside of India.

Gin
Gin is an alcoholic beverage flavoured with juniper first made in the Netherlands.

Ginger Beer
Ginger Beer is a low alcohol style of beer flavoured with root ginger.

Goat Water
Goat Water is a goat stew made in Montserrat.

Green Beer
Green Beer is a term applied to a young beer which has not had time to mature.

Gueuze
Gueuze is a ripe blend of old and new Belgian lambics which causes a secondary fermentation to occur resulting in a distinctive sparkling beer with a fruity, sour dry taste.

Guinness
Guinness is an Irish stout brewed in Ireland and other parts of the world. It has a smooth texture due to the nitrogen dispensing system used in the draught beer.

Guinness Extra Stout
Guinness Extra Stout is a bottled stout made with unmalted roasted barley and heavily hopped to give a very bitter taste.

Haggis
Haggis is a Scottish dish made from a sheep's or calf's heart, liver, and lungs, minced with onion, oatmeal, suet, spices, and salt, mixed with stock, and traditionally boiled in the animal's stomach for several hours. Haggis is traditionally served at Hogmanay and on Burns' Night.

Ham
Ham is pork leg which has been preserved by salting and drying.

Hamburger
The hamburger is a fast food consisting of a fried patty of minced meat, usually served in a bread roll. The hamburger (without the bun) is said to have been invented by medieval Tatar invaders of the Baltic area around Hamburg, Germany, from where it takes its name. As a dish made from minced meat, onions, bread, and milk, it was taken to the USA in the 19th century. The hamburger in its present form spread from there and was reintroduced to Europe in the 1960s.

Harp Lager
Harp Lager is a low strength lager developed by Guinness in 1959 to mark their bicentenary.

Heads A Rolling
Heads A Rolling is a medium strength ale brewed by the Ash Vine company. It is a pale beer with a powerful hop flavour.

Hefe
Hefe is a German term for unfiltered beer.

Ice Beer
Ice Beer is beer which during the brewing is frozen and some of the ice removed to increase the alcohol content of the beer. Ice beers were developed in Canada by Labatt in the early 1990s.

India Pale Ale
see "IPA"

IPA
IPA (India Pale Ale) is a strong heavily hooped English style of beer designed to withstand the long sea voyage to India.

Kichel
Kichel is a type of small cake.

Kozel
Kozel is a Bohemian bottled pilsner which was voted the number one champion Pilsner at the 1997 World Beer Festival in Chicago. It is a barley malt beer brewed since 1871 with water drawn from forest wells away from any sources of pollution.

Lambic
A lambic is a style of Belgian beer brewed with at least 30% unmalted wheat which produces a milky wort and with old hops which are used for their preservative value. Yeast isnt added, instead the beer is brewed open to allow wild yeast spores to enter and ferment the beer.

Lapin Kulta
Lapin Kulta is a strong Finnish Pilsner brewed by Hartwall.

Lard
Lard is the rendered and clarified internal fat from the abdomen of pigs or cattle used in cooking and pharmacy.

Lardon
A lardon is a strip of bacon or pork used to lard meat.

Light Ale
In England the term Light Ale refers to a bottled low-gravity bitter.

Liqueur
A liqueur is a strong sweet alcoholic beverage with a spirit base and flavoured with aromatics.

Lite
Lite is a North American term applied to thin, low calorie beers.

Malmsey
Malmsey is a strong, sweet wine with a strong flavour. It was originally made in Greece, but now most of it is made in Madeira.

Malt
Malt is derived from grain, usually barley, which is steeped in water and made to germinate which causes the grain's starch to convert into saccharine matter, it is then dried in a kiln and used in the brewing of beer, distilling of whisky and other culinary uses.

Malted
see "Malt"

Malting
see "Malt"

Marsala
Marsala is a dry or sweet Sicilian dessert wine, with a dark amber colour and a caramel flavour. It is fortified with grape juice that has been cooked and reduced to one-third of its original volume.

Mead
Mead is an alcoholic beverage made from fermented honey.

Merlin Stout
Merlin Stout is a medium strength stout brewed by the Tomos Watkins brewery of Llandeilo, Wales.

Mild
Mild is a low-gravity malty beer.

Milk Stout
Milk Stout is a type of stout with added lactose (milk sugar). The term was banned in Britain in 1946 because of the implication that milk was added to the brew.

Mondongo
Mondongo is a Puerto Ricoan tripe stew.

Mullagatawny
Mullagatawny is a soup made with meat cut into small pieces and mixed with rice and curry-powder.

Mum
Mum is a malt liquor made of malt wheat, oats and bean meal. It was brewed extensively in Brunswick at the start of the 20th century.

Murphy's
Murphy's is a relatively low strength Irish stout.

Newcastle Brown
Newcastle Brown is a famous English strong brown ale first brewed by Colonel Jim Porter in Newcastle in 1927.

Omelette
An omelette is a dish of eggs beaten until frothy and cooked until set in a frying pan. Often other ingredients, such as mushrooms or cheese are added.

Ouzo
Ouzo is a Greek liqueur flavoured with aniseed and herbs.

Pale Ale
Pale Ale is a style of English bottled beer, usually stronger than light ale and often based upon the brewery's best bitter.

Pepperpot
Pepperpot is an ancient Amerindian meat stew - flavoured with cassareep - which originated in Guyana and has spread throughout the Caribbean.

Picadillo
Picadillo is a Cuban beef hash flavoured with chile, olives and capers.

Pilau
Pilau is an oriental dish of rice with meat or fish and spices.

Pilsner
Pilsner is a style of golden, hoppy aromatic lager which originated in the Czech town of Plzen (Pilsen) in 1842.

Pimm's
Pimm's is a proprietary drink based upon a fruit cup invented in the 1820's by James Pimm. It is based upon London gin flavoured with various secret ingredients including orange.

Plug & Play
Plug & Play is a strong dark ale brewed by the Ash Vine company of Frome, Somerset.

Porter
Porter (Stout) is a dark type of beer which originated in London in 1722.

Pride of Romsey
Pride of Romsey is a strong bottle conditioned English beer with a powerful aroma of hops.

Pulque
Pulque or octli is a drink made in Mexico and Central America from the juices of various species of agave.

Puree
A puree is a type of soup made from meat, fish, game or vegetables which have been rubbed through a sieve and flavourings, liquid fat and a thickening agent have been added.

Quass
Quass (Kvass) is a sour, fermented liquor made by pouring warm water on rye or barley meal. It was popular in Russia amongst the peasantry.

Ragout
Ragout is a dish of meat or fish stewed with vegetables and highly seasoned so as to excite a jaded appetite.

Rauchbier
Rauchbier is a type of German smoked beer from the Franconia region. It gets its flavour from malt that has been dried over moist beechwood fires.

Real Ale
Real Ale is a term coined by CAMRA for traditional cask-conditioned beer.

Rice
Rice is the seeds of a grass grown in marshes mainly in the orient.

Roggen
Roggen is a German/Austrian rye beer.

Rosolio
Rosolio is an alcoholic beverage from southern Europe.

Rum
Rum is an alcoholic beverage distilled from sugar cane.

Sahti
Sahti is the traditional style of beer brewed in Finland. It is a strong (around 8%) unfiltered, hazy, reddish-amber brew, quite flat with a spicy, bitter-sweet flavour. It is brewed with rye rather than barley and juniper rather than hops.

Sangaree
Sangaree is an alcoholic beverage made from wine diluted with water and mixed with spices and sugar and drunk iced.

Sanoche
Sanoche is a Trinidadian pork and beef and yam and dasheen and cassava stew.

Sausage
Sausage is an article of food consisting of chopped or minced meat, such as pork, beef or veal, seasoned with sage, salt, pepper or other herbs, and stuffed into the entrails of sheep, oxen or pigs and tied at short intervals. Today artificial skins tend to be used in place of intestines.

Sherry
Sherry is a Spanish alcoholic beverage of wine mixed with brandy.

Sloe Gin
Sloe Gin is a liqueur made of gin flavoured with sloes or some other fruit which are then strained out.

Souffle
A souffle is a dish, either sweet or savoury, the essential ingredient of which is egg white beaten to a froth.

Southern Comfort
Southern Comfort is an American liqueur based upon whisky flavoured with peaches.

Spruce Beer
Spruce beer is an alcoholic beverage prepared by boiling sugar with essence of spruce, cooling and fermenting with yeast. It was popular in Canada in the timber regions during the early 20th century.

Steaming
Steaming is the practise of cooking by indirect moist heat.

Stewing
Stewing is a method of cooking somewhat similar to boiling. Less water is used, however, and the juices and food values are drawn out, whereas in boiling they are sealed in. It is an economical but slow method of cooking meat.

Stilton
Stilton is an English, strong cheese named after the village of Stilton, but actually first made in Leicestershire.

Stout
see "Porter"

Strega
Strega is an Italian liqueur so called because it is supposedly based upon a witche's recipe for an aphrodisiac which will bind two lovers together for ever (Strega is Italian for Witch). It is a yellow, syrupy, citrus based drink with a complex blend of herbs.

Suet
Suet is the fatty tissue surrounding the kidneys of oxen and sheep. It is used in cooking.

Sundance
Marston's Sundance is a strong golden pale ale characterised by a crisp bitterness derived from golden hops.

Sweetbread
Sweetbread is the name given to the pancreas, or thymus of the calf or lamb used as a food.

Swiss Roll
Swiss roll is a sponge cake spread with jam, cream, or some other filling, and rolled up.

Syllabub
Syllabub is a beverage made from a mixture of milk, wine and sugar.
Syllabub is a British cold dessert made from milk or cream beaten with sugar, wine, and lemon juice.

Tamal
Tamal is a Mexican dish of crushed maize with pieces of meat or chicken, red pepper etc., wrapped in corn husks and baked or steamed.

Tapioca
Tapioca is a starchy granular foodstuff prepared from cassava and used in puddings. The name comes from the Brazilian word tipioca which translates as juice of cassava. The tapioca is obtained by pulping the root, washing it out and collecting the starch which is then dried on heated plates.

Tesvino
Tesvino is a variety of maize beer, prepared by the Indians in mexico and Central America.

Timbale
A timbale is a dish of minced meat, or fish cooked in a drum-shaped mould of pastry.

Toddy
Toddy is a drink made from the fresh or fermented sap of various species of palm.

Toffee
Toffee is a sweet of sugar, butter and flavourings boiled together and then allowed to cool and harden.

Tokay
Tokay is a rich sweet aromatic wine made near Tokay in Hungary.

Tortilla
A tortilla is a Latin American thin flat cake made of maize flour and baked on a flat piece of stone or iron.

Tournedos
A tournedos is a small piece of fillet beef grilled or sauteed.

Trappistine
Trappistine is a liquer prepared by the Trappist monks of certain French monasteries. Two varieties are produced; green and yellow.

Treacle
Treacle is an uncrystallised syrup produced when sugar is refined.

Trifle
Trifle is a sweet dish of sponge-cakes flavoured with wine or jam and topped with custard and whipped cream.

Tripe
Tripe is the culinary term for a ruminant's stomach.

Verjuice
Verjuice is the name given to the harsh juice of the unripe grapes used in wine making.

Vermouth
Vermouth is an alcoholic liqueur prepared from wine, sweetened with sugar and sometimes with bitter aromatic herbs added.

Vodka
Vodka is an alcoholic beverage distilled from rye, potatoes, maize or barley.

Wassail
Wassail is a spiced beverage prepared from roasted apples, sugar, toast, nutmeg and other spices and old ale. During the Anglo-Saxon and early English period wassail played an important part on all great festive occassions, such as Wassails.

Welsh Rabbit
Welsh Rabbit is a popular savoury of melted cheese on a slice of toast. It is often, erroneously, referred to as "rare-bit".

Whisky
Whisky is an alcoholic beverage made from malted barley.

White Beer
see "Witbier"

Wine
Wine is the fermented juice of fruits, vegetables or flowers. The more important wines are fermented from grapes.

Witbier
Witbier or white beer is a Belgian style of beer brewed with 50% wheat and then flavoured with spices.

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