Is that fries with that then?

I did get a little anxious one morning last week when I found myself nodding in silent agreement with the results of some new research that were published in the morning newspaper.  It is not often that I reach the news pages over the corn flakes - no, it was muesli that day - as I am usually trying to complete the sudoku puzzle before I finish my breakfast.  It must have been easier than normal that day.

Anyway, this research.  It shows that in the majority of couples, the woman selects the menu, buys the food and prepares the meals.  This being so, she tends to opt for the healthier choices with plenty of greens and salads.  Whilst many of these meals would not be considered as particularly appetising by the men, they keep quiet for the sake of domestic harmony.  But, as soon as they are let of the leash and allowed to choose what they want from the menu in a restaurant, they revert to form and it's chips with everything.  The funny thing is, the women show the same tendency, albeit not to such a marked degree.

As I said, I was nodding in agreement.

There are meals the Old Bat serves up on a fairly regular basis which almost make me groan out loud.  I do not much like lamb chops, for instance, and I would never dream of telling the old dear that her Bolognaise sauce is actually a disaster.  On the other hand, she does know what I like and tries to cover my preferences as well as her own.  But do things change when we eat out?

The answer is, I suppose, both yes and no.  Here in England we generally eat out twice a month.  There is the Lions Club dinner meeting one evening where we are usually presented with a fixed menu with perhaps two starters and two main dishes to choose from.  The mains could be, for example, steak and ale pie or poached salmon together with vegetables.  Hardly chips with everything there then.  The other meal out is a pub lunch with a large crowd of people with Scouting connections.  Here we have the choice of the menu and, yes, this time it is usually chips.  Not unnaturally, I tend to go for something that we don't eat at home, like scampi.  The Old Bat will often choose ham, egg and chips or something similar.

So it would appear that my personal experience mirrors what the researchers discovered.  But I have to wonder: what was the point of the research?  Who paid for it?  And what good has it done for mankind in general and the man on the Clapham omnibus in particular?

~~~~~

Here for your delight is a picture taken in Patcham, a quiet corner of a close just off the Old London Road.  Those soft, gentle tones just whisper "England" to me and I don't think this could be anywhere else.