Demand For Lighter Fare With Changed Dining Habits

Poverty Bay Herald, Volume LXII, Issue 18632, 16 February 1935, Page 10

Demand For Lighter Fare With Changed Dining Habits

LONDON', Doe, 20. national habits ami a closer study of dieretics have had a marked effect upon the “roast beef of old England. ’■’ According to .Mr. Walter Elliot, the Minister oi Agriculture, the production of beef is going up all over the world at the very moment when-eoii-.-umption is going down. • ■ ■

“Thiit is only too true.'’ commented the head of a linn of-London restaurant proprietors. “There is abundant evidence of the change in habit. It used to be a common experience fat men to order it chop or steak foj lunch in the City, day after day, year after year. “To-day the demand is for lighter fare. Tastes have altered completely. Business men are -eating less meat, and so are their womenfolk.

“Motoring -also has led to big changes. In line went iter I lie country highways are dulled with traveller* dispensing with the set lunch in ordet to partake of lettuce, bread and cheese, or a samlwieh. All of these tilings have had a big effect on the quantity of meal consumed.” Growth of Snack Bars.

Another’authority was equally emphatic. “Everyone seems to be demanding a light meal to-day," lie said, “instead of a. heavy one. Snack bars are becoming more and more numerous. Public-houses are specialising in them. Hotels are doing the same.

“I do not think this is the product of a desire to save money. The national habit lias changed. Women have been largely responsible. They cat less meal, and men are following suit.

‘• .Moreover, there is a much greater choice of food. It was often the lack of variety in a City lunch that made men rely so consistently on a ‘.joint and two vegetables.' ” At big hotels the comment was .just, the stum 1 . A departmental manager of one big chain of hotels said, “The change in the attitude of the public to words meals is most; remarkable. Light fare is insisted upon; meal is demanded in much smaller proport ions. That Sleepy Feeling.

“More fruit is being eaten. Motorists refuse to have heavy lunches. They, like City men, say that big meals at midday make them too sleepy." But M. Clmmbard, eltef of the Trocadero grillroom, spoke kindly ot beef. “.It is still a popular English dish," he said, “either as a joint or in the form of steaks. And it is still very .much a Sunday national dish. “Nevertheless, it is true thiit within the last 20 years the lunching and dining habits- of the English people have changed to a remarkable degree. They do not desire heavy and Jong meals. They do not eat less, but they are much more discriminating. Thev have become diet-conscious.

“The staple dishes of their grandfathers have been abandoned in favor.of meals of greater variety and attractiveness. Fruits and salads are. eaten, during the summer in quantities .which would have been unthinkable in. pre-war days."