Barry's Beef

It's British Food Fortnight in the House of Commons. Oh joy. Once again we are to be blessed with such cultural dishes as jellied eels and liquer, faggots and peas and...ermmm...chips. Well actually, no. What we get is the exact same meals with the exact same ingredients apart from the marketing so, for instance, instead of Grilled Turkey Escalope with Lemon and Apricot Couscous you get Grilled Norfolk Turkey Escalope with Lemon and Apricot Couscous. Get it? Nice and subtle. This is clearly daft, but it gets dafter when you are offered Chilli con Carne made with East Yorkshire Beef (Debate, Monday), Jerk Suffolk Chicken with Rice and Peas (Debate, Thursday), Jerk British Chicken with Rice and Peas (the Terrace, Friday) and Rogan Josh made with Cornish Lamb, served with Rice and a Poppadom (Terrace, Thursday).
What a crock. Obviously, if you want to do it properly you should start with dressing ALL security staff as Beefeaters with compulsory Raven (defence in the War on Terror); there should be Great British quotes daubed on the wall ("We shall defend our island, whatever the cost may be, we shall fight on the beaches, we shall fight on the landing grounds, we shall fight in the fields and in the streets, we shall fight in the hills; we shall never surrender" ; "Maggie, Maggie, Maggie. Out! Out! Out!" and "I'm not racist but it's unfair immigrants get free council housing the minute they set foot in the country" instantly spring to mind). And a 21 gun salute for every 100th customer. Bulldogs should be roaming freely amongst tramps getting loudly and abusively hammered on Tennent's Super.
It's just another opportunity missed.