Daily Dose of English 156
Pub Food
Daily Dose of English 156
Intermediate
Hey everyone, my name is Ben and you're listening to A Daily Dose of English. This is a short, simple podcast that you can listen to every day to improve your English. You can find the transcripts for all episodes and more on benslanguagelab.com. I'm glad you could make it today. In this episode, we're gonna be talking about pub food. Pub food, what is pub food? Um, pub food is what we refer to. Well, it's food that you can find in a pub, like, uh, uh, which is not quite a bar, but it's sort of a, a mix between a bar and a restaurant somewhere in the middle. They're fairly common in the US, but definitely it's not where they're most well-known. Pubs are very common in other parts of the world, especially in parts of Europe, there's more pubs than people almost. And they have a bit of a similar vibe throughout a whole country. And that is very much true for the US. Pubs have a specific reputation, which is different from other countries, but they all end up being fairly similar, fairly the same in what they do. They usually serve beer as their main thing. They typically also have other drinks and wine and stuff, but beer is the main focus. I don't know where the word pub comes from, but it sort of has a similar connotation in the U.S. to the word brewery, so a place where brewed is beer. Beer is brewed, which is a brewery. And the pub is typically the restaurant connected to the brewery. So for example, a brewery that I love in Oregon is called Deschutes Brewery, which is named after the river. D-E-S-H-U-T-T-E-S Brewery. Oh no, D-E-S-C-H-U-T-E-S Brewery. It is a fantastic little brewery that is, well it's not even, it's actually pretty big. It's a pretty big brand and they have really good beer. And I believe they are in, Where are they actually? The actual, because they have ones in Portland, but like where's their main one? Um, this is very much a side tangent, but I don't know where the original one is. Bend, Oregon. That's where it is in Bend, Oregon, which is a, um, pretty small, super small country in the middle of the U S middle of the U S middle of, of my God, I can't speak middle of Oregon. Um, and that is very much a brewery, but all of their breweries have pubs connected to them where you can go eat, drink, hang out, and they're usually bigger establishments, bigger restaurants with lots of space, lots of tables, because breweries are typically made to be pretty big, because they have to have tons and tons of beer in them, because it sits there for a while, so they end up being pretty big, which is why they also end up being in smaller parts of the country, so like small towns or whatever. There's plenty of little breweries all over Oregon, and they often have really good restaurants. But the food that the restaurants serve is typically pretty similar. Usually fried focuses on lots of flavor and kind of ignores any sort of health or whatever kind of thing you might want to focus on in that way. So the classic for the US is a burger. Burger and fries is absolutely core to the pub food experience. And a good burger is very good. There's lots of different kinds of burgers, but the sort of standard is bacon, not bacon, what am I saying? I cannot phrase things that I know. It's a patty, a beef patty, which is usually pretty thick, so a quarter pounder or a little bit thicker, third of a pound. And then there is lettuce, tomato, pickle, onion, usually red onion. And cheese is also very, very common on a pub burger. A lot of the pubs that I've gone to in the U.S., which are usually a little bit, they're not fancy, it's like they're a little bit nicer, is like what I wanna say. It's this weird mix, because, hmm, how do I explain this? Because pub food is supposed to be sort of cheap, fast, delicious, fatty, greasy, that sort of thing. But in the U.S., it often has this additional level of niceness to it. The food at Deschutes Brewery is very good. It's not just good because it's fried like that. It's good because they use good ingredients. It's not cheap. And they use nice cheese, for example. And so when you think of a cheeseburger, you might think of something that's very different from a pub burger. Like a McDonald's What are they called? McChicken? No, that's the chicken one. I never go to McDonald's. I don't think I've gone in like 20 years. What are they called? The main burger thing. Am I just dumb? Mc... I can't think of the most famous hamburger in the world, the name of it. You know what I mean, okay? The famous hamburger that everybody has heard the name of, that's not what you're gonna get in a pub. You're gonna get something a little bit of a higher quality, often with some nicer cheese, with maybe homemade pickles, things like that. But there's also plenty of other things to order, right? Fish and chips are also very common. You can usually get a steak of some kind. It almost always has potatoes. Potatoes are often the core of a good pub food because you want a side. That's something that's very common in the US, is to have sides with your food. So you get like a main thing, so maybe a burger, and then a side or two. Whether it's coleslaw, or vegetables, or french fries, or beans, or broccoli. There's lots of different sides that you can get. And that to me is the other hallmark of a pub food. Hallmark, by the way, is like a thing that feels very, standard for something. So it's a hallmark of pub food is that it comes with sides. For example, every pub food comes with sides. So when you think of pub food, you think of sides, for example. And the hallmark for me is definitely sides and beer. Sides, there's a lot of different ones, and they often are very, very good. This is how I judge a restaurant, is if their sides are good. Because if their main course is good, yeah, that's easy. You can make a burger be good, that's not hard. You can make fish and chips be good, that's not hard. But can you make your coleslaw be good? Can you make your baked beans be good? Can you make your macaroni and cheese be good? Because that, those are the details that really matter to have really good pub food. So I definitely recommend you look out for those. Other pub sides are things like chips, even like just potato chips are very common. Kettle chips are another sort of style that you might find. Mashed potatoes, pickles just on the side. God, I love a good pickle. Pickles are so good. Plenty of other things that I can't think of right now. vegetables, whatnot. And then there's also other fried things. Oh, that's the other big one. Tater tots. Tater tots. So tater tots, I don't know if are that common outside of the US, but you can find them in a lot of places in the US as an alternate to French fries. Tater tots are basically french fries, but instead of being shaped into, like, whatever the shape of a french fry is, like a, what is the shape of a french fry? Like a stick, I guess? They are made into much smaller pieces, so they're kind of, not ground up, they're grated, they're made very small, into little flakes of potato, and then they're made into little balls, or little nuggets, almost, and then they're fried. And these are called tater tots. Tater comes from potato. A tater is a short name for a potato. And a tot, it is a word for like an infant, but I don't know if that's actually the same root as tater tot or not, but yeah. And those are really good. I actually prefer them to French fries because they are, sorry, geez. because they are crispier, they have more potato flavor, and they pick up sauce better. I like French fries too, but yeah, I would definitely choose tater tots if I can. And yeah, that's pretty much it. Pub food is pretty simple. There's more to it. There's like burgers, hot dogs, things like that. You can kind of just look up some restaurants or just some images even and kind of get an idea. There is variety and choice and things that you can choose from, but it's all kind of the same vibe. When you order, it's not like you're going to get something totally different. You can also get roast meat, chickens, whatnot. Sometimes there's seafood if it's closer to the sea and they have good access to that. But yeah, I don't really have anything else specific to add to the list of good pub food. But definitely if you're in the US, try to find some good breweries that have nice brew pubs connected to them. Get some beer, get some good food, have a good time, and enjoy it. That's all that I really have for today. I hope that you enjoyed listening to this episode about me talk about food because I am kind of hungry. And I hope that you come back again tomorrow for another episode and I will see you then. Have a fantastic rest of your evening or day or whatever. I'll see you tomorrow. Bye.
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