A feast for the whole world: what subjects of British monarchs are treated to at coronations

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One festive dish for the whole of Britain is already a tradition of coronation celebrations in the United Kingdom. Over the past hundred years, this country has tried three ways to cook chicken in honor of the reigning monarch, and finally it’s time for dessert.

Although the British throne passed to Elizabeth II on February 6, 1952 – the day of the death of her father George V, the coronation in Westminster Abbey took place on June 2, 1953. It was attended by about eight thousand guests, including members of the royal family, prime ministers of the Commonwealth, peers, representatives of the House of Commons and all major public circles in Great Britain, as well as representatives of 129 foreign states and territories. How to feed so many people at once? It is obvious that even if cooks from all the royal residences took up cooking, they would not be able to provide every guest with a hot meal. Therefore, the leaders of the London culinary school Le Cordon Bleu, Constance Spree and Rosemary Hume, based on the chicken recipe served at the “silver” anniversary of George V, came up with their original recipe “Poulet Reine Elizabeth”. This is a cold chicken in curry cream sauce with a salad of rice, green peas and herbs.

The organizers of the celebrations decided to publish the recipe for this dish in the newspapers in advance so that everyone could cook it at home and thus celebrate Elizabeth’s accession to the throne. For a royal banquet, it is quite modest. Stew the diced chicken breasts until soft with water and a little wine, adding carrots and a few peas of allspice, and then cool. For the sauce – fry the onion in vegetable oil, mix with curry seasoning, add tomato paste, wine, water and bay leaf, and then bring to a boil, add lemon, a pinch of salt, pepper and sugar. Simmer uncovered for 5-10 minutes. Strain and refrigerate. Add mayonnaise, apricot puree, seasonings to taste, and then mix with a little whipped cream. Put the resulting mass on the chicken pieces, mix. However, this is only one of the variants of the dish that went down in history as the “coronation chicken”. Every self-respecting British chef has his own recipe. Some people add raisins instead of apricots, some mango chutney, some serve a dish with peas and rice, and some spread it on bread. In any case, since then, “coronation chicken” has become an integral part of the British gastronomic landscape. But his follower “anniversary chicken” with lime and ginger, invented by the chefs of Buckingham Palace in 2002 – on the 50th anniversary of the Queen’s accession to the throne, did not take root, although eyewitnesses say that he was very, very good.

This became a lesson, and it was decided to prepare a festive pudding for the current “platinum” anniversary of the queen. Moreover, this time the recipe had to come not from elite palace cooks, but from ordinary subjects of Her Majesty. To do this, the legendary department store Fortnum & Mason, by the way, the official supplier of, among other things, Christmas puddings for the royal court, announced a competition for the best recipe for a “platinum” dessert. The jury included cookbook authors, bakers and Buckingham Palace chef Mark Flanagan. The Queen’s daughter-in-law, Camilla Duchess of Cornwall, led the process. She herself has repeatedly admitted that she is not strong in cooking, but her son from her first marriage, Tom Parker-Bowles, is a famous restaurant critic. The participants of the competition were offered to focus on the wording from the book of one of the judges, culinary historian Regula Aisoin:

The term “pudding” has become synonymous with dessert in the UK. But not all puddings are desserts, although all desserts are puddings in the modern sense of the word.

Thus, British homegrown chefs were given complete freedom for creativity – from pie to jelly. The jury had four main evaluation criteria: the list of ingredients must be accurate, the recipe must be simple enough that people all over the world can cook it at home, it must have a story, and it must be not only delicious, but also beautiful, because it will be served to the queen! The confectioners’ competition was included in the official program of the celebration of the Queen’s jubilee. It began on January 10, and within hours of the announcement, Google searches for “pudding recipe” were up 733 percent. By February 14, Fortnum & Mason chefs selected 50 best recipes out of five thousand, and on February 21, an authoritative jury reduced their number to five. On March 14, the five finalists were invited to Fortnum & Mason in Piccadilly, where the final battle took place. And on May 12 the winner was announced. It was the traditional multi-layered English dessert trifle of lemon biscuit rolls, lemon jelly with tangerine coulis, amaretto biscuits, and whipped cream according to the recipe of Southport copywriter Gemma Melvin.

The culmination of the celebrations of the 70th anniversary of the stay of Elizabeth II on the British throne will be a four-day weekend from June 2 to 5. On the first day, a royal parade will be held, in which more than 1,400 military personnel and 400 musicians will take part. This annual event has been held for more than 260 years on the official birthday of the British monarch, but in the first two years since the start of the coronavirus pandemic, it was not held. Immediately after the parade, the royal family will come out onto the balcony to greet the subjects. It is already known that this time there will not be the Duke of York involved in the scandal and the members of the royal family who have refused the duties of Prince Harry with Meghan Markle. More than 1,500 commemorative lighthouses will be lit across the UK, the Channel Islands, the Isle of Man and the Overseas Territories. And on June 5, a grandiose festive show will take place. All these days, jubilee street parties will be held throughout the country, at which the “platinum pudding” will receive its first baptism of fire.