BLUE ROADS

I can’t remember when I first heard of Jane and Michael Stern: it seems like they’ve always been there.  Their book Roadfood  was first published in 1977 and has been much updated, and they had various columns in food magazines, and I believe still do. This was them back in the day.

Their original idea was brilliantly simple – they drove around America, originally in a Volkswagen Beetle, eating in ‘ordinary’ American roadside restaurants, and writing about it.  Sounds like a plan, doesn’t it?

 

They also wrote a book titled Blue plate specials & blue ribbon chefs: the heart and soul of America's great roadside restaurants.  Now that phrase ‘blue plate special’ is about as all-American as it gets, and as far as I can tell as a non-American, it refers to specials served in cheap and cheerful eateries around the States.

I’m not sure that these meals were always served on actual blue plates but some undoubtedly were, and sometimes the plates were segmented – perhaps in the interests of portion control. 

 

The term seems to date from the very end of the  nineteenth century, at Fred Harvey Restaurants, usually found in railroad stations.  It also seems to have something to do to do with willow pattern plates.  My grandmother had a couple of those but we never ate from them – they were wall decorations.

 

All this has been on my mind since I recently bought a couple of low-priced blue plates from the local Asda.  

 

In general I’m in favour of plain, simple white plates, but you know, I discover that most things look pretty darn good on these blue numbers.  That's snapper and samphire, if you're interested.

 

Photo by Caroline Gannon

And then, synchronicity being what it is, I was looking at Fuschia Dunlop’s posts on Instagram and up popped this fabulous picture of a table centerpiece at a dinner she was at, I think in Beijing. Looks great to me. 

 

Yep, blue is the colour!

Oh and incidentally, my pal Sue Hutchins tells me that she's a big fan of blue plates and directs me to this fine example - a blue (and white) plate with a dodo!  Oh my.