You can’t beat a good old family meal (or several)

Jul 25 2008 by Our Correspondent, Huddersfield Daily Examiner

MY love of roast beef and Yorkshire pudding on a Sunday came in for some stick while elder daughter Siobhan was staying with us.

“You have a fetish for roast beef,” she claimed.

“Not so,” I said. “I just like it.”

“You’re a stick-in-the-mud traditionalist.”

“I’m preserving our culinary heritage.”

Anyway, after we had finished arguing she insisted we all go out for Sunday lunch and suggested an Italian restaurant.

“I don’t like Italian food,” I said, which has always been a bone of contention since I married Antonietta Maria Colaluca, who makes the best spaghetti Bolognese this side of her home port of Naples.

“How about an Indian restaurant?” suggested Maria, being peacemaker.

“The last thing I want on a Sunday is a curry,” said Siobhan.

So five of us, plus two children, ended up going to a restaurant with a varied menu.

“We could have got a lovely piece of beef and all the trimmings and cooked it at home for £20.”

“Shut up,” said my daughter. So I did.

I ordered roast beef and Yorkshire pudding and everybody else ordered something different. Siobhan had fresh salmon.

“What’s it like?” her husband Ronan said.

“Very nice.” She pulled a face. “But I wish I’d had the roast beef.”

I made no comment. I also maintained a dignified but rather smug silence that evening when she said: “Does anybody fancy a curry?”

Not that I minded going for it. I called in for a pint while it was being cooked.

And she was right. The last thing she had on Sunday was a curry.