Do you know the Supersizers?

This is Sue Perkins and Giles Coren. Giles is a food critic, Sue is a broadcast personality. Together, they’re adorable, they’re the Supersizers, and they’re pretty funny.

After the movie Supersize Me came out, the BBC featured a one hour, one-off show called “Edwardian Supersize Me” in 2007.

The premise was that the Edwardian diet (from the period of King Edward VII, who reigned from 1901-1910) marked a sort of heyday in British cuisine… and the amount of food the “ruling classes” ate was somewhat catastrophic—sort of like the whole idea of only eating Supersized portions of everything like Morgan Spurlock did, right?

So they got Giles and Sue to “go back in time”, and for 7 days they wore period costumes, engaged in period activities, and… most importantly, ate period food and nothing else! Giles was medically tested before and after the week to see what the effects of gluttony and almost no vegetables would be… and

if you ever wanted confirmation of just how fast you can hurt yourself with your diet, this is a pretty good example!

The show was a huge success, and led to a 6-episode season called “Supersizers Go…” in 2008, in which Giles and Sue went back in time to six other periods in British history (Wartime, Restoration, Victorian, Seventies, Elizabethan, and Regency), to live and eat like their forebears had. The pic up top is from “Wartime”: they went back to the Second World War and were rationed. Yay!

In that episode, they eat what’s called “Lord Woolton’s Pie“, seen at right, (image source). This is a dish of vegetables, vegetables, and more vegetables, topped with either a thin crust (this pic doesn’t reflect rationing!!) or a layer of potatoes… which means more vegetables.

Because I’m a HUGE nerd, I think historical food is kind of fun: I’ve actually made Lord Woolton’s pie before! I used the original recipe, but didn’t think to photograph it. Ga!

You can’t even believe it, but it was DELICIOUS! Not excitingly life-changing, but surprisingly good food!

Since I wasn’t being rationed, however, I ate mine doused in hot salsa, which made it even better… and I owe it all to the great fun that was the Supersizers!

Giles and Sue came back for a second season called “Supersizers Eat…” in 2009, which means there are 13 glorious episodes in all. Considering they were so popular, it’s funny that the BBC never released them on DVD. Luckily, some patient soul has uploaded it all… and you can watch every episodes on Youtube. Awesome!

I highly recommend it… sit back, watch it up, and try to imagine yourself living in history and eating what they did… just ew.

(I find it a bit funny that they have a harder time eating some—albeit gross—cuts of meat, but in the Seventies and Eighties episodes, they can eat the chemical food with gusto… weird!)

Lord Woolton’s Pie
(from the original recipe in The Times, 26 April 1941)

Ingredients

FOR THE CRUST TOPPING:
3/4 cup whole wheat flour
1/4 tsp salt
1/4 cup vegetable shortening
1.5 tbsp water

FOR THE FILLING:
1 lb diced potatoes
1 lb diced cauliflower
1 lb diced swedes (I used turnips, a smaller, whiter cousin of the swede)
1 lb diced carrots
3-4 spring onions (I used shallots)
1 tsp vegetable extract (which is… Vegemite? I PASSED!!)
1 tsp oatmeal

How to:

MAKE THE CRUST:
Mix all the crust ingredients with a fork, and roll out very thinly (you probably won’t use it all to cover the pie).

MAKE THE FILLING:
Cook all the filling ingredients together for 10 minutes on the stove top with just enough water to cover it; stir occasionally.

Transfer veggies to a pie dish and cover with a thin layer of wheat meal crust.

Bake in “a moderate oven” (I used 350°F) until the pastry browns; serve it hot! The original recipe said to serve with a brown gravy… but salsa improves it lots!

You don’t need to have Lord Woolton’s pie to enjoy the Supersizers, but there’s something in there for every foodie!

Have you ever tried cooking any “historical food”?

Update—I just counted: I used 15 exclamation points in this post. Yes, I love Supersizers, but I think that’s more about the tequila I drank before writing. Sorry, will keep ebullience in check in the future…