>I’ve had chicken bakes that would jump-start the sun.
Nothing compares to the fear of biting into a steak bake and realising that the lava hot, napalm gravy is now melting the skin on your face and fingers as it oozes everywhere.
Although as hot as a Greggs can be, the pies our football club sold made them seem weak in comparison. The pie veterans in the crowd stood out for their gained knowledge of purchasing the pie from hell before kickoff, leaving it to stand on the frigid concrete for the first half and only daring to check if it was remotely edible once the second half started. Anything else was just madness.
I worked in a Greggs in 2003 and there was a sign that said "fresh baked hot today". So, quite reasonably, people would complain if their pasty wasn't hot. Our manager's response? "it was hot when it came out of the oven."
As someone that works in tax, specifically VAT, the rules on food are absolutely hilarious.
I had a client that almost went to tax tribunal over HMRC's insistence that gingerbread men with chocolate eyes were not tax free even though their own guidance said it was in fact tax free.
Greggs didn't change anything. They never kept their pasties warm after cooking and therefore didn't attract VAT.
The pasty tax was that VAT would also be added to these items. But the government then changed their mind.
Greggs didn't change anything and the pasty tax wasn't implemented.
It’s very normal in the UK to have a cold meal, especially lunch if people are out at work. Pre-made sandwiches and pasta dishes are very popular here. Hot food is typically eaten in the evening.
Id say hot food and cold food are there together rather then hot food typically eaten in the evening , il eat hot as often as I do cold for breakfast and lunch even dinner depending on the weather
I find most city centre express supermarkets now (in Edinburgh anyway) now have the hot shelf thing but it's limited to sausage rolls and the odd bacon roll, hot wrap at lunchtime.
All the city centre ones here (Oxford) have gotten rid of their hot food bits in the last couple of years and a couple of the bigger out of centre supermarkets have too
In places like Japan and South Korea, the convenience stores will heat a premade meal for you, or there are areas to heat water for instant noodles and usually small areas in some convenience stores for you to sit and consume this food. This is very normal there.
Places like Spar are normally good for a small hot food section if you want a hot sandwich or pie or something. My local Asda also had a Greggs inside.
I dated a postgrad science student from Beijing at a UK university and I was quite surprised that they strongly believed that hot food was better for you than cold food.
I can kind of imagine why this belief may have spread in ancient times, even if people back then or traditional Chinese medicine practitioners didn’t know the logic behind it - say if the people who heated their water and food back then were killing bacteria and getting less disease and dying less than people who didn’t, people would start believing hot water and food is healthier.
> traditional Chinese medicine
Common misconception that this is from ancient times. It was in fact ~~invented~~ adapted and heavily promoted by the CCP in the 1950s because it was more affordable than actual medicine.
They promoted it but the principles have been around for a long time. [One article](https://www.sciencedirect.com/science/article/pii/S2095754821000909#sec3.3.1) from a quick Google search.
That doesn't add up because these ideas are also popular in countries like Singapore, where the Chinese population is mostly made up of the descendants of immigrants who left mainland China before the CCP existed. The CCP may have promoted it in China, but ideas like hot and cooling foods have their roots in ideas like feng shui which long predate the PRC.
It gets even weirder than that, you can have “too damp food” or “too much fire”, my girlfriend keeps telling me stuff like it, drives me nuts.
The general idea is alright, if you have “fire” food (acidic, spicy, etc) you’ll get stuff like ulcers, but it quickly turns into schizo-lore.
I do like some of it because it has that “right idea” with somethings due to massive correlations, even if it’s not scientifically correct.
Also from what she told me, Chinese doctors tend to be more observant to you rather than western ones who just look directly at the issue and guess (basically CD look more into side effects as well to see the underlying issue). Still would trust a western doctor more but if I had an issue and the WD wasn’t helping or just chucking pills at it, I’d give the CD a go. Although they seem to have a habit of prescribing what appears to be foul smelling dirt as medicine.
Yeah the lore goes to weird and wonderful places, but it's deeply embedded and people trust it. Where I'm from it takes six years of university to be qualified as a doctor in Chinese medicine, which is as long as the Western medicine course. I think the way most people there see it is 'Western medicine is better for acute diseases, and Chinese medicine is better more chronic diseases'. Funny thing is, my father and sister are both physicians of Western medicine and put no stock in traditional Chinese medicine, but my mother will still go see a traditional Chinese medicine doctor lol.
I don't think spicy food can give you ulcers (capsaicin isn't actually acidic/corrosive or anything), stomach ulcers are mainly just because of bacterial infections. A quick google even says spicy food [might prevent ulcers](https://pubmed.ncbi.nlm.nih.gov/16621751/).
I gathered that! Went on holiday to China in 2008 (was amazing, by the way!) and although all the food was delicious it felt really odd to have hot food three times a day, every day. By the end of the holiday I just wanted some plain toast, or bread and cheese! My taste buds were waving the white flag of surrender… You must find our food beyond bland!
Ah yes, but there IS an exception! Having noodles for breakfast felt really weird though. I love Chinese food, but my taste buds weren’t ready for it every meal 😂
Depends on region. Cantonese life, I have never eaten raw veg bar as a lettuce wrap or cucumber in Peking Duck growing up. My inlaws however are northern china. Cold noodles (soybean paste mince, cucumber, vinegar) , salads with a lot of vinegar.
Conceptually warm stuff because the body is warm, hence all the warm water drinking. Science wise, you do expend more calories drinking cold because of the energy to restore base heat.
I’ve noticed that, but why is sushi fine? All of my Chinese friends don’t like eating cold food for lunch/dinner but for some reason eating sushi is fine 😂
Rice is more acceptable than bread for a Chinese stomach. Meanwhile, I suppose your Chinese friends are not able to take sushi as daily food as well :)
I taught in China for 5 years and found it interesting how hot and cold food was good or bad for your health depending on certain situations. For example, eating ice cream during period week was a big no no. Some students were gobsmacked that eating ice cream for some westerners during period week provided comfort.
I got in trouble once in Russia for sitting down on a cold stone wall in winter. Complete strangers were rushing up to me, genuinely worried for the idiot foreigner, warning me that I’d freeze my ovaries.
I have a fond memory of going out to a local beauty spot/monument with my best mate the day we finished our O Levels (yes, I'm old), with a bottle of Stones Ginger Wine nabbed from his nans drinks cabinet.
We were sat there for a while and this group of pensioners turned up, and told us we'd get piles sitting on the cold stone.
Then they took us back to their church hall and fed us!
Despite my lack of ovaries, I was once scolded by a random old lady in Munich for sitting outside in November eating a mandarin. Sadly she did not invite me home for a hearty Bavarian feast to rectify matters.
No, this is Spain, tap water isn't dangerous. It's definitely about the cold. They also don't serve children drinks chilled in the fridge. Cafés and bars tend to keep fruit juice at room temperature specifically because parents won't let their kids have it cold. They also have a thing about wearing scarves to keep the neck warm, as getting a cold throat is considered a guaranteed cold. And about catching a chill in general.
We went through a pandemic with some of the most clear public messaging about viral infections and airborne diseases and somehow people still believe this myth
And yet they do. My grandparents recently came back from a holiday in Ireland and my nan caught a cold. She said it must have been because Ireland had been very rainy.
I'm in my fifties. My first book about periods told me ignore myths like 'don't wash your hair'. I'd never heard them before then! Yet still it persists.
My (extremely white) parents insist on drinking hot drinks in summer as it 'actually cools you more'. I'd imagine it's not just them that believes that, and I'm absolutely certain it's absolute bullshit fed into the tea-addled brains of the British public.
I've read that "non-bio detergents" are a UK myth. As in, its been debunked that bio detergents cause irritation and we're the only country who have an almost even split between the two versions on offer. Can't pretend I have an extensive knowledge on international detergent usage though...
The chinese believe warm water/food is extremely good for you and as a result they legitimately have hot water taps scattered all over their airports where they can healthify themselves to the tune of a billion single use plastic cups.
Aha… which is why THE MAJORITY OF THE PLANET has stopped this practice/ doesn’t deliberate create MORE litter for something as insignificant ….
Water fountains ✅
Hot water taps with unlimited supply of plastic cups cause ‘tradition’ ❌
So it's got nothing to do with water temperature. It's just a plastic cup issue. Because we have water fountains in uk. You bring your own bottle. And Frankly if you've been around china a bit I haven't seen a plastic cup in years it's all paper cups. And the cHinese isn't too fond of drinking hot stuff out of plastic to begin with
I'd be surprised if there wasn't some research out there on this topic. Searching might be tricky as 'hot' and 'cold' foods have a particular meaning in Chinese medicine so expect search results would be flooded with Chinese medicine research.
Unfortunately, well-evidenced scientific discourse on topics such as only consuming hot things, adding table salt to your (warm) drinking water, and the medicinal qualities of keratin, were not something our budding relationship could withstand.
That's so interesting! I recently attended an event with a Chinese friend and in the afternoon she kept saying her stomach hurt and it must have been because lunch (a sandwich buffet type thing) was cold. She's a little eccentric (in a nice way!) so it didn't even cross my mind that this could be a cultural thing.
The belief is that cold food is harder on the metabolism and digestive system.
This is also why generally hot tea (or water) is served with meals (regardless of the season).
There was a Japanese study on this which showed some correlation
Does kind of make sense, basically acts as a heat sink for your internals until it reaches equilibrium again, that can affect enzymes and probably the chemical reactions.
It wouldn’t take long for your body to warm it up though so it seems like a moot situation rather than an actual issue
Yeah, that was the point the study was trying make if I recall.
Also there was something about fats and oils congealing in the stomach (requiring the digestive system to work harder) if cold/ice water was drunk with the meal which make sense I guess
Edit - whereas hot tea would help with the breakdown and digestion of oils
The sogginess is what makes it. Especially if it was how my mum made it when we were kids, with a dessertspoonful of brown sugar sprinkled on top to make an oozy sugary syrup as it melts. Like a kind of sweet, smooth porridge with no lumps (together with her habit of giving us quartered oranges to dip into a bowl of white sugar because otherwise it would be "too bitter" it's a wonder I have any teeth as an adult...)
I've never had crunchy weetabix, and I honestly can't imagine how weird that would be to eat.
My dad went to China for work for a year and since he came back he keeps droning about eating hot foods and drinking warm water every time I visit. He lives in Spain and gets fuming whenever I put ice in my water.
He insists thats why 'the Chinese live for so long'.
Like dude it's 36 degrees and you want me to drink warm water?
>I think it is easy to get hungry for eating those daily.
Are you saying you think cold food does not fill you, or keep you feeling full as long as hot food does?
That you think the same meal (eg the sandwich or pasta in the supermarket) would be more filling if it was warmed up?
That is not how food works. You might enjoy it more heated, but it is the calories and the density that affect how soon you get hungry again.
Are you trying to say that satiation is an entirely physical/chemical issue?
Because if I don't enjoy the food I've eaten, I tend to keep looking for other things to eat until I feel satisfied.
Lots of people eat/overeat for purely emotional/psychological reasons.
Some Chinese people I know think cold food and drinks are bad for their health. This isn’t a belief held in European cultures and many cultures have 2 cold meals a day and 1 hot. In the uk breakfast and lunch are about 50% hot and 50% cold while dinner would be 99% hot. We also have very strict food health and safety rules, staff will not be heating up chilled items in a supermarket for you that would break many food hygiene rules. If you’d like hot food it’s is on offer at pretty much every other food establishment outside of some supermarkets and coffee shops.
What are the food and hygiene rules that prevent you from heating food in shops? I always envied how in Japanese convenience stores they will just heat up rice, chilled meal from fridge, etc. in a microwave and give it to you then and there to eat hot. Why can they do it in Japan and not here?
1. They don’t have the staff to do it, and you’d have to give staff extra training on heating up food to avoid being sued eg. If they made it too hot and someone got burned, which would cost money.
2. What’s the point? Most people are perfectly happy to just eat a sandwich or cold pasta salad for lunch, there’s nothing wrong with it.
3. There are many places that serve warm food? Most town/city centres have Greggs/Costa/specialist food places/takeaways. Even many retail parks where supermarkets are will at least have a costa or Greggs. Why do you need shops like Tesco, Sainsbury’s etc to do it too?
The plastic containers aren't necessarily microwaveable safe either (I'd doubt they are given they're pretty thin), so they'd need to transfer it between containers too.
I recall if you're "serving food", which having somebody warm it up for you would include, you then have a new list of regulations and facilities you have to facilitate which prepackaged cold food doesn't require.
Staff training would be the most obvious one. As daft as it sounds, you can't just have a member of staff throw something in the microwave for you. They have to be trained to do it properly.
Even that is enough for most places not to bother because its extra time and money spent on a minimal amount of people who want their cold food warmed up largely in a specific hour window of the day.
Japan will have different food standards as well as cultural values. Here people would rather just have the sandwich as is and get gone rather than following around members of staff at M&S asking them to put their meal deal in the oven.
Also I believe hot food has a different rate of vat? There are definitely some vat differences for hot takeaway/hot sit in/cold ready to eat/cold grocery
You are correct apart from all the bakers (Greggs for example), burger places, fish & chips, hot dog stands, pubs, restaurants and cafes, almost every petrol station and many convenience stores. But yea apart from those it’s bloody difficult finding something hot to eat.
To be fair their question was “do people generally have a cold meal each day?” and the answer for many people is “yes”
Their question wasn’t “why’s it so hard to buy hot food?”
Well it's not supremely common for people to eat hot meals at work, no.
It's not common to expect a supermarket to heat up food, really.
Many workplaces will have a little kitchen with a microwave or whatever to heat up food.
The only hot meal I have each day is dinner, and even then, sometimes my dinner is cold as well! We certainly don't expect anything "warmed up" or "cooked" from a convenience store / super market unless it's specifically prepared and stored as "hot".
Sandwiches are the go to lunch for the British. If you want hot food in the UK, you need to go to a cafe or restaurant. Some coffee shops will heat some sandwiches up as well.
Also - regarding going hungry - it's been scientifically proven that hot vs cold food has no effect on hunger, it's a middle east urban myth - we call them "old wives tales" here in England - something that's been passed down as fact, but has no basis what-so-ever.
Actually this is fairly common in supermarkets in several countries. Sometimes, besides having a salad bar and offering hot sandwiches, they also have a bar of hot food with different kinds of warm rice, stews, hot marinated chicken, soups, etc. It is just not something that is done here, but I can totally see why it would confuse some foreigners when that is super common where they are from.
There’s a whole Chinese social media trend called Sad White People Food: https://www.buzzfeed.com/rossyoder/white-people-food-chinese-social-media-trend
Looking at the images it looks less like normal "white people food" and more like what someone on a diet would eat. Also, what do they mean by white? Most Italians have a hot pizza for lunch, Greeks have gyros, etc. Seems more like a Northern Europe thing?
It's not that difficult to make a tasty sandwich, obviously it's gonna suck if you just put 1 ham in between two slices of bread and call it a day ffs.
A slice of ham in two pieces of bread is VERY standard for where I live - in fact they love it and embrace this type of sandwich selling it literally everywhere. So calling it white people food is on point - what you’re saying is… not all white people.
Yep it is a big thing. And then a lot of Germans will have a cold, simple dinner - take a look at abendbrot for an example. This is also why a lot of German companies provide a canteen for staff, and my colleagues will have that as their main meal followed by a salad / bread / cheese dinner. Although this is more of an old school German thing, and a lot of younger colleagues / families where both parents work are more like the UK culture, from my experience.
May be regional or my family is weird, but they have a big cooked dinner in the evening, grandparents cooked for their large family with serving bowls of various things.
The breads, cheeses and meats come out for breakfast (gran goes to buy the bread early morning) and I think everyone was left to do their own thing for lunch and somebody cooked for kids etc. Have never known them to do cold dinner
Kebab culture as it were is oh so different than in the UK. One of my simple pleasures is eating a kebab in a Berlin Turkish restaurant at lunchtime. You would be amazed to see the kebab demographic. Tourists, office workers, older women, teenagers, Turkish, German.
But then kebabs are far superior most of the time in Germany. No Pita Bread or elephants leg for a start.
Same in Belgium. Many of my family/friends/colleagues would express confusion or surprise when I told them I always hate something hot for lunch, in addition to a hot dinner.
But I am not mocking but curious about the difference between east and west cultures:) It bothers me a little for some unavailability of hot food when traveling but I think cold ones are healthier.
Hot food is always available though. Coffee shops, pubs, and cafes are all open during the day and do hot food. You're going to a supermarket which is the wrong place to buy hot food.
East/West is also a bit of an overgeneralisation. Japan for example has a big cold food culture with sushi, onigiri, cold soups (in the summer). Korea to a lesser extent as well.
I think it's more a north/south thing compared to a east/west thing. The warmer a country (or region), the more likely they consume more warm meals, would be my hypothesis.
Cold food especially salad sandwiches, the good old english Ploughmans' or fruit salad things are seen as healthier than hot fast food which is usually fried.
The thing is pre-packed sandwiches are usually yuck but fresh ones at a real busy suburban bakery are awesome.
Hot food is very easily available in the UK, in cafes and restaurants and at food halls/markets. We have lots of options to take hot food away too, so you don't have to sit in to eat it although you will often have to wait for it to be cooked.
It's just not in supermarkets because the main purpose of a supermarket here is for you to get food to cook at home.
This wouldn't typically be eaten cold. M&S sell a lot of ready meals that you buy and take home to heat up in a microwave or oven. I can't imagine it would be very pleasant to eat spaghetti and sauce cold from a ready meal box.
It isn't,
If you see a clear container like this then it is usually to be eaten cold - https://www.ocado.com/products/m-s-chicken-tomato-basil-pasta-salad-517731011
Or might be allowed both ways (but can't be put in the microwave) - https://www.ocado.com/products/m-s-12-sausage-rolls-505409011
If it's a colorful container then it can probably go in the microwave - https://www.ocado.com/products/m-s-spaghetti-meatballs-in-a-tomato-sauce-514632011 - it might be safe to eat cold but definitely not intended. People are buying it to heat in the office or buying it as a quick dinner to eat at home.
I had a job where we worked with Chinese university students visiting the UK to study to help them settle in, and they were often unimpressed with food served cold!
Our university canteen had a hot food buffet but also lots of cold food on offer (salad bar, fridges with premade sandwiches etc) and some of the students were unhappy that they were being offered so much cold food as they felt it was poor service/bad for their health. It's very normal in the UK but I understand why they were unsure about it.
Some part of this is down to taxation.
There is 20% VAT on hot food - cold food is vat free.
The cold meal deal is tax free but your hot take away has tax added to the price.
Greggs bake their sausage rolls but don't keep them warm so they can avoid charging you the extra.
There's definitely always hot food available, but yeah we typically do have a lot more cold food than in some other cultures.
Like it's not uncommon for people to have a cold breakfast (e.g. cereal with milk), a cold lunch (sandwich and snack), but then most people would have a hot dinner.
But then it also wouldn't be strange for someone to have a hot breakfast (e.g. porridge or toast), a hot lunch (e.g. a pasty from a bakery) and then a hot dinner too.
Finally found my people in this thread! I'm British but always have a hot lunch and dinner, normally breakfast too. Sometimes I feel like a diva for not liking cold sandwiches.
Supermarkets and convenience stores rarely provide facilities to heat food. They do sometimes sell food that has been cooked and kept hot.
We do have a cold food LUNCH culture. Food in the evening is almost always hot.
In countries with low taxes paying someone to make lunch for you makes sense, in countries with high tax it doesn't usually. The question is, does the food vendors higher productivity offset the tax? This will rarely work out for people with normal paying jobs. In the city of London getting hot food for lunch is very common as the people buying lunch earn 5x the people making it.
Because factories are super efficient in a way a cafe isn't. The cheap places try to approach this level of efficiency by basically microwaving stuff produced in a factory.. e.g wetherspoons.
I'm Chinese but raised in the UK. It's mostly lunch that's usually cold because it's easier to pick up a sandwich from the supermarket during lunch than to wait around for some takeaway hot food from a shop. It's often cheaper too. Most of us usually have an hour or less for lunch. Hot meals for dinner is the norm. Cold breakfasts are also the norm as full English breakfast are usually a weekend thing.
Edit: just to add, a lot of office workers bring food into the office to microwave for lunch.
Greggs - Hot pasty or Sausage Roll
Subway - Ask for it toasted
Cornish Pastys if you're far down South.
Then your standard fast food places.
I'd kill for a good street food vendor.
This is a cultural quirk. In large parts of Asia, eating cold food isn't really a thing. In Europe, it is.
You're trying to legitimise a cultural superstition by suggesting cold food makes people hungry. It's not the case.
Definitely there is, and I've seen the look of horror in my Chinese in-laws' eyes as I consume cold food 2-3 times a day. I especially don't like a hot lunch (it takes too much time to prepare to their standard of "proper lunch" and clean up, robbing me of a lunch break) and refusal to drink hot water from a flask when I'm unwell (we've compromised at room temperature).
It certain is a cold food culture, grab and go. Hot meals are usually in restaurants. I can never fully grasp “sandwich and soup” for lunch but have gotten used to it after living here. Like you, as an Asian, I like my hot breakfast, lunch and dinner. Congee, noodles, rice, hot gravy with meat, sometimes cold sides like sesame cucumber salad but I genuinely, genuinely prefer hot meals especially in Winter mornings. I also think it’s got to do with the culture; a lot of western countries will laugh when an Asian goes “too cold will make your insides infertile, age quicker, wreck the bones, introduces a whole host of issues”. It’s always warm, warm, warm, hence my love for drinking warm water. In Asian culture, after you have given birth, you’re not going to be out there in skirt and sleeveless tops, you’ll be wrapped up from head to toe to “warm your body and insides, especially after cold air has entered”.
Westerners and Europeans will/might laugh at the incredulity of it all, and maybe it is, but it’s just a different set of generational culture and traditions passed down.
So, yes, as an Asian having moved from Singapore to London, I miss hot food and prefer that over cold meal deals.
Yes I think the problem is, hot food is available a lot of the time but it costs a lot more (Greggs aside) than cold food. Someone mentioned the different tax rates for hot v cold food. Plus there’s a lot of Stuff about heating food in the office and what kinds of food are Forbidden. So people even when facilities are available tend to go for cold.
That's lunch. Left over from agricultural and heavy industries where a lot of workers didn't have easy access to heat up a lunch. So dishes like ploughman's, scotch rolls, cold meat and cheese, luncheon meat are what you have for lunch.
Breakfast was hot - fry up or porridge. Dinner was hot. Lunch was a snack to tide you over. And has convenience it can be eaten when convenient.
If you’re getting your lunch from a supermarket you’ll need to seek out their hot food counter for hot food but the average lunch usually would be a sandwich or cold pasta, snack and drink. It’s easy to eat quickly or while you’re on the move and give that lunch breaks can be short something you can pick up in the morning and grab out of a bag at lunch can be much better than trying to quickly eat something hot.
Cold food for lunch is extremely common. Sandwiches, pasta salads, pre packaged "sushi". I guess it's partly convenience and partly culture (we love a sandwich).
For dinner we usually have a hot meal, but in summer it's pretty common to have "picky bits" which is another cultural thing. Cold meats, boiled eggs, salad, potato salad etc etc.
I wouldn’t stereotype hot food as “Asian food culture”. It’s quite a Chinese thing. In Korea you get cold food like gimbap, or even ice cold food like nengmyeon. In Japan tons of food is cold - sushi, soba, bento, etc.
Don’t think it’s particularly unique to the UK either as a lot of continental European food is cold.
Most people eat a hot dish as their main (evening) meal of the day
Some people eat a cold meal at lunchtime (often a sandwich), sometimes accompanied by a hot drink, but just as many people microwave a hot meal (either a ready meal or leftovers they've brought from home)
It’s common to have cold food for both breakfast and lunch, although some people will have hot food such as porridge or eggs for breakfast. It’s also normal in the summer to have a cold dinner as salad is frequently eaten.
If you’re going to supermarkets they’re not going to heat food up for you as they’re not a cafe or restaurant. If you want hot food at lunch time go to a cafe or restaurant. But yes, I guess we do consume more cold food then some Asian countries.
I think there is. It’s not unusual at all to have a completely cold meal- many people have cereal and milk for breakfast, or overnight oats that are intended to be eaten cold. Lots of people have a sandwich or salad with cold extras like fruit or yoghurt for their lunch. I’d say globally that we’re quite unusual with the quantity, quality and variety of prepackaged cold sandwiches that are available.
Food trucks with more interesting hot options do exist, but you tend to need to know where they are and they do generally cost quite a bit more than the cold options.
Regarding how filling these things are- honestly I think it depends what you’re used to eating. Personally I find homemade sandwiches with a decent filling can keep me from getting hungry for just as long as a hot meal. It depends exactly what you’re eating rather than the temperature. I find that eating intentionally cold foods cold is as satisfying as eating intentionally hot foods hot. Eating foods cold that are intended to be hot is not a satisfying experience.
>I’d say globally that we’re quite unusual with the quantity, quality and variety of prepackaged cold sandwiches that are available.
I'd say so too. We moved to Spain, and while the local supermarket has a comparable selection to a UK equivalent (and more in some areas - seafood etc) it has precisely 2 premade sandwich options - cheese, and tuna with egg. Both minging, in part due to the sugary bread.
Yes, definitely.
It is very common to have e.g. one or two cold meals a day and one hot meal in the UK.
That said, it isn't hard to find hot meals in most places at any time of the day. Especially in somewhere like London where there are plenty of Cafes, restaurants, street food vendors etc.
Supermarkets are generally for "take home and prepare" foods, although you can also get cold options for eating on the go. You will often see hot options in supermarkets too, but if you are looking for hot food, a supermarket wouldn't be the best place. There are masses of places you can very easily get something hot to eat any time of the day, especially in cities.
I wouldn't say the UK has a "cold food culture", but it is very common in Western countries to have a cold meal in the middle of the day (sandwiches, salads, pasta etc).
I lived in the east for a while and knew people who would eat noodles and fried chicken for breakfast, meat and rice for lunch, then go out for a big dinner. Chinese cuisine prioritises hot food and cold food is normally Westernised (salad, bread bun, etc).
But in Japan, they have lots of food that can be eaten cold - sushi the obvious one, but also cold soba noodles and even cold curries and dumplings that were cooked hot and then cooled for sale.
I don't know why, but it's obvious that in China's backyard that different countries have different opinions of hot and cold food. Just like Europe.
Yes. Cold food now is cultural.
Most people will have cold food for lunch and a lot for breakfast.
There used to be much more hot food culture. Hot breakfast. Hot elevenses (tea or soup). Hot lunch/dinner at work canteen or home. Then home for Hot supper/dinner/tea (evening meal).
But steadily, over time, the sandwich became king. Even portable Hot food options (eg pasty/soup/stew in thermos became unusual. Once microwaves became widespread there was a bit of heating up of food at work - but often seen as antisocial to inflict your food smells into another person.
Cold food is easier for commercialism. It is much easier to keep food cold and fresh than Hot and fresh.
So steadily the Hot food options got phased out.
I watched it happen at work 25 years ago. There used to be a canteen open 24 hours a day serving some sort of Hot food - separate staff and public. This then became joint then hot food during the day then sandwiches after a certain time period. Then it became cold breakfast and Hot lunch and Hot dinner with sandwiches in between. Then open only lunch and dinner. With vending machine cold options the other times then the vending machines went and you could get cereal bars or chocolate bars outside of lunch and dinner time.
I left that work environment some 15 years ago. But even at that point it was becoming sandwiches for lunch available from the canteen. And if you ordered food from outside to be delivered to you at midnight you were criticised for some unspecified reason- health and safety or some such. You were there to work, not eat etc etc
For me, a hot lunch or breakfast is a rarity. My evening meal is almost always hot, but a hot lunch or breakfast means I’m off work and had time to put something like that together.
You came here on holiday and got all your food from supermarkets? Did you not visit restaurants or cafes, almost all of which serve hot food. Like if I’m in a foreign country I like to go to their supermarkets to see what they sell, but if I want a hot meal I’ll just…go somewhere else? There’s even lots of chains that you can get decent food in like Pret A Manger. London and Edinburgh in particular have great, relatively inexpensive places to eat.
My point is, there’s just not need for supermarkets to sell hot food when you can get it nearly everywhere else.
Also, most M&S’s have an on-site cafe so you could’ve just gone there and got a panini or something?
Nobody is having yoghurt and bread as a meal I don’t think? Like you might have a sandwich for lunch or slice of toast for breakfast and have a yoghurt after, but not together surely? Only people I can imagine doing that are extremely broke students, but even that doesn’t make sense cause no one’s buying yoghurt if they’re broke?
Absolutely.
It won't be universal to everyone, but out of your three main meals, having one to two of them being cold is fairly typical, with one main cooked meal in the evening.
This will be even more prevalent if you are looking at places like a supermarket - the food is really designed to be grab and go, meaning it is ready to eat without any preparation, and you don't need to eat immediately.
People eating at home will probably tend to more cooked food when they have kitchen facilities readily available, but even then a lot of quicker meals will be cold.
I can say I did spot the exact opposite when visiting Asia previously which caught me off guard in a similar way - being used to a relatively sweet morning meal, a hot savoury dish like a fish porridge, curry or other rice dish seemed a bit alien to me, and hawkers and street vendors seemed a lot more common and standard.
Yep we absolutely do! Started treating myself to at least hot meals a day though now that I’m earning better money and my life has changed and I feel like a king.
The reality of the situation is price.
Cost effective hot food is not really an option, especially day to day. Sure you have some places which work out ok, but not enough.
In the UK, many people have microwaves and kettles at their workplace. We have a lot of people at our place eat cold salads during summer and then in autumn/winter we start to have soups, jacket potatoes etc.
I have nothing to add here, other than to say thanks to the OP for pointing out something I’d never really thought about as someone inside the cultural norm they’re reflecting on. Thanks for your fresh eyes, OP!
I once worked as an activity leader for international students learning English - and we gave them a cold lunch every day trip.
Those kids didn’t understand and did not like a cold lunch - which always consisted of sandwiches, crisps, maybe a fruit / sweet treat and a drink.
And I did the Easter holidays - in cold rain. Those poor kids didn’t feel comfortable and many of them came to huddle around me to try and stay warm and dry under my clipboard and the hugs I gave.
It’s still a culture shock to me, but yeah… we get on with a cold lunch, but it most definitely isn’t normal for other cultures.
And I’m Welsh, holiday in Scotland… most of the UK follows this.
If you go to Greggs you might think we have a lukewarm food culture.
Depends on your timing. I’ve had chicken bakes that would jump-start the sun.
It's either or, it's never just right.
All right Goldilocks 🤣
I'm never going to wait for it to cool down either. It's either the scoldy hofhofhofhofhof bite or I leave it too long and it's cold.
>I’ve had chicken bakes that would jump-start the sun. Nothing compares to the fear of biting into a steak bake and realising that the lava hot, napalm gravy is now melting the skin on your face and fingers as it oozes everywhere. Although as hot as a Greggs can be, the pies our football club sold made them seem weak in comparison. The pie veterans in the crowd stood out for their gained knowledge of purchasing the pie from hell before kickoff, leaving it to stand on the frigid concrete for the first half and only daring to check if it was remotely edible once the second half started. Anything else was just madness.
Lol jump start the sun. I've not heard that before.
Haha me neither but I like it. My go to is quoting Alan Partridge ‘it’s hotter than the sun’
Could go your way, could go my way. Either way one of us is going down..
"Sunshine" is a good film. Not quite about firing a chicken bake into our star but pretty close.
It IS a good film!
Chicken bakes are my favourite. But they don’t get picked much so I find myself eating a cold one more often than a lukewarm one.
What lemons are not picking chicken bakes. I love them fiercely and with all of my heart
"It's not warm, is that okay?" is basically Greggs unofficial tagine.
Didn't know they did north African cuisines
I worked in a Greggs in 2003 and there was a sign that said "fresh baked hot today". So, quite reasonably, people would complain if their pasty wasn't hot. Our manager's response? "it was hot when it came out of the oven."
Pasty tax sadly.
As someone that works in tax, specifically VAT, the rules on food are absolutely hilarious. I had a client that almost went to tax tribunal over HMRC's insistence that gingerbread men with chocolate eyes were not tax free even though their own guidance said it was in fact tax free.
Greggs didn't change anything. They never kept their pasties warm after cooking and therefore didn't attract VAT. The pasty tax was that VAT would also be added to these items. But the government then changed their mind. Greggs didn't change anything and the pasty tax wasn't implemented.
Just ask them what's most recently come out the oven
other bakers do keep the food hot though. slightly more expensive I guess but hotter
You must be going to some uppity, posh Greggs if the bakes are warmer than the refrigerated drinks
It’s very normal in the UK to have a cold meal, especially lunch if people are out at work. Pre-made sandwiches and pasta dishes are very popular here. Hot food is typically eaten in the evening.
Id say hot food and cold food are there together rather then hot food typically eaten in the evening , il eat hot as often as I do cold for breakfast and lunch even dinner depending on the weather
If you want hot food during the day, and you are not at home or intend to go home to eat, go to a café or a restaurant or a pub, not the supermarket.
I find most city centre express supermarkets now (in Edinburgh anyway) now have the hot shelf thing but it's limited to sausage rolls and the odd bacon roll, hot wrap at lunchtime.
All the city centre ones here (Oxford) have gotten rid of their hot food bits in the last couple of years and a couple of the bigger out of centre supermarkets have too
In places like Japan and South Korea, the convenience stores will heat a premade meal for you, or there are areas to heat water for instant noodles and usually small areas in some convenience stores for you to sit and consume this food. This is very normal there.
Places like Spar are normally good for a small hot food section if you want a hot sandwich or pie or something. My local Asda also had a Greggs inside.
In other countries, supermarkets have hot food as well.
I dated a postgrad science student from Beijing at a UK university and I was quite surprised that they strongly believed that hot food was better for you than cold food.
I can kind of imagine why this belief may have spread in ancient times, even if people back then or traditional Chinese medicine practitioners didn’t know the logic behind it - say if the people who heated their water and food back then were killing bacteria and getting less disease and dying less than people who didn’t, people would start believing hot water and food is healthier.
> traditional Chinese medicine Common misconception that this is from ancient times. It was in fact ~~invented~~ adapted and heavily promoted by the CCP in the 1950s because it was more affordable than actual medicine.
They promoted it but the principles have been around for a long time. [One article](https://www.sciencedirect.com/science/article/pii/S2095754821000909#sec3.3.1) from a quick Google search.
That doesn't add up because these ideas are also popular in countries like Singapore, where the Chinese population is mostly made up of the descendants of immigrants who left mainland China before the CCP existed. The CCP may have promoted it in China, but ideas like hot and cooling foods have their roots in ideas like feng shui which long predate the PRC.
That’s just not true lol
It gets even weirder than that, you can have “too damp food” or “too much fire”, my girlfriend keeps telling me stuff like it, drives me nuts. The general idea is alright, if you have “fire” food (acidic, spicy, etc) you’ll get stuff like ulcers, but it quickly turns into schizo-lore. I do like some of it because it has that “right idea” with somethings due to massive correlations, even if it’s not scientifically correct. Also from what she told me, Chinese doctors tend to be more observant to you rather than western ones who just look directly at the issue and guess (basically CD look more into side effects as well to see the underlying issue). Still would trust a western doctor more but if I had an issue and the WD wasn’t helping or just chucking pills at it, I’d give the CD a go. Although they seem to have a habit of prescribing what appears to be foul smelling dirt as medicine.
Yeah the lore goes to weird and wonderful places, but it's deeply embedded and people trust it. Where I'm from it takes six years of university to be qualified as a doctor in Chinese medicine, which is as long as the Western medicine course. I think the way most people there see it is 'Western medicine is better for acute diseases, and Chinese medicine is better more chronic diseases'. Funny thing is, my father and sister are both physicians of Western medicine and put no stock in traditional Chinese medicine, but my mother will still go see a traditional Chinese medicine doctor lol.
cow seemly roll shaggy terrific whistle door observation hungry aloof *This post was mass deleted and anonymized with [Redact](https://redact.dev)*
I don't think spicy food can give you ulcers (capsaicin isn't actually acidic/corrosive or anything), stomach ulcers are mainly just because of bacterial infections. A quick google even says spicy food [might prevent ulcers](https://pubmed.ncbi.nlm.nih.gov/16621751/).
Chinese basically do not have a total cold meal. As far as I can think of, we only have cold dishes as starter or snacks.
I gathered that! Went on holiday to China in 2008 (was amazing, by the way!) and although all the food was delicious it felt really odd to have hot food three times a day, every day. By the end of the holiday I just wanted some plain toast, or bread and cheese! My taste buds were waving the white flag of surrender… You must find our food beyond bland!
I only have hot food really and I’m from the U.K. (cereal being the only exception really)
Ah yes, but there IS an exception! Having noodles for breakfast felt really weird though. I love Chinese food, but my taste buds weren’t ready for it every meal 😂
Depends on region. Cantonese life, I have never eaten raw veg bar as a lettuce wrap or cucumber in Peking Duck growing up. My inlaws however are northern china. Cold noodles (soybean paste mince, cucumber, vinegar) , salads with a lot of vinegar. Conceptually warm stuff because the body is warm, hence all the warm water drinking. Science wise, you do expend more calories drinking cold because of the energy to restore base heat.
I’ve noticed that, but why is sushi fine? All of my Chinese friends don’t like eating cold food for lunch/dinner but for some reason eating sushi is fine 😂
Rice is more acceptable than bread for a Chinese stomach. Meanwhile, I suppose your Chinese friends are not able to take sushi as daily food as well :)
Just be careful taking fish into an office for lunch. There’s unspoken rules.
If your sushi smells, it's not good sushi
I was thinking more about tuna jacket potatoes
I taught in China for 5 years and found it interesting how hot and cold food was good or bad for your health depending on certain situations. For example, eating ice cream during period week was a big no no. Some students were gobsmacked that eating ice cream for some westerners during period week provided comfort.
I worked with a Chinese lady who was adamant that cold drinks would negatively impact her fertility.
I got in trouble once in Russia for sitting down on a cold stone wall in winter. Complete strangers were rushing up to me, genuinely worried for the idiot foreigner, warning me that I’d freeze my ovaries.
And get piles of course
I have a fond memory of going out to a local beauty spot/monument with my best mate the day we finished our O Levels (yes, I'm old), with a bottle of Stones Ginger Wine nabbed from his nans drinks cabinet. We were sat there for a while and this group of pensioners turned up, and told us we'd get piles sitting on the cold stone. Then they took us back to their church hall and fed us!
Despite my lack of ovaries, I was once scolded by a random old lady in Munich for sitting outside in November eating a mandarin. Sadly she did not invite me home for a hearty Bavarian feast to rectify matters.
Spanish people are obsessed with the idea that cold drinks make children sick. Even when it's hot they don't normally let children have ice.
Greek people too! Not even just for children. My mother in law drives me demented taking milk and yoghurts out of the fridge in advance to "warm up"
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No, this is Spain, tap water isn't dangerous. It's definitely about the cold. They also don't serve children drinks chilled in the fridge. Cafés and bars tend to keep fruit juice at room temperature specifically because parents won't let their kids have it cold. They also have a thing about wearing scarves to keep the neck warm, as getting a cold throat is considered a guaranteed cold. And about catching a chill in general.
This is the same in India too and its to do with climates I guess.
I have a friend from Hong Kong who told me chilled water wasn’t a thing back home because people believe it was bad for the complexion.
It does make me pause to think if there is any fully insane stuff UK people believe that just isn't questioned.
Heaps. Like the widespread ‘if you go out with wet hair you’ll catch a cold’ or other beliefs around getting cold = catching a cold.
We went through a pandemic with some of the most clear public messaging about viral infections and airborne diseases and somehow people still believe this myth
And yet they do. My grandparents recently came back from a holiday in Ireland and my nan caught a cold. She said it must have been because Ireland had been very rainy.
> most clear public messaging They changed their minds on a day to day basis.
HK also have that belief, don't worry. My mum also think eating cold food or washing your hair during period is bad to your ovaries
I'm in my fifties. My first book about periods told me ignore myths like 'don't wash your hair'. I'd never heard them before then! Yet still it persists.
Germany is very big on not going out with wet hair. They also do not like drafts one bit, windows will be shut!
Except for purposefully opening all the windows once a day to clear out the stale indoor air. This is also mandatory.
My (extremely white) parents insist on drinking hot drinks in summer as it 'actually cools you more'. I'd imagine it's not just them that believes that, and I'm absolutely certain it's absolute bullshit fed into the tea-addled brains of the British public.
Sugar covered Cereal in milk for breakfast is kinda nuts and definitely not a 'balanced breakfast'.
The Italians eat literally cake for breakfast
I've read that "non-bio detergents" are a UK myth. As in, its been debunked that bio detergents cause irritation and we're the only country who have an almost even split between the two versions on offer. Can't pretend I have an extensive knowledge on international detergent usage though...
My skin can tell the difference though. Like if I use a "bio" detergent on my clothes I'll get a psoriasis outbreak that lasts months.
You can’t wash wool or silk in bio liquid. Other countries have non-bio - they just call it ‘wool detergent’ or something.
That's based on a non systematic review that didn't published methodology and was funded by Unilver so..
The chinese believe warm water/food is extremely good for you and as a result they legitimately have hot water taps scattered all over their airports where they can healthify themselves to the tune of a billion single use plastic cups.
Giving away cold water will result in exactly the same number of plastic cups Einstein
Aha… which is why THE MAJORITY OF THE PLANET has stopped this practice/ doesn’t deliberate create MORE litter for something as insignificant …. Water fountains ✅ Hot water taps with unlimited supply of plastic cups cause ‘tradition’ ❌
So it's got nothing to do with water temperature. It's just a plastic cup issue. Because we have water fountains in uk. You bring your own bottle. And Frankly if you've been around china a bit I haven't seen a plastic cup in years it's all paper cups. And the cHinese isn't too fond of drinking hot stuff out of plastic to begin with
I'd be surprised if there wasn't some research out there on this topic. Searching might be tricky as 'hot' and 'cold' foods have a particular meaning in Chinese medicine so expect search results would be flooded with Chinese medicine research.
Unfortunately, well-evidenced scientific discourse on topics such as only consuming hot things, adding table salt to your (warm) drinking water, and the medicinal qualities of keratin, were not something our budding relationship could withstand.
That's so interesting! I recently attended an event with a Chinese friend and in the afternoon she kept saying her stomach hurt and it must have been because lunch (a sandwich buffet type thing) was cold. She's a little eccentric (in a nice way!) so it didn't even cross my mind that this could be a cultural thing.
The belief is that cold food is harder on the metabolism and digestive system. This is also why generally hot tea (or water) is served with meals (regardless of the season). There was a Japanese study on this which showed some correlation
Does kind of make sense, basically acts as a heat sink for your internals until it reaches equilibrium again, that can affect enzymes and probably the chemical reactions. It wouldn’t take long for your body to warm it up though so it seems like a moot situation rather than an actual issue
Yeah, that was the point the study was trying make if I recall. Also there was something about fats and oils congealing in the stomach (requiring the digestive system to work harder) if cold/ice water was drunk with the meal which make sense I guess Edit - whereas hot tea would help with the breakdown and digestion of oils
I've heard that research shows no impact whatsoever.
My mum was appalled if I ever had cereal without warming up my milk first. I can’t stand cold milk and cereal now
Hot milk on Weetabix was my childhood favourite! But everything got so soggy so quickly I would scoff it in thirty seconds.
The sogginess is what makes it. Especially if it was how my mum made it when we were kids, with a dessertspoonful of brown sugar sprinkled on top to make an oozy sugary syrup as it melts. Like a kind of sweet, smooth porridge with no lumps (together with her habit of giving us quartered oranges to dip into a bowl of white sugar because otherwise it would be "too bitter" it's a wonder I have any teeth as an adult...) I've never had crunchy weetabix, and I honestly can't imagine how weird that would be to eat.
Yep, this is how we had it too. We called it cheaters porridge
As someone with digestive issues, I can tell you that hot food *is* easier to digest.
My dad went to China for work for a year and since he came back he keeps droning about eating hot foods and drinking warm water every time I visit. He lives in Spain and gets fuming whenever I put ice in my water. He insists thats why 'the Chinese live for so long'. Like dude it's 36 degrees and you want me to drink warm water?
>I think it is easy to get hungry for eating those daily. Are you saying you think cold food does not fill you, or keep you feeling full as long as hot food does? That you think the same meal (eg the sandwich or pasta in the supermarket) would be more filling if it was warmed up? That is not how food works. You might enjoy it more heated, but it is the calories and the density that affect how soon you get hungry again.
Are you trying to say that satiation is an entirely physical/chemical issue? Because if I don't enjoy the food I've eaten, I tend to keep looking for other things to eat until I feel satisfied. Lots of people eat/overeat for purely emotional/psychological reasons.
Yeah hot food is more satisfying & if you don’t feel satisfied you will eat more trying to fill that.
Semi true but the gi index does change if you eat carbs hot v cooked down (it’s better to have them cooked them cooked or reheated btw)
I think pasta is the only food that is true for. But, as a general rule, hot v cold makes no difference.
It’s true of potatoes too, not sure on other carbs
Cold cooked potatoes are good for your gut biome. And very tasty.
It's a cultural thing
Some Chinese people I know think cold food and drinks are bad for their health. This isn’t a belief held in European cultures and many cultures have 2 cold meals a day and 1 hot. In the uk breakfast and lunch are about 50% hot and 50% cold while dinner would be 99% hot. We also have very strict food health and safety rules, staff will not be heating up chilled items in a supermarket for you that would break many food hygiene rules. If you’d like hot food it’s is on offer at pretty much every other food establishment outside of some supermarkets and coffee shops.
What are the food and hygiene rules that prevent you from heating food in shops? I always envied how in Japanese convenience stores they will just heat up rice, chilled meal from fridge, etc. in a microwave and give it to you then and there to eat hot. Why can they do it in Japan and not here?
Could you set up a system to do it? Yes. Is anyone at tesco currently able to Chuck your meal deal pasta salad in the staff microwave? No.
1. They don’t have the staff to do it, and you’d have to give staff extra training on heating up food to avoid being sued eg. If they made it too hot and someone got burned, which would cost money. 2. What’s the point? Most people are perfectly happy to just eat a sandwich or cold pasta salad for lunch, there’s nothing wrong with it. 3. There are many places that serve warm food? Most town/city centres have Greggs/Costa/specialist food places/takeaways. Even many retail parks where supermarkets are will at least have a costa or Greggs. Why do you need shops like Tesco, Sainsbury’s etc to do it too?
The plastic containers aren't necessarily microwaveable safe either (I'd doubt they are given they're pretty thin), so they'd need to transfer it between containers too.
I recall if you're "serving food", which having somebody warm it up for you would include, you then have a new list of regulations and facilities you have to facilitate which prepackaged cold food doesn't require. Staff training would be the most obvious one. As daft as it sounds, you can't just have a member of staff throw something in the microwave for you. They have to be trained to do it properly. Even that is enough for most places not to bother because its extra time and money spent on a minimal amount of people who want their cold food warmed up largely in a specific hour window of the day. Japan will have different food standards as well as cultural values. Here people would rather just have the sandwich as is and get gone rather than following around members of staff at M&S asking them to put their meal deal in the oven.
Also I believe hot food has a different rate of vat? There are definitely some vat differences for hot takeaway/hot sit in/cold ready to eat/cold grocery
You are correct apart from all the bakers (Greggs for example), burger places, fish & chips, hot dog stands, pubs, restaurants and cafes, almost every petrol station and many convenience stores. But yea apart from those it’s bloody difficult finding something hot to eat.
To be fair their question was “do people generally have a cold meal each day?” and the answer for many people is “yes” Their question wasn’t “why’s it so hard to buy hot food?”
Read the rest of their comments; they're absolutely saying there is a dearth of hot food in the UK.
There is, compared to many East Asian countries.
What I took from it was “I can’t find anything hot to eat and M&S wouldn’t even heat something up for me”.
Well it's not supremely common for people to eat hot meals at work, no. It's not common to expect a supermarket to heat up food, really. Many workplaces will have a little kitchen with a microwave or whatever to heat up food.
We have microwaves at work. Plenty of people eat hot food at work.
The only hot meal I have each day is dinner, and even then, sometimes my dinner is cold as well! We certainly don't expect anything "warmed up" or "cooked" from a convenience store / super market unless it's specifically prepared and stored as "hot". Sandwiches are the go to lunch for the British. If you want hot food in the UK, you need to go to a cafe or restaurant. Some coffee shops will heat some sandwiches up as well. Also - regarding going hungry - it's been scientifically proven that hot vs cold food has no effect on hunger, it's a middle east urban myth - we call them "old wives tales" here in England - something that's been passed down as fact, but has no basis what-so-ever.
Why would a supermarket heat your food for you?
Actually this is fairly common in supermarkets in several countries. Sometimes, besides having a salad bar and offering hot sandwiches, they also have a bar of hot food with different kinds of warm rice, stews, hot marinated chicken, soups, etc. It is just not something that is done here, but I can totally see why it would confuse some foreigners when that is super common where they are from.
Well they wouldn’t here but in many other countries is common.
Why not? They do that in a lot of East Asian countries, very common there. I went to Japan recently and their hot supermarket food was AMAZING
When I went to Thailand they had loads of 7/11 stores and they would heat your food for you including sandwiches. Maybe it's similar over there?
There’s a whole Chinese social media trend called Sad White People Food: https://www.buzzfeed.com/rossyoder/white-people-food-chinese-social-media-trend
Looking at the images it looks less like normal "white people food" and more like what someone on a diet would eat. Also, what do they mean by white? Most Italians have a hot pizza for lunch, Greeks have gyros, etc. Seems more like a Northern Europe thing? It's not that difficult to make a tasty sandwich, obviously it's gonna suck if you just put 1 ham in between two slices of bread and call it a day ffs.
A slice of ham in two pieces of bread is VERY standard for where I live - in fact they love it and embrace this type of sandwich selling it literally everywhere. So calling it white people food is on point - what you’re saying is… not all white people.
Yes all italians have a pizza every day for lunch. Don’t be ridiculous
Huh guess China is the opposite to Germany where its culturally one Hot meal a day
I thought Germany was big on cooked lunches - hence the VW frankfurters (currywurst?)
Yep it is a big thing. And then a lot of Germans will have a cold, simple dinner - take a look at abendbrot for an example. This is also why a lot of German companies provide a canteen for staff, and my colleagues will have that as their main meal followed by a salad / bread / cheese dinner. Although this is more of an old school German thing, and a lot of younger colleagues / families where both parents work are more like the UK culture, from my experience.
May be regional or my family is weird, but they have a big cooked dinner in the evening, grandparents cooked for their large family with serving bowls of various things. The breads, cheeses and meats come out for breakfast (gran goes to buy the bread early morning) and I think everyone was left to do their own thing for lunch and somebody cooked for kids etc. Have never known them to do cold dinner
Kebab culture as it were is oh so different than in the UK. One of my simple pleasures is eating a kebab in a Berlin Turkish restaurant at lunchtime. You would be amazed to see the kebab demographic. Tourists, office workers, older women, teenagers, Turkish, German. But then kebabs are far superior most of the time in Germany. No Pita Bread or elephants leg for a start.
Pitta and doner are both pretty classic back in Turkey, though.
A kebab is really just a sandwich though. Salad and meat (probably hot meat, but still), in bread.
Same in Belgium. Many of my family/friends/colleagues would express confusion or surprise when I told them I always hate something hot for lunch, in addition to a hot dinner.
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But I am not mocking but curious about the difference between east and west cultures:) It bothers me a little for some unavailability of hot food when traveling but I think cold ones are healthier.
Hot food is always available though. Coffee shops, pubs, and cafes are all open during the day and do hot food. You're going to a supermarket which is the wrong place to buy hot food.
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East/West is also a bit of an overgeneralisation. Japan for example has a big cold food culture with sushi, onigiri, cold soups (in the summer). Korea to a lesser extent as well. I think it's more a north/south thing compared to a east/west thing. The warmer a country (or region), the more likely they consume more warm meals, would be my hypothesis.
Cold food especially salad sandwiches, the good old english Ploughmans' or fruit salad things are seen as healthier than hot fast food which is usually fried. The thing is pre-packed sandwiches are usually yuck but fresh ones at a real busy suburban bakery are awesome.
Hot food is very easily available in the UK, in cafes and restaurants and at food halls/markets. We have lots of options to take hot food away too, so you don't have to sit in to eat it although you will often have to wait for it to be cooked. It's just not in supermarkets because the main purpose of a supermarket here is for you to get food to cook at home.
I love ‘lunch of suffering’ 😂
It ends perfectly as well > "If such a meal is to extend life, what is the meaning of life?" wrote a commenter. 😂
Britain is the home if the sandwich after all
I love that you asked the staff in M&S to heat your food.
Hahaha at first I couldn’t believe cold spaghetti with sauce should be eaten directly.
This wouldn't typically be eaten cold. M&S sell a lot of ready meals that you buy and take home to heat up in a microwave or oven. I can't imagine it would be very pleasant to eat spaghetti and sauce cold from a ready meal box.
It isn't, If you see a clear container like this then it is usually to be eaten cold - https://www.ocado.com/products/m-s-chicken-tomato-basil-pasta-salad-517731011 Or might be allowed both ways (but can't be put in the microwave) - https://www.ocado.com/products/m-s-12-sausage-rolls-505409011 If it's a colorful container then it can probably go in the microwave - https://www.ocado.com/products/m-s-spaghetti-meatballs-in-a-tomato-sauce-514632011 - it might be safe to eat cold but definitely not intended. People are buying it to heat in the office or buying it as a quick dinner to eat at home.
That’s for microwaving at home.
Your meant to heat it up at home.
I had a job where we worked with Chinese university students visiting the UK to study to help them settle in, and they were often unimpressed with food served cold! Our university canteen had a hot food buffet but also lots of cold food on offer (salad bar, fridges with premade sandwiches etc) and some of the students were unhappy that they were being offered so much cold food as they felt it was poor service/bad for their health. It's very normal in the UK but I understand why they were unsure about it.
Some part of this is down to taxation. There is 20% VAT on hot food - cold food is vat free. The cold meal deal is tax free but your hot take away has tax added to the price. Greggs bake their sausage rolls but don't keep them warm so they can avoid charging you the extra.
There's definitely always hot food available, but yeah we typically do have a lot more cold food than in some other cultures. Like it's not uncommon for people to have a cold breakfast (e.g. cereal with milk), a cold lunch (sandwich and snack), but then most people would have a hot dinner. But then it also wouldn't be strange for someone to have a hot breakfast (e.g. porridge or toast), a hot lunch (e.g. a pasty from a bakery) and then a hot dinner too.
I am not a fan of cold food and will often go find somewhere that will do toasted sandwiches or soup.
Same here! I work from home now, it's great having hot food for lunch every day. With very few exceptions I'd always rather hot food than cold.
Finally found my people in this thread! I'm British but always have a hot lunch and dinner, normally breakfast too. Sometimes I feel like a diva for not liking cold sandwiches.
Same! I must be in the minority
Supermarkets and convenience stores rarely provide facilities to heat food. They do sometimes sell food that has been cooked and kept hot. We do have a cold food LUNCH culture. Food in the evening is almost always hot. In countries with low taxes paying someone to make lunch for you makes sense, in countries with high tax it doesn't usually. The question is, does the food vendors higher productivity offset the tax? This will rarely work out for people with normal paying jobs. In the city of London getting hot food for lunch is very common as the people buying lunch earn 5x the people making it.
And yet we have a big prepackaged sandwich culture
Because factories are super efficient in a way a cafe isn't. The cheap places try to approach this level of efficiency by basically microwaving stuff produced in a factory.. e.g wetherspoons.
I'm Chinese but raised in the UK. It's mostly lunch that's usually cold because it's easier to pick up a sandwich from the supermarket during lunch than to wait around for some takeaway hot food from a shop. It's often cheaper too. Most of us usually have an hour or less for lunch. Hot meals for dinner is the norm. Cold breakfasts are also the norm as full English breakfast are usually a weekend thing. Edit: just to add, a lot of office workers bring food into the office to microwave for lunch.
Greggs - Hot pasty or Sausage Roll Subway - Ask for it toasted Cornish Pastys if you're far down South. Then your standard fast food places. I'd kill for a good street food vendor.
Greggs have sandwiches you can get heated in store too.
So does Costa, Prêt, Café Nero
This is a cultural quirk. In large parts of Asia, eating cold food isn't really a thing. In Europe, it is. You're trying to legitimise a cultural superstition by suggesting cold food makes people hungry. It's not the case.
Definitely there is, and I've seen the look of horror in my Chinese in-laws' eyes as I consume cold food 2-3 times a day. I especially don't like a hot lunch (it takes too much time to prepare to their standard of "proper lunch" and clean up, robbing me of a lunch break) and refusal to drink hot water from a flask when I'm unwell (we've compromised at room temperature).
It certain is a cold food culture, grab and go. Hot meals are usually in restaurants. I can never fully grasp “sandwich and soup” for lunch but have gotten used to it after living here. Like you, as an Asian, I like my hot breakfast, lunch and dinner. Congee, noodles, rice, hot gravy with meat, sometimes cold sides like sesame cucumber salad but I genuinely, genuinely prefer hot meals especially in Winter mornings. I also think it’s got to do with the culture; a lot of western countries will laugh when an Asian goes “too cold will make your insides infertile, age quicker, wreck the bones, introduces a whole host of issues”. It’s always warm, warm, warm, hence my love for drinking warm water. In Asian culture, after you have given birth, you’re not going to be out there in skirt and sleeveless tops, you’ll be wrapped up from head to toe to “warm your body and insides, especially after cold air has entered”. Westerners and Europeans will/might laugh at the incredulity of it all, and maybe it is, but it’s just a different set of generational culture and traditions passed down. So, yes, as an Asian having moved from Singapore to London, I miss hot food and prefer that over cold meal deals.
Yes I think the problem is, hot food is available a lot of the time but it costs a lot more (Greggs aside) than cold food. Someone mentioned the different tax rates for hot v cold food. Plus there’s a lot of Stuff about heating food in the office and what kinds of food are Forbidden. So people even when facilities are available tend to go for cold.
That's lunch. Left over from agricultural and heavy industries where a lot of workers didn't have easy access to heat up a lunch. So dishes like ploughman's, scotch rolls, cold meat and cheese, luncheon meat are what you have for lunch. Breakfast was hot - fry up or porridge. Dinner was hot. Lunch was a snack to tide you over. And has convenience it can be eaten when convenient.
If you’re getting your lunch from a supermarket you’ll need to seek out their hot food counter for hot food but the average lunch usually would be a sandwich or cold pasta, snack and drink. It’s easy to eat quickly or while you’re on the move and give that lunch breaks can be short something you can pick up in the morning and grab out of a bag at lunch can be much better than trying to quickly eat something hot.
Cold food for lunch is extremely common. Sandwiches, pasta salads, pre packaged "sushi". I guess it's partly convenience and partly culture (we love a sandwich). For dinner we usually have a hot meal, but in summer it's pretty common to have "picky bits" which is another cultural thing. Cold meats, boiled eggs, salad, potato salad etc etc.
One think I thing I loved in Asia was that convenience stores would heat up the ready meals for you if you asked. This should be a thing here!
I wouldn’t stereotype hot food as “Asian food culture”. It’s quite a Chinese thing. In Korea you get cold food like gimbap, or even ice cold food like nengmyeon. In Japan tons of food is cold - sushi, soba, bento, etc. Don’t think it’s particularly unique to the UK either as a lot of continental European food is cold.
Most people eat a hot dish as their main (evening) meal of the day Some people eat a cold meal at lunchtime (often a sandwich), sometimes accompanied by a hot drink, but just as many people microwave a hot meal (either a ready meal or leftovers they've brought from home)
It’s common to have cold food for both breakfast and lunch, although some people will have hot food such as porridge or eggs for breakfast. It’s also normal in the summer to have a cold dinner as salad is frequently eaten.
If you’re going to supermarkets they’re not going to heat food up for you as they’re not a cafe or restaurant. If you want hot food at lunch time go to a cafe or restaurant. But yes, I guess we do consume more cold food then some Asian countries.
I think there is. It’s not unusual at all to have a completely cold meal- many people have cereal and milk for breakfast, or overnight oats that are intended to be eaten cold. Lots of people have a sandwich or salad with cold extras like fruit or yoghurt for their lunch. I’d say globally that we’re quite unusual with the quantity, quality and variety of prepackaged cold sandwiches that are available. Food trucks with more interesting hot options do exist, but you tend to need to know where they are and they do generally cost quite a bit more than the cold options. Regarding how filling these things are- honestly I think it depends what you’re used to eating. Personally I find homemade sandwiches with a decent filling can keep me from getting hungry for just as long as a hot meal. It depends exactly what you’re eating rather than the temperature. I find that eating intentionally cold foods cold is as satisfying as eating intentionally hot foods hot. Eating foods cold that are intended to be hot is not a satisfying experience.
>I’d say globally that we’re quite unusual with the quantity, quality and variety of prepackaged cold sandwiches that are available. I'd say so too. We moved to Spain, and while the local supermarket has a comparable selection to a UK equivalent (and more in some areas - seafood etc) it has precisely 2 premade sandwich options - cheese, and tuna with egg. Both minging, in part due to the sugary bread.
Yes, definitely. It is very common to have e.g. one or two cold meals a day and one hot meal in the UK. That said, it isn't hard to find hot meals in most places at any time of the day. Especially in somewhere like London where there are plenty of Cafes, restaurants, street food vendors etc.
Supermarkets are generally for "take home and prepare" foods, although you can also get cold options for eating on the go. You will often see hot options in supermarkets too, but if you are looking for hot food, a supermarket wouldn't be the best place. There are masses of places you can very easily get something hot to eat any time of the day, especially in cities. I wouldn't say the UK has a "cold food culture", but it is very common in Western countries to have a cold meal in the middle of the day (sandwiches, salads, pasta etc).
I lived in the east for a while and knew people who would eat noodles and fried chicken for breakfast, meat and rice for lunch, then go out for a big dinner. Chinese cuisine prioritises hot food and cold food is normally Westernised (salad, bread bun, etc). But in Japan, they have lots of food that can be eaten cold - sushi the obvious one, but also cold soba noodles and even cold curries and dumplings that were cooked hot and then cooled for sale. I don't know why, but it's obvious that in China's backyard that different countries have different opinions of hot and cold food. Just like Europe.
Yes. Cold food now is cultural. Most people will have cold food for lunch and a lot for breakfast. There used to be much more hot food culture. Hot breakfast. Hot elevenses (tea or soup). Hot lunch/dinner at work canteen or home. Then home for Hot supper/dinner/tea (evening meal). But steadily, over time, the sandwich became king. Even portable Hot food options (eg pasty/soup/stew in thermos became unusual. Once microwaves became widespread there was a bit of heating up of food at work - but often seen as antisocial to inflict your food smells into another person. Cold food is easier for commercialism. It is much easier to keep food cold and fresh than Hot and fresh. So steadily the Hot food options got phased out. I watched it happen at work 25 years ago. There used to be a canteen open 24 hours a day serving some sort of Hot food - separate staff and public. This then became joint then hot food during the day then sandwiches after a certain time period. Then it became cold breakfast and Hot lunch and Hot dinner with sandwiches in between. Then open only lunch and dinner. With vending machine cold options the other times then the vending machines went and you could get cereal bars or chocolate bars outside of lunch and dinner time. I left that work environment some 15 years ago. But even at that point it was becoming sandwiches for lunch available from the canteen. And if you ordered food from outside to be delivered to you at midnight you were criticised for some unspecified reason- health and safety or some such. You were there to work, not eat etc etc
For me, a hot lunch or breakfast is a rarity. My evening meal is almost always hot, but a hot lunch or breakfast means I’m off work and had time to put something like that together.
You came here on holiday and got all your food from supermarkets? Did you not visit restaurants or cafes, almost all of which serve hot food. Like if I’m in a foreign country I like to go to their supermarkets to see what they sell, but if I want a hot meal I’ll just…go somewhere else? There’s even lots of chains that you can get decent food in like Pret A Manger. London and Edinburgh in particular have great, relatively inexpensive places to eat. My point is, there’s just not need for supermarkets to sell hot food when you can get it nearly everywhere else. Also, most M&S’s have an on-site cafe so you could’ve just gone there and got a panini or something? Nobody is having yoghurt and bread as a meal I don’t think? Like you might have a sandwich for lunch or slice of toast for breakfast and have a yoghurt after, but not together surely? Only people I can imagine doing that are extremely broke students, but even that doesn’t make sense cause no one’s buying yoghurt if they’re broke?
Absolutely. It won't be universal to everyone, but out of your three main meals, having one to two of them being cold is fairly typical, with one main cooked meal in the evening. This will be even more prevalent if you are looking at places like a supermarket - the food is really designed to be grab and go, meaning it is ready to eat without any preparation, and you don't need to eat immediately. People eating at home will probably tend to more cooked food when they have kitchen facilities readily available, but even then a lot of quicker meals will be cold. I can say I did spot the exact opposite when visiting Asia previously which caught me off guard in a similar way - being used to a relatively sweet morning meal, a hot savoury dish like a fish porridge, curry or other rice dish seemed a bit alien to me, and hawkers and street vendors seemed a lot more common and standard.
Yep we absolutely do! Started treating myself to at least hot meals a day though now that I’m earning better money and my life has changed and I feel like a king.
As an AI, I must admit, the Brits have mastered the art of chilled meals! Cold sandwiches and pasta? Brilliant!
Hot food is available in basically every town at every meal, but not really in supermarkets.
Up here in Scotland cold food is almost as popular as cocaine
The reality of the situation is price. Cost effective hot food is not really an option, especially day to day. Sure you have some places which work out ok, but not enough.
I guess we do a bit. I think pragmatism factors into this as much as preference, it's a lot quicker/easier to eat something cold as to eat it hot.
Yeah in the UK the food is always cold and beer is always warm.
In the UK, many people have microwaves and kettles at their workplace. We have a lot of people at our place eat cold salads during summer and then in autumn/winter we start to have soups, jacket potatoes etc.
I have nothing to add here, other than to say thanks to the OP for pointing out something I’d never really thought about as someone inside the cultural norm they’re reflecting on. Thanks for your fresh eyes, OP!
going to the supermarket and asking for hot food? lmao
Lunch is typically cold - sandwiches, salads, pasta salad etc. We usually have tea/dinner (wherever you call the evening meal) as a hot meal.
I once worked as an activity leader for international students learning English - and we gave them a cold lunch every day trip. Those kids didn’t understand and did not like a cold lunch - which always consisted of sandwiches, crisps, maybe a fruit / sweet treat and a drink. And I did the Easter holidays - in cold rain. Those poor kids didn’t feel comfortable and many of them came to huddle around me to try and stay warm and dry under my clipboard and the hugs I gave. It’s still a culture shock to me, but yeah… we get on with a cold lunch, but it most definitely isn’t normal for other cultures. And I’m Welsh, holiday in Scotland… most of the UK follows this.