Anthony Burgess left England in a Bedford Dormobile in 1968 and spent many of his later years in Italy and Monaco. Here he reflects on the British food which was not generally available when he was living on the mainland of Europe:

‘Living abroad as I do, I miss various things which Europe does not care to import from Britain — our incomparable butcher’s pork sausages, for instance, and all our cheeses except for a synthetic cheddar. A dish I particularly miss is a good London mixed grill as served in one of the old chophouses — bacon, a sausage, a kidney, a lamb chop, a grilled tomato, a steaming load of chips. And, of course, Worcestershire sauce. This last is obtainable in Europe, and even French chefs slyly top off their savoury dishes with a few drops. HP Sauce, from whose label I learned French when I was four, is rarely around. This, whose quality has not changed in all my seventy-odd years, recalls, when I sniff the bottle, the working-class kitchen of my Lancashire home. It is the lowly equivalent of Proust’s madeleine.’

First published in Harpers and Queen, 1990.

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