A ploughman's lunch: buttered bread, cheese, raw onion, and a mug of cider.

A ploughman's lunch (often just called a ploughman's) is a cold snack or meal originating in the United Kingdom, comprising at a minimum cheese (usually a thick piece of Cheddar, Stilton, or other local cheese), pickle (called "relish" outside the UK), such as that made by Branston, bread (especially crusty bread, which may be a chunk from a loaf or a bap), and butter^[1]. It is often accompanied by a green salad; other common additions are half an apple, celery, pâté, crisps, diced hard boiled egg or beetroot.

The origins of the ploughman's lunch remain unclear. It appears to date back at least to the 1960s, when the Milk Marketing Board promoted the meal nationally to boost sales of cheese, and some investigations have concluded that the meal is nothing more than marketing. However, other sources suggest that a comparable meal has been called a ploughman's lunch at least from 1957, the meal itself may have been popular at least as far back as before World War II, though it may have been called a ploughboy's lunch.

It is a common menu item in English pubs. It is considered a cultural icon of England^[2]. The familiarity of the ploughman's lunch has led catering companies to describe a sandwich containing Cheddar cheese, pickle and salad as a "ploughman's sandwich"^{[citation needed]}.

[edit] Origins and etymology

The Oxford English Dictionary (OED) dates this phrase back to at least 1837, in the book Memoirs of the life of Sir Walter Scott by John G. Lockhart^[3]; but this stray early use may have meant merely the sum of its parts, "a lunch for a ploughman".

Until recently, the OED's next citation was only from 1970, indicating a long period of time when the expression was virtually unknown. This long disuse and recent rediscovery has led some people, such as the writer Ian McEwan (in his film The Ploughman's Lunch), to portray the dish as being a recent invention dressed up as a traditional meal.

Lexicographer Edwin Radford in To Coin a Phrase (1974) attributes the current usage to Richard Trehane, chairman of the English Country Cheese Council^{[citation needed]}. Nigel Rees also concluded current usage to be 1970s marketing^{[citation needed]}.

In 2005, research by Victoria Coren and others for the Wordhunt project^[4] in conjunction with the first series of Balderdash and Piffle on the BBC (first broadcast at the beginning of 2006^[5]) traced the origin of the phrase to 1960; the documentary evidence was minutes of meetings of the English Country Cheese Council, and contemporaneous advertising matter. The BBC concluded that "the Ploughman's Lunch was invented as a marketing ploy to sell British cheese in pubs."^[6]

It has since been traced back slightly further, to an edition of The Times from 29 April 1958^[7]. The new citation has been incorporated into the online edition of the OED and will be included in the next revision of the published OED^{[citation needed]}. The new evidence supports Trehane as the inventor of the term^{[dubious – discuss]}.

There was a statement on BBC TV that the idea for the 'ploughman's lunch' as a name for a type of sold meal arose when a workman working in a café brought a packed lunch of bread and cheese and pickle to work; a customer saw it and ordered it, and was curtly told 'That's a navvy's lunch'; but that gave the management the idea of selling similar meals^{[citation needed]}.

The 1983 film The Ploughman's Lunch has a subtext that is "the way countries and people re-write their own history to suit the needs of the present", according to screenonline^[8]. The title is a reference to the way in which the history of the ploughman's lunch has apparently been dictated in order to promote cheese as a lunch-time food, rather than as a reflection of its historical popularity, as indicated in the dialogue^[9].

However, an edition of a magazine published by the Brewers' Society called A Monthly Bulletin from July 1956 describes activities of the Cheese Bureau, which it says "exists for the admirable purpose of popularising cheese and, as a corollary, the public house lunch of bread, beer, cheese and pickles. This traditional combination was broken by rationing; the Cheese Bureau hopes, by demonstrating the natural affinity of the two parties, to effect a remarriage."^[9] This implies that a "traditional combination" of bread, beer, cheese and pickles was popular before rationing in the United Kingdom (which followed World War II), albeit without the butter. Author Adrian Bell at the time said: "There’s a pub quite close to where I live where … all you need say is, ‘Ploughboy’s Lunch, Harry, please.’ And in a matter of minutes a tray is handed across the counter to you on which is a good square hunk of bread, a lump of butter and a wedge of cheese, and pickled onions, along with your pint of beer. ‘Ploughboy’s Lunch’, that’s called – remember those words: they stand for something pretty good."^[9]

Only one year later, in June 1957, another edition of the same publication referred to a ploughman's lunch using exactly that name, and said that it consisted of "cottage bread, cheese, lettuce, hard-boiled eggs, cold sausages and, of course, beer"^[9].

[edit] External links

Wikibooks Cookbook has a recipe/module on Ploughman's Lunch

• Recipe for Ploughman's Lunch
• Ploughmans lunch image @ Flickr

[edit] References

• Why Do We Say ...?, Nigel Rees, 1987, ISBN 0-7137-1944-3.