Peas Mussolini? Tarrant’s rant over those pretentious menus

FOR decades diners have been bewildered by pretentious menus, often too embarrassed to ask what the elaborate language actually refers to.

But Chris Tarrant has struck a blow for all those left at a loss about what to order just because the chef decided some fancy vocabulary would impress the clients.

Describing a menu he encountered recently, the 70-year-old presenter said: ‘I was meandering as best I could through a particularly incomprehensible menu in a not very special restaurant last week, when I came across this gem: “A delight of North Sea cod with pommes de terre diced in the classic styling and peas Mussolini”. ‘Pommes de terre in classic styling? So just bogstandard chips, then. And what on earth are “peas Mussolini?” It’s another world.’ The menu may have been referring to peas mousseline, rather than a dish devised by Italy’s wartime dictator.

Tarrant added: ‘On the same menu was salt-baked beetroot, deconstructed lemon meringue… romesco and ’nduja. Had I arrived on the planet Zarg? What inspires the people who write menus to make them incomprehensible?’

Writing in Woman’s Weekly magazine, the former Who Wants To Be A Millionaire host suggested that some of the wording must simply be made up and he railed against statements of the obvious. He said: ‘All those meaningless embellishments: green peas, for instance – what other colours of peas are there, for goodness’ sake?

‘My favourite is sea scallops – well where else will you find scallops – growing on a bush in Albania?

‘ Where will it end? Freshly- choked chicken, four-wheel-drive-run-over pheasant? I really don’t want to know.’