Second coming of the corned beef sarnie ...

LOVE it or hate it, corned beef is the ultimate retro food — and if you don’t think you’re a fan, M&S has a new product which might just change your mind.

Corned beef — so called because the meat was cured with large ‘corns’ of salt — was most popular in the first and Second World Wars when fresh food was scarce.

But there’s now a resurgence of interest in this traditionally cured meat, which is suddenly popping up on the menu at fashionable restaurants such as roast in London Bridge.

Most corned beef is produced in South America, but when M&S decided to stock it, it set about trying to find a homegrown supplier of the very best quality meat.

Lo and behold their new sandwich made with corned beef that’s cured, cooked and sliced in east Anglia.

M&S sandwich expert Julia Bradbury says: ‘It’s great to be bringing back corned beef sandwiches and offering customers a forgotten favourite.

‘ The British corned beef we’ve found is absolutely top quality. We’ve put it with ploughman’s pickle on soft white bread and, for me, it tastes very nostalgic.’

If you’d like something to wash it down with, how about another old-fashioned favourite that’s been given a modern makeover? Lambrusco?

forget the fizzy plonk that was quaffed in vast quantities back in the eighties, M& S now has a fizzy red that’s so good it will dispel any snobbish notions you might have about the retro fizz.

Made from grapes grown in the emilia romagna region of Italy that’s also home to Parma ham, Parmesan cheese and ravioli, it goes beautifully with food, particularly cured meats. Sparkling red wine is hugely popular in countries such as Australia, where sparkling Shiraz is often served at barbecues because of its affinity with food.

fizz is often just thought of as an aperitif in this country, but this red version works particularly well at the dinner table.