Sorry France, but Britain is better at food than you are

For the great French gastronome, it might be la paille finale. But for us food-loving Brits, it’s le moment juste.

This week, the online cheesemonger Cheesegeek announced that the UK now produces some 1,000 varieties of artisanal cheese. These are cheeses made according to traditional methods and by hand.

One might naturally assume, given that France is the land de fromage, that the title of the European country that produces the largest number of such cheeses would be a Gallic one. But alas, mon brave, the total number of French cheeses that are not produced in a factory or made mechanically is a paltry 550. So it’s not just the scent of a victory, or the mere whiff of a triumph. As we now make almost double the number of France, one can say, as Bart Simpson once did, that the French really are a nation of “cheese-eating surrender monkeys”.

There has been a renaissance in British cheesemaking since the 1990s, with hundreds of small businesses emerging across the country. And since it’s universally acknowledged that we produce the best milk, it follows that we make the finest cheese – and great wheels of it. As Philip Wilton, of Tottenham store Wildes Cheese, puts it: “We are just better at cheesemaking.”

But the reason the Gallic gourmet is today weeping croissant-sized tears into his

soup du jour is that it is almost impossible not to conclude that les rosbifs now beat the frogs at food and drink across the board.

For me, while the cheese news is reassuring, the moment, the coup de grâce, came a few weeks ago when I tasted a glass of Gusbourne Brut Reserve 2017. For there, in a glass – a blend of the classic champagne grapes of chardonnay, pinot noir and pinot meunier, made in the traditional “méthode champenoise” – was a taste of sparkling wine perfection: light gold in colour, fresh on the palate with a hint of baked pastry. Better than a great deal of French champagnes. And it’s from a vineyard in Kent. Today, from a sublime taste of Nutbourne Sussex Reserve to Hampshire’s Balfour Brut rosé, we can sip our way to heaven across England’s finest vineyards.

And while France has seen its food culture trampled upon by nearly 1,500 branches of Mcdonald’s, from Calais to Cannes, at last we have serious cheffing talent not just in London but across the country. There’s Stuart Ralston in Edinburgh, Dan Mcgeorge in the Peak District, Lisa Goodwin-allen in Lancashire, Tommy Heaney in Cardiff and Paul Ainsworth in Cornwall.

What makes it sweeter is how long it has taken. Hundreds of years, to be precise. Things were looking promising in the early 1800s when Antoine Beauvilliers opened his Grande Taverne de Londres in Rue de Richelieu in Paris, a tribute to John Farley’s London Tavern of Bishopsgate of the 1780s.

But during the 19th century, France cemented its position as gastronomic ruler of the universe with seminal figures such as chef-philosopher Jean Anthelme Brillat-savarin and the founding of the Cordon Bleu school by Marthe Distel in 1895. All we Brits did for about the next 100 years was turn out good sponge puddings and think that talking about food was common.

Today we see the rise and rise of independent butchers and delis, passionate food producers, the world’s greatest restaurateurs, and generally the most culinary diverse landscape. And a lot of cheese. C’est magnifique!