whatever happened to the ploughman's lunch?

[PineappleDanish]

We didn't often eat out as children but did have the occasional pub lunch. My parents would ALWAYS order a ploughman's lunch - bread, cheese, cured meats, pickle, sometimes a pork pie, salad. It was seen (in the 70s and 80s) as a culinary delight.

They appear to have disappeared - are all the ploughmen now eating Vietnamese pho or Japanese bento boxes instead?

Ooh! your version sounds delicious ShesGotBetteDavisEyes although I'd replace the crackers with a big wadge of wholemeal bread with lashings of butter! ginger beer sounds a good drink to go with it.

My actual ploughman, if he’s near home and comes in for lunch, quite often has a ploughman’s, complete with cider. (Neither of us drink much, so we share a can.)
If he’s not, he takes cold pizza, and chicken tikka pasties, but a cheese, ham, salad n pickle sandwich is always welcome, especially if someone else puts it together! Not sure he’s quite ready for a bento box, but give it another 5 years...

Cheese
Bread
Tomato
pickle/pickles onions (lots)
spring onion

that is all...

I have no issues with mezze and foreign food in general. (Although I draw the line at goats' cheese, it's an abomination). But I don't understand why many places have chucked out traditional British favourites in favour of mediterranean platters or mezze.

We have some amazing local food in this country and we should be celebrating that just as much as looking overseas for inspiration.

Still common in pubs in Somerset.

They do a ploughman's in our local (Kent) but it's shite.

I think a lot of people my age find this sort of traditional fare bland and old fashioned. Personally for me:

Mezze Platter chickpea & pinenut falafels, spiced red pepper dip, breaded brie, tzatziki, duo of hummus topped with Omega seeds & a stone-baked flatbread

Sounds nice, if a bit more 'picnic' than meal out.

Whereas a ploughmans is basically a deconstructed cheese sandwich like something you'd make out of desperation from fridge leftovers, not something I want to spend money on in a pub.

I used to work in a tea room and approved when people ordered ploughmans because it was so simple. Lettuce, tomato, cucumber, pickle in a little bowl, huffer (bread roll), butter, pickled onion, massive wedges of cheddar or rolls of ham (depending whether a ham ploughman or a cheese ploughman) and half an apple. The apple never got eaten.

Well done OP, I am now desperate for a Ploughman's Lunch

So am I!

And until OP mentioned it, I hadn't realised that these delightful little platefuls of deliciousness had disappeared off the culinary menu - but she's right!

I think a lot of people my age find this sort of traditional fare bland and old fashioned

Ooh, you don’t know you’re born!

Best meal known to humankind, and yes, I'd forgotten all about it. It's about as 80s as a Black Forest gateaux, or a cheese and pineapple hedgehog. All of which I will now be having for tea!

Any farmers care to share what's in their packed lunch?

Plastic white bread, a packet of ham and a can of Coke, to go by what I once found in a bale of hay!

Plastic white bread, a packet of ham and a can of Coke, to go by what I once found in a bale of hay!

Another illusion shattered, Daffodil

The most traditional pub I can think of does a platter of:

Cured meat and cheese platter – Cured ham, Coppa, Pancetta and schiacciata ham with cheddar cheese golden
beetroot piccalilli, marinated olives and sourdough bread

Sounds really nice, but you couldn't really say it's local. Maybe I should start a pub selling scampi, chicken in a basket and ploughman's lunch, with black forest gateau for afters.

Isn't a ploughman's basically just a DIY sandwich? Can't the pubs be bothered to actually put the cheese inside the bread? I do love one with crusty bread, mature cheddar and pickle though, my mouth is actually watering.

I used to love a ploughman’s sandwich. I am now craving a ploughman’s lunch, nice one OP! Thanks a bunch!

I read somewhere that a farmworker's lunch would have been a lump of cheese, bread, and an onion eaten like an apple. Hope that helps with your bucolic fantasies,SchadenfreudePersonified

It's so much more than a DIY sandwich! Most ploughman's I remember have crusty bread, not flat slices to make a sandwich with. Tear off chunks and have it with a different type of cheese each bite. Lovely.

Have to have decent pickle though, none of your Branston's.

The problem with a ploughmans is that the quality varies so much a between delicious (home baked bread, good quality cheese, nice veggies & pickles)and horrendous (plastic bread, value cheddar and a best buy gerkin). i would only order it in a pub i really trust!

(In olden times I mean)

Regularly see it in Yorkshire. Often make our own at home for dinner

It was crap. Cheddar cheese (ugh) Branston pickle, bread etc

It was the 80s pub idea of a salad.

Ooh, I love a cheese ploughmans...

The modern version is a Mezze board.

Meat, pitta, cheese, gherkins etc.

I’ve seen it a few years ago but I think it’s fallen out of fashion and been replaced with hipster alternatives

I think a little cafe decked out like your MIL's sitting room in the 1980's with staff dressed in vintage Laura Ashley serving ploughman's lunches, pints of prawns, chicken in a basket, and lager and lime would be very hipster. Maybe with a sideline selling organic Devon violets toilet water, hand crocheted antimacassars and a bespoke recreation of the Weekend Selection Box.