“Football team food has been poor because it’s been accepted for a long time without anyone pointing out how bad it is,” says Tom Kirby, founder of Footyscran, a Twitter account that for the past two years has been posting photographs of some of the weak, disgusting, but also increasingly wonderful offers offered by clubs.
“Clubs know match-going fans, especially ones who may have had a drink or two, are happy to spend £5 or more on very bog standard food,” Kirby adds. “This is all the while knowing that once fans are in the ground there’s nowhere else you can go to eat. So the clubs often don’t strive to make the offering better.”
The food on football pitches has been poor because it’s just been accepted for so long without anyone finding it bad.
Tom’s site has more than 300,000 followers, who are encouraged to upload photographs of their own snacks, good, bad and downright ugly, taken in one fit day in the UK and, increasingly, around the world. His view of the cynic and the greedy attitudes of boys’ clubs are well-founded. I still can’t forget my first plate of cakes and chips on a football pitch, served through a guy who looked like he had killed farm animals with his bare hands in his spare time, at the racecourse, home of my team Wrexham FC, in 1991.
The cake had the pallor of a sports sock we were given as a gift and tasted, unsurprisingly, like a sloth’s nose. The ketchup fries looked and tasted as if they had been buried under a hole near the M62 from the structure and harpooned through. A hungry fox bleeding from the nose. I swore to myself, from that day on, that I would wait until I was given a house after the game before eating. However, some thirty years later, it seems that the farm animals are killing cake. The boy of yesteryear is virtually absent from today’s football “stadiums”.
“Now I hear other people say, ‘It’s worth standing in line to see this. ‘After two years, we now have enthusiasts who come first for the souvlaki, then for the beer and only thirdly for the football itself,” says Erint Petsani, who takes care of the stoves in Como
“I was born in Albania, but I moved to Greece when I was 2 years old,” he tells me. “Come & Go Souvlaki came as an idea to me during the pandemic. Lockdown meant I wasn’t allowed to go and eat my favourite food which has always been souvlaki. So I thought that I should open the type of venture that would give people my favourite food fast and quick. The fact that I’d already worked in street food markets during my studies on another Greek food stall allowed me to learn how the wraps and the ingredients come together.”
The pie had the pallor of a forgotten gym sock and tasted, predictably, like the pickings from a sloth’s nostrils
As a promising young striker seen through a scout, Eint’s food was tasted through one of the administrators of Dulwich Hamlet FC and he was made an offer to come and see if his food would sell in a football environment. To Erint’s delight, Dulwich Hamlet enthusiasts have adopted their antidote to burgers and hot dogs, and their souvlaki stand is now a permanent fixture on the grounds of the Champion Hill club on good form days.
“Burgers and hot dogs are things you can find anywhere and eat whenever you need them at home,” Erit says. “Souvlaki is another story. The efforts we are making to achieve this are much more intensive and time-consuming. Confusion arises when enthusiasts say they need chili sauce in their souvlaki. I say that in Greece we would never use chili in the souvlaki, so I made my favorite Greek feta sauces, very spicy, a type of htipiti, which worked really well.
Dulwich Hamlet and his association with Come
“The city of Birmingham is trialling many street food stalls on its grounds, giving foodies the chance to try curries, roasted red meat tiger buns and even a range of amazing flatbreads,” he tells me. “Hull City will be near/lower on the football ladder with their inventions in shredded red meat chips and Buffalo bird wings, all at very affordable prices. “
Souvlaki is another story. The effort we put into doing this is much more intense and time-consuming.
But in the era of VIP executive briefings, corporate lunches, and the feeling that hot new stadiums are sometimes built more with Adele and Bruce Springsteen concerts in mind than football games, There is a vital component of the game. Provide an audience that has no challenge with the concept of dining on street food in reasonable seating.
It was in the early 1980s that executive boxes and accompanying restaurants first appeared on British football grounds. Before that, “VIP” amenities encompassed nothing more than a pint and a tray of cookies in the convention hall after the game. However, once again, football has failed to materialise the drastic change in British dining habits. In the late 1990s, I won an executive ticket to watch Tottenham Hotspur play at Wimbledon on a foggy winter afternoon. , and affordable food just beginning to emerge on our grocery shopping streets in the form of Pierre Victoire and Wagamama, White Hart Lane’s menu reads like a 1970s anthem to flared pants, beige colors, and the three days of the week.
The ‘soup of the day’ was thinner than Bobby Charlton’s hair and the cheese board consisted of two types of cheddar so cold that they may have just been removed from a mortuary slab. That’s not the case any longer. White Hart Lane was torn down in 2017 to be replaced by the Tottenham Stadium, where beer is brewed in-house and the dizzying array of executive dining areas includes ‘The Chef’s Table’, overseen by head chef Mark Reynolds.
“The difference in catering control criteria since I’ve been racing in football has been unbelievable,” Mark says as I speak to him in one of Tottenham’s luxurious executive suites ahead of a pre-season friendly against Shakhtar Donetsk, where 55,000 fans are about to attend. see Harry Kane. Scores a hat-trick against the Ukrainian team. “What we used to serve as a component of high-end hospitality is now what we sell in the lobbies to all the enthusiasts who attend,” he adds.
The “soup of the day” thinner than Bobby Charlton’s hair
Having worked at Wembley Stadium and Arsenal before joining Spurs, Mark presides over a team of more than 80 chefs each day in fit who create each and every new product in a fit day, from executive suites to sausage rolls and pies. the latter has a homemade pie-like filling, complemented by an added touch of Bovril. It’s a cake any gourmet bakery would aspire to, combining high-quality ingredients with an old-fashioned flavor nuance to appeal to old-school football purists like me.
“It’s also value for money,” Mark insists. “If you drink a pint of our IPA on the floor or eat one of our sausage rolls or pies, it will cost you less than you would get commercially. ”
Marc is right. A pint at Tottenham is equivalent to just over five Dollos Angelesrs, while you’ll also receive the replacement of a five-pound note after buying a cake. However, if you’ve been given deeconsistency with your wallet (up to around £400 consistently withson, to be precise), the Chef’s Table delight offers you a two-course menu that can include anything from pumpkin and pine nut ravioli with stick tomato sauce and basil pesto. Roast chicken fed with corn, English asparagus, blos angelesck truffle, anna apples and thyme juice. This is a Los Angeles a la carte delight with table service that, in the most productive way imaginable, is reminiscent of what might delight in a first-class angelless living room on a Gulf luxury airline. .
“For each and every away game next season, we’ll be bringing in a guest chef from that region to create something more in terms of hospitality,” enthuses Mark. “We will have Angela Hartnett for the Arsenal derby because she supports them and we are making plans for Bryn Williams for the Liverpool game because he is a big Reds fan. “
If you win, smart food is an added treat. And if you lose, it’s raining, and you’re angry, then the right food can make everything a little better.
With celebrity chefs decorated in Michelin garlands rubbing shoulders with prominent real-life footballers in north London, it could possibly be argued that the soul of football has either advanced or been lost along the way. As much as I enjoyed my pumpkin ravioli and New Zealand Sauvignon Blanc, I felt a desire to see if anything had been replaced in the remotest corners of the English football world, far from the culinary inventions of London.
300 miles north, in Workington, Cumbria, I discovered a town that, it seems, has little to do with the evolution of football. The town’s football club has not been a member of the Football League since 1977 and the The ground, Borough Park, has hardly been replaced since then, with its numerous terraces, solid roof, peeling paint and, under the main stand of their match against Penrith, a queue of 15 other people for their meat pie, chips, peas and gravy, priced at £4. 50. With the option to finish the homemade Mars Bar pie made through ‘Gina’, I found that I might not even finish the pie and chips, such as the incredibly dense but flaky crust, the chewiness of the chips, and the sauce almost viscous, evoking the dream Sunday dinner that your grandmother may never master.
“It makes a difference,” lifelong fan Terry tells me, as Workington scores a third goal to secure a comprehensive victory over their local rivals. I tell him about my reports at the top of the London football stadium and Terry smiles before taking a drink. another bite from his belly, which is overflowing with Cumberland sausages.
“Well, that’s all well and good and it’s smart, but I don’t think it works here. They’ve cooked classic smart food in Workington. Si eagerness, smart food is an added treat. And if you lose, it’s raining, and you’re angry, then smart food can make things a little better.