UK Gourmet: Where The Accent Is On The British Isles

By Kaaren Valenta

Salt and vinegar-flavored potato chips, double Devon cream butter, steak and kidney pie, bangers, kippers, and Stilton cheese. To Nigel Whitmore, the UK Gourmet is just like being home.

Mr Whitmore and his wife Lisa opened the UK Gourmet in the Taunton Plaza at 147 Mt Pleasant Road in July and filled it with the British delicacies that he grew up with in Gloucester, England.

Lisa –– the former Lisa Payne of Bethel –– met Nigel in 1998 when he was visiting the United States for his sister’s wedding. “We were married two years later on a cruise to Bermuda with family and friends,” Ms Whitmore said. “My husband then started a very successful business here, Nigel Whitmore Construction.”

Lisa Whitmore had worked in retail for 15 years, so when the couple discovered how difficult it was to find British food in the Danbury area, they decided to open their own specialty food store.

“Nigel missed his food and used to have to travel to get it,” Lisa, 34, said. “After we started the store, we discovered that there is a big English community here and quite a few Scots, too.”

On one wall of the store is a large map of Great Britain with colored push pens marking all the spots where customers previously lived. “Some grew up there, others were Americans who went there for university and are nostalgic for the food,” Lisa Whitmore said.

Finding a good location for the store was easy when they heard that the store next to Taunton Liquors was available.

“It has such a cute English look with the brick and trim,” Ms Whitmore said. “My mother, Rosemary Payne, did the garden out front and helps me in the store now that she is retired.”

Mrs Payne, a former teacher in Bethel, also is a photographer whose note cards are sold in the shop.

“I have some crafts by local artists in the shop,” Lisa Whitmore said. “I think people like to buy things that are handmade in the area.”

There are also items with British insignia at UK Gourmet and shelves of home accessories and gifts along with the meats, cheeses, and groceries from throughout the United Kingdom.

“Our freezer items are very popular,” Ms Whitmore said. “We sell black and white Irish pudding, which is actually a type of pork breakfast sausage, Yorkshire pudding, Scotch pies, beef pasties, English bacon, and many other frozen foods.”

Next to the freezer is a refrigerator case with cheeses from England, Ireland, Scotland, and Wales, cheeses that range from Blarney Castle and Boddingtons Cheddar with Pickles to White Stilton with Lemon (excellent crumbled into a salad). “We also have White Stilton with Cranberry and Chocolate Royale Stilton that tastes like cheesecake,” Ms Whitmore said. “There’s a Guinness Cheddar from Ireland that has ale blended with the cheese. It is very nice.”

Many customers come in for the first time because they have purchased wine at the adjacent liquor store and are looking for an exceptional cheese to serve with it.

To go with the cheese is a large assortment of crackers, which the English call biscuits. There are English teas and teacakes, teapots and other accessories.

“Their decaffeinated tea tastes like real tea –– you tell that it is decaf when you drink it,” Ms Whitmore said.

Serve the tea with Sticky Toffee, a sponge pudding that resembles a moist cake, topped with Devon custard, or creamed semolina, or creamed rice and topped with the golden syrup called Treacle.

“A can is supposed to serve three but sometimes it only serves one,” admitted Nigel Whitmore, 43, who stands well over six feet tall. “We also have Irish Cottage jams including rhubarb and ginger jam which is the best I’ve ever tasted.”

Like the crisps (potato chips), which come in such flavors as Worcestershire sauce and prawn cocktail, the English honey also varies from its American cousin. “The honey is thicker,” said Lisa Whitmore, gesturing at a shelf of honey in such flavors as ginger, apricot and orange.

Another shelf holds traditional English concentrated drinks like orange barley water and black currant, which are diluted with water or seltzer. “I grew up on this stuff,” Nigel Whitmore said.

There are cans of mushy peas (pureed peas), Marmite (a molasseslike spread), pickled onions, English flour, and bullion cubes that are so soft they can be crumbled. Bird’s Custard Powder comes in the original powder form and also in a ready-made version.

“A lot of what we carry is by special request, like the candy,” Ms Whitmore said. “We started with just a few choices and now we have over 30. We even have Harry Potter candy that is made in the United Kingdom. The kid’s really like the Harry Potter Dragon Eggs.”

The shop regularly stocks items like English crackers –– paper firecrackers filled with gifts and treats –– and is getting a large selection of Christmas puddings and cakes and brandied butter sauce for the holidays.

Custom-made gift baskets, often with a bottle of wine from next door, and gift certificates also are available.

UK Gourmet is a family business. Lisa’s sister, Stacey Payne, also helps in the store. In recent weeks Nigel’s son, Mark, 21, has been visiting and working with his father. Mark plays rugby in England at Nigel’s former club, the Cryptains. Nigel also has a daughter, Kay, 20, who has two young children.

The UK gourmet is open Tuesday, Thursday, and Saturday from 10 to 5; Wednesday and Friday from 10 to 8. Beginning after Thanksgiving the shop will have extended hours, open until 8 pm on Saturday and from 10 to 5 on Sunday. There is a website at www.UKGourmet.US. The Whitmore’s can be reached at 426-9666 or by email at UKGourmet@aol.com.