Book excerpt: In Britain, we have always had an awkward relationship with food. We've been told for so long that we are terrible cooks and yet according to a 2012 YouGov survey, our traditional food and drink are more important to us than the monarchy and at least as significant as our landscape and national monuments in defining a collective notion of who we are. Taking nine archetypically British dishes - Pie and Peas, A Cheese Sandwich, Fish and Chips, Spag Bol, Devonshire Cream Tea, Curry, The Full English, The Sunday Roast and a Crumble with Custard - and examining them in their perfect context, Pete Brown reveals just how fundamental food is to Britain's sense of identity, perhaps even our sense of pride, and the ways in which we understand our place in the world.