A carvery is a pub or a

restaurant A restaurant is a business that prepares and serves food and drinks to customers. Meals are generally served and eaten on the premises, but many restaurants also offer take-out and food delivery services. Restaurants vary greatly in appearan ...

where cooked

meat Meat is animal flesh that is eaten as food. Humans have hunted, farmed, and scavenged animals for meat since prehistoric times. The establishment of settlements in the Neolithic Revolution allowed the domestication of animals such as chic ...

is freshly sliced to order for customers, sometimes offering unlimited servings in a

buffet A buffet can be either a sideboard (a flat-topped piece of furniture with cupboards and drawers, used for storing crockery, glasses, and table linen) or a system of serving meals in which food is placed in a public area where the diners serve ...

style for a fixed price. The term is most commonly used in the

United Kingdom The United Kingdom of Great Britain and Northern Ireland, commonly known as the United Kingdom (UK) or Britain, is a country in Europe, off the north-western coast of the continental mainland. It comprises England, Scotland, Wales and ...

Ireland Ireland ( ; ga, Éire ; Ulster-Scots: ) is an island in the North Atlantic Ocean, in north-western Europe. It is separated from Great Britain to its east by the North Channel, the Irish Sea, and St George's Channel. Ireland is the s ...

Cyprus Cyprus ; tr, Kıbrıs (), officially the Republic of Cyprus,, , lit: Republic of Cyprus is an island country located south of the Anatolian Peninsula in the eastern Mediterranean Sea. Its continental position is disputed; while it is ...

, and Commonwealth countries like

Canada Canada is a country in North America. Its ten provinces and three territories extend from the Atlantic Ocean to the Pacific Ocean and northward into the Arctic Ocean, covering over , making it the world's second-largest country by to ...

and

Australia Australia, officially the Commonwealth of Australia, is a sovereign country comprising the mainland of the Australian continent, the island of Tasmania, and numerous smaller islands. With an area of , Australia is the largest country by ...

, but it is also found in the

United States The United States of America (U.S.A. or USA), commonly known as the United States (U.S. or US) or America, is a country Continental United States, primarily located in North America. It consists of 50 U.S. state, states, a Washington, D.C., ...

Description

Carveries are often found in pubs and hotels, and are particularly commonly held at weekends, when they offer traditional

Sunday roast A Sunday roast or roast dinner is a traditional meal of British and Irish origin. Although it can be consumed throughout the week, it is traditionally consumed on Sunday. It consists of roasted meat, roasted potatoes and accompaniments ...

s to a potentially large number of people. The meat is usually accompanied by a choice of

potato The potato is a starchy food, a tuber of the plant ''Solanum tuberosum'' and is a root vegetable native to the Americas. The plant is a perennial in the nightshade family Solanaceae. Wild potato species can be found from the southern Uni ...

(boiled,

mashed Mashed may refer to: * Mashed, that created from mash ingredients * Mashed, the result of a mashing * Mashed, the result of a mashup (music) * ''Mashed'' (album), a 2007 mashup album * ''Mashed'' (video game), a vehicular combat video game * M ...

and roasted), stuffing, and vegetables (commonly including

carrot The carrot ('' Daucus carota'' subsp. ''sativus'') is a root vegetable, typically orange in color, though purple, black, red, white, and yellow cultivars exist, all of which are domesticated forms of the wild carrot, ''Daucus carota'', na ...

s, parsnips,

peas The pea is most commonly the small spherical seed or the seed-pod of the flowering plant species ''Pisum sativum''. Each pod contains several peas, which can be green or yellow. Botanically, pea pods are fruit, since they contain seeds and d ...

and other traditional British vegetables). Also provided are

gravy Gravy is a sauce often made from the juices of meats that run naturally during cooking and often thickened with wheat flour or corn starch for added texture. The gravy may be further coloured and flavoured with gravy salt (a simple mix of sa ...

and a

sauce In cooking, a sauce is a liquid, cream, or semi-solid food, served on or used in preparing other foods. Most sauces are not normally consumed by themselves; they add flavor, moisture, and visual appeal to a dish. ''Sauce'' is a French wor ...

considered a traditional accompaniment to the various meats (for example, mint sauce to accompany roast

lamb Lamb or The Lamb may refer to: * A young sheep * Lamb and mutton, the meat of sheep Arts and media Film, television, and theatre * ''The Lamb'' (1915 film), a silent film starring Douglas Fairbanks Sr. in his screen debut * ''The Lamb'' (1918 ...

apple sauce Apple sauce or applesauce is a purée (not necessarily served as a true sauce) made of apples. It can be made with peeled or unpeeled apples and may be spiced or sweetened. Apple sauce is inexpensive and is widely consumed in North America and s ...

to accompany roast

pork Pork is the culinary name for the meat of the domestic pig (''Sus domesticus''). It is the most commonly consumed meat worldwide, with evidence of pig husbandry dating back to 5000 BCE. Pork is eaten both freshly cooked and preserved ...

and so on).

Examples

Carveries existed as early as 1956 in London, in two

Lyons Lyon,, ; Occitan: ''Lion'', hist. ''Lionés'' also spelled in English as Lyons, is the third-largest city and second-largest metropolitan area of France. It is located at the confluence of the rivers Rhône and Saône, to the northwest of t ...

Corner Houses. One of the restaurants, in each of the

Strand Strand may refer to: Topography *The flat area of land bordering a body of water, a: ** Beach ** Shoreline * Strand swamp, a type of swamp habitat in Florida Places Africa * Strand, Western Cape, a seaside town in South Africa * Strand Street ...

and the

Tottenham Court Road Tottenham Court Road (occasionally abbreviated as TCR) is a major road in Central London, almost entirely within the London Borough of Camden. The road runs from Euston Road in the north to St Giles Circus in the south; Tottenham Court Road t ...

Lyons, was a carvery. They provided a three-course meal with beverage, but all but the carvery items were served by a

Nippy A nippy was a waitress who worked in the J. Lyons & Co tea shops and cafés in London. Beginning in the late 19th century, a J. Lyons waitress was called a "Gladys". From 1926, because the waitresses nipped (moved quickly) around the tea sh ...

(waitress). Even the carvery table had an employee to help those having difficulty in the actual carving. The price at this time was five shillings. In the 1970s and later, many more carveries appeared in London. One well-known carvery was situated in the

Regent Palace Hotel The Regent Palace Hotel was a large hotel in central London at 10 Glasshouse Street, close to Piccadilly Circus, between 1915 and 2006. It was designated as a Grade II listed building by English Heritage in 2004.

. The restaurant there was on the ground floor, the

Art Deco Art Deco, short for the French ''Arts Décoratifs'', and sometimes just called Deco, is a style of visual arts, architecture, and product design, that first appeared in France in the 1910s (just before World War I), and flourished in the Unit ...

ceiling of which has been reassembled in the new Air W1 building. Later they were operated by pub chains such as Harvester,

Brewer's Fayre Brewers Fayre is a licensed pub restaurant chain, with 161 locations across the UK as of August 2018. Owned by Whitbread, Brewers Fayre restaurants are known for serving traditional British pub food and for their Sunday Carvery. History The f ...

and Beefeater. The Toby Carvery brand took over many former Beefeater sites. The chain of Fuzzy's Grub in

London London is the capital and List of urban areas in the United Kingdom, largest city of England and the United Kingdom, with a population of just under 9 million. It stands on the River Thames in south-east England at the head of a estuary dow ...

is a noted carvery, being voted "Best Traditional British Restaurant, but all but the carv in London" in

Harden's ''Harden's'' is a UK restaurant guide, publishing print, online and mobile reviews and ratings for both London and UK restaurants. Like New York's Zagat Survey (which no longer has a London edition), the ratings and reviews are based on the result ...

2007 guide. Carvery food is now very popular and is now found in the whole of the UK.

United States

Some restaurants in the US use the term or concept, and it is a staple at some

s. Examples include: * The House of Prime Rib, a

prime rib A standing rib roast, also known as prime rib, is a cut of beef from the primal rib, one of the primal cuts of beef. While the entire rib section comprises ribs six through 12, a standing rib roast may contain anywhere from two to seven ribs. ...

carvery in San Francisco, California * The Sign of the Beefcarver, a carvery chain in Michigan

References

{{reflist Restaurants by type Serving and dining Buffet restaurants

Description

Examples

United States

See also

References