Roast Dinners Are Everywhere—Here's How to Make One

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Despite the fact that Sunday roast dinners have been a tradition in Britain since at least 1485 (when King Henry VII was said to have planted the seed for the Sunday feast as a way to break the fast after church), there were many years in the recent past when trend analysts thought the custom was a culinary falling star. 

Back in 2019, our friends at Food & Wine declared Sunday roast the “ultimate home-cooked meal.” With fewer folks cooking multi-course menus in the early 2000s, relying on convenience foods and opting for more restaurant visits instead, the ritual of the Sunday roast dinner seemed to be losing a bit of steam. 

This was true until three culinary trendsetters changed the tide and triggered a legit Sunday roast dinner renaissance.

First, perfectly-timed with the pandemic when we were spending more time at home and up for more “project cooking” recipes, Ina Garten shared a preview of her then-upcoming cookbook, Modern Comfort Food, in May 2020. A picture of Garten-friend and actor Emily Blunt’s English Roasted Potatoes caused such an uproar that fans crashed the Barefoot Contessa website. So many Instagram followers flocked to snag the recipe—which was part of Blunt’s Sunday roast dinner tradition—that Garten felt inspired to post an apology about the website’s temporary absence: “We're fixing it now. Try again soon,” the celebrity chef, author, entertaining ace, and BHG contributor wrote. “They're worth it!!! Xxxx."

A few years later, a third female force entered the conversation and officially put Sunday roast dinners back on the map in 2023. TikTok creator Brittany Miller, aka @brittanyhmiller, regularly started sharing her twists on the tradition. Racking up millions of