Surf and turf
A type of cuisine that combines both meat and seafood (especially lobster and steak), or restaurants that serve such cuisine.
Often written «surf ‘n’ turf». See also, beef and reef.
Origin
Obviously, surf refers to seafood and turf to beef animals fed on grass. It began to appear in print in that sense from the 1960s, as here in an advert for ‘The Continental’ restaurant, Lowell, Massachusetts, in The Lowell Sun, January 1966:
«Champagne Dinner — Surf ‘N Turf (A Continental Original). A delightful Continental combination of a Junior Filet Mignon — Baked Stuffed Alaskan Crab Legs and a nescalope [sic] of Halibut in creamy Lobster Newburg Sauce.»
Surf and turf has a poor reputation amongst gourmets and, as a dining experience, isn’t what Basil Faulty would have described as «the absolute apex». The item above was part of a seven course meal, with drinks, which cost $4.95. Even in 1966 that wasn’t a great deal of…