The Victorians were a peculiar bunch. Turns out, that could have something to do with what they ate. Though many of the dishes that landed on Victorian dinner tables may appear stomach-churning today, at the time they were commonly enjoyed or even regarded as delicacies.

The Victorians’ penchant for odd food and flavour combinations was especially pronounced since the finest and best quality foods were reserved for the wealthy: poorer Victorians were forced to come up with ingenious and sometimes bizarre recipes to make their ingredients go further. Not ones to waste any part of an animal, you might wash down a mouthful of cow brain with a cup of fresh blood.

In this video, Dan Snow experiences some of the food options that would have been on the menu for a member of the Victorian working-class.

First, he reluctantly tries some sheep's trotters. In the Victorian era, sheep's feet were usually boiled allowing you to just gnaw on the greasy, grisly appendage until you cleaned it down to the bone. There wasn't very much meat on one of these, and there was also the potential that it wasn't very clean either.

Next, Dan tastes some jellied eels. Exactly what it sounds like, the dish ‘jellied eels’ consists of eel chunks coated in their own ‘naturally produced gelatin’. Invented in London’s East End and sold directly from street food carts, the dish was often flavoured with a splash of vinegar or dollop of butter.

After a roast loin of mutton, Dan finishes off his Victorian eating experience with a good old fashioned Christmas pudding - which has become synonymous with the Victorian period thanks to the work of Charles Dickens and the character of Mrs Cratchit.