1.
Distilled beverage
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This process purifies it and removes diluting components like water, for the purpose of increasing its proportion of alcohol content. As distilled beverages contain more alcohol, they are considered harder – in North America, as examples, this term does not include beverages such as beer, wine, sake, and cider, as they are fermented but not distilled. These all have relatively low alcohol content, typically less than 15%, brandy is a spirit produced by the distillation of wine, and has an ABV of over 35%. Other examples of distilled beverages include bourbon, vodka, gin, rum, tequila, mezcal, whisky, scotch, the term spirit refers to a distilled beverage that contains no added sugar and has at least 20% alcohol by volume. Distilled beverages bottled with added sugar and added flavorings, such as Grand Marnier, Frangelico, Distilled beverages generally have an alcohol concentration higher than 30%. The origin of liquor and its close relative liquid was the Latin verb liquere, according to the Oxford English Dictionary, an early use of the word in the English language, meaning simply a liquid, can be dated to 1225. The first use the OED mentions of its meaning a liquid for drinking occurred in the 14th century and its use as a term for an intoxicating alcoholic drink appeared in the 16th century. The term spirit in reference to alcohol stems from Middle Eastern alchemy and these alchemists were more concerned with medical elixirs than with transmuting lead into gold. The vapor given off and collected during a process was called a spirit of the original material. Distilled water was described in the 2nd century AD by Alexander of Aphrodisias, the Alexandrians were using a distillation alembic or still device in the 3rd century AD. The medieval Arabs learned the process from the Alexandrians and used it extensively. Freeze distillation involves freezing the alcoholic beverage and then removing the ice, the freezing technique had limitations in geography and implementation limiting how widely this method was put to use. The earliest evidence of distillation of alcohol comes from the School of Salerno in southern Italy during the 12th century. Again, the Chinese may not have been far behind, with evidence indicating the practice of distillation began during the 12th century Jin or Southern Song dynasties. A still has been found at a site in Qinglong, Hebei. Fractional distillation was developed by Taddeo Alderotti in the 13th century, the production method was written in code, suggesting that it was being kept secret. In 1437, burned water was mentioned in the records of the County of Katzenelnbogen in Germany and it was served in a tall, narrow glass called a Goderulffe. Claims upon the origin of specific beverages are controversial, often invoking national pride, but they are plausible after the 12th century AD and these spirits would have had a much lower alcohol content than the alchemists pure distillations, and they were likely first thought of as medicinal elixirs
2.
Alcoholic drink
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Long-term use can lead to alcohol abuse, physical dependence, and alcoholism. Drinking alcohol plays an important social role in many cultures, most countries have laws regulating their production, sale, and consumption, some countries ban such activities entirely. However, alcoholic drinks are legal in most parts of the world, the global alcoholic drink industry exceeded $1 trillion in 2014. Alcohol is one of the most widely used drugs in the world. For instance, in 2015, among Americans, 89% of adults had consumed alcohol at point, 70% had drunk it in the last year. Alcoholic drinks are divided into three classes—beers, wines, and spirits—and typically contain between 3% and 40% alcohol by volume. Discovery of late Stone Age jugs suggest that intentionally fermented drinks existed at least as early as the Neolithic period, wine is a fermented beverage produced from grapes. Wine involves a longer process than beer and also a long aging process. Sparkling wine can be made by means of a secondary fermentation, fruit wines are made from fruits other than grapes, such as plums, cherries, or apples. Sake is an example of rice wine. Beer is a beverage fermented from grain mash and it is made from barley or a blend of several grains. If the fermented mash is distilled, then the drink is a spirit, beer is the most consumed alcoholic beverage in the world. Cider or cyder is an alcoholic drink made from any fruit juice, apple juice, peaches. Cider alcohol content varies from 1. 2% ABV to 8. 5% or more in traditional English ciders, in some regions, cider may be called apple wine. Mead is a drink created by fermenting honey with water, sometimes with various fruits, spices, grains. The alcoholic content of mead may range from about 8% ABV to more than 20%, the defining characteristic of mead is that the majority of the drinks fermentable sugar is derived from honey. A distilled drink or liquor is a drink produced by distilling ethanol produced by means of fermenting grain, fruit. Unsweetened, distilled, alcoholic drinks that have a content of at least 20% ABV are called spirits
3.
Fruit
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In botany, a fruit is the seed-bearing structure in flowering plants formed from the ovary after flowering. Fruits are the means by which angiosperms disseminate seeds, accordingly, fruits account for a substantial fraction of the worlds agricultural output, and some have acquired extensive cultural and symbolic meanings. On the other hand, in usage, fruit includes many structures that are not commonly called fruits, such as bean pods, corn kernels, tomatoes. The section of a fungus that produces spores is called a fruiting body. Many common terms for seeds and fruit do not correspond to the botanical classifications, however, in botany, a fruit is the ripened ovary or carpel that contains seeds, a nut is a type of fruit and not a seed, and a seed is a ripened ovule. Examples of culinary vegetables and nuts that are botanically fruit include corn, cucurbits, eggplant, legumes, sweet pepper, in addition, some spices, such as allspice and chili pepper, are fruits, botanically speaking. g. Botanically, a grain, such as corn, rice, or wheat, is also a kind of fruit. However, the wall is very thin and is fused to the seed coat. The outer, often edible layer, is the pericarp, formed from the ovary and surrounding the seeds, the pericarp may be described in three layers from outer to inner, the epicarp, mesocarp and endocarp. Fruit that bears a prominent pointed terminal projection is said to be beaked, a fruit results from maturation of one or more flowers, and the gynoecium of the flower forms all or part of the fruit. Inside the ovary/ovaries are one or more ovules where the megagametophyte contains the egg cell, after double fertilization, these ovules will become seeds. The ovules are fertilized in a process starts with pollination. After pollination, a tube grows from the pollen through the stigma into the ovary to the ovule, later the zygote will give rise to the embryo of the seed, and the endosperm mother cell will give rise to endosperm, a nutritive tissue used by the embryo. As the ovules develop into seeds, the ovary begins to ripen and the ovary wall, in some multiseeded fruits, the extent to which the flesh develops is proportional to the number of fertilized ovules. The pericarp is often differentiated into two or three distinct layers called the exocarp, mesocarp, and endocarp, in some fruits, especially simple fruits derived from an inferior ovary, other parts of the flower, fuse with the ovary and ripen with it. In other cases, the sepals, petals and/or stamens and style of the fall off. When such other floral parts are a significant part of the fruit, it is called an accessory fruit, since other parts of the flower may contribute to the structure of the fruit, it is important to study flower structure to understand how a particular fruit forms. There are three modes of fruit development, Apocarpous fruits develop from a single flower having one or more separate carpels
4.
Spice
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A spice is a seed, fruit, root, bark, or other plant substance primarily used for flavoring, coloring or preserving food. Spices are distinguished from herbs, which are the leaves, flowers, sometimes, spices may be ground into a powder for convenience. Spices are sometimes used in medicine, religious rituals, cosmetics or perfume production, the spice trade developed throughout South Asia and Middle East by at least 2000 BCE with cinnamon and black pepper, and in East Asia with herbs and pepper. The Egyptians used herbs for mummification and their demand for exotic spices and herbs helped stimulate world trade. The word spice comes from the Old French word espice, which became epice, and which came from the Latin root spec, by 1000 BCE, medical systems based upon herbs could be found in China, Korea, and India. Early uses were connected with magic, medicine, religion, tradition, archaeological excavations have uncovered clove burnt onto the floor of a kitchen, dated to 1700 BCE, at the Mesopotamian site of Terqa, in modern-day Syria. The ancient Indian epic Ramayana mentions cloves, the Romans had cloves in the 1st century CE, as Pliny the Elder wrote about them. In the story of Genesis, Joseph was sold into slavery by his brothers to spice merchants, in the biblical poem Song of Solomon, the male speaker compares his beloved to many forms of spices. The earliest written records of spices come from ancient Egyptian, Chinese, the Ebers Papyrus from Early Egyptians that dates from 1550 B. C. E. Describes some eight hundred different medicinal remedies and numerous medicinal procedures, historians believe that nutmeg, which originates from the Banda Islands in Southeast Asia, was introduced to Europe in the 6th century BCE. Indonesian merchants traveled around China, India, the Middle East, Arab merchants facilitated the routes through the Middle East and India. This resulted in the Egyptian port city of Alexandria being the trading center for spices. The most important discovery prior to the European spice trade were the monsoon winds, sailing from Eastern spice cultivators to Western European consumers gradually replaced the land-locked spice routes once facilitated by the Middle East Arab caravans. Spices were among the most demanded and expensive available in Europe in the Middle Ages. Given medieval medicines main theory of humorism, spices and herbs were indispensable to balance humors in food, in addition to being desired by those using medieval medicine, the European elite also craved spices in the Middle Ages. An example of the European aristocracys demand for spice comes from the King of Aragon and he was specifically looking for spices to put in wine, and was not alone among European monarchs at the time to have such a desire for spice. Spices were all imported from plantations in Asia and Africa, which made them expensive, from the 8th until the 15th century, the Republic of Venice had the monopoly on spice trade with the Middle East, and along with it the neighboring Italian city-states. The trade made the region rich and it has been estimated that around 1,000 tons of pepper and 1,000 tons of the other common spices were imported into Western Europe each year during the Late Middle Ages
5.
Flower
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A flower, sometimes known as a bloom or blossom, is the reproductive structure found in plants that are floral. The biological function of a flower is to effect reproduction, usually by providing a mechanism for the union of sperm with eggs, Flowers may facilitate outcrossing or allow selfing. Some flowers produce diaspores without fertilization, Flowers contain sporangia and are the site where gametophytes develop. Many flowers have evolved to be attractive to animals, so as to them to be vectors for the transfer of pollen. After fertilization, the ovary of the flower develops into fruit containing seeds, the essential parts of a flower can be considered in two parts, the vegetative part, consisting of petals and associated structures in the perianth, and the reproductive or sexual parts. A stereotypical flower consists of four kinds of structures attached to the tip of a short stalk, each of these kinds of parts is arranged in a whorl on the receptacle. The four main whorls are as follows, Collectively the calyx, corolla, the next whorl toward the apex, composed of units called petals, which are typically thin, soft and colored to attract animals that help the process of pollination. Androecium, the whorl, consisting of units called stamens. Stamens consist of two parts, a called a filament, topped by an anther where pollen is produced by meiosis. Gynoecium, the innermost whorl of a flower, consisting of one or more units called carpels, the carpel or multiple fused carpels form a hollow structure called an ovary, which produces ovules internally. Ovules are megasporangia and they in turn produce megaspores by meiosis which develop into female gametophytes and these give rise to egg cells. The gynoecium of a flower is described using an alternative terminology wherein the structure one sees in the innermost whorl is called a pistil. A pistil may consist of a carpel or a number of carpels fused together. The sticky tip of the pistil, the stigma, is the receptor of pollen, the supportive stalk, the style, becomes the pathway for pollen tubes to grow from pollen grains adhering to the stigma. The relationship to the gynoecium on the receptacle is described as hypogynous, perigynous, although the arrangement described above is considered typical, plant species show a wide variation in floral structure. These modifications have significance in the evolution of flowering plants and are used extensively by botanists to establish relationships among plant species, the four main parts of a flower are generally defined by their positions on the receptacle and not by their function. Many flowers lack some parts or parts may be modified into other functions and/or look like what is typically another part, in some families, like Ranunculaceae, the petals are greatly reduced and in many species the sepals are colorful and petal-like. Other flowers have modified stamens that are petal-like, the flowers of Peonies and Roses are mostly petaloid stamens
6.
Nut (fruit)
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A nut is a fruit composed of a hard shell and a seed, which is generally edible. In a general context, however, a variety of dried seeds are called nuts. The translation of nut in certain languages frequently requires paraphrases, as the word is ambiguous. Most seeds come from fruits that naturally free themselves from the shell, unlike nuts such as hazelnuts, chestnuts, and acorns, which have hard shell walls and originate from a compound ovary. The general and original usage of the term is less restrictive, and many nuts, such as almonds, pecans, pistachios, walnuts, common usage of the term often refers to any hard-walled, edible kernel as a nut. A nut in botany is a dry fruit with one seed in which the ovary wall becomes increasingly hard as it matures. Most nuts come from the pistils with inferior ovaries and all are indehiscent, true nuts are produced, for example, by some plant families of the order Fagales. Order Fagales Family Fagaceae Beech Chestnut Oak Stone-oak Tanoak Family Betulaceae Hazel, in botany, this term specifically refers to a pyrena or pyrene, which is a seed covered by a stony layer, such as the kernel of a drupe. Walnuts and hickories have fruits that are difficult to classify and they are considered to be nuts under some definitions, but are also referred to as drupaceous nuts. Tryma is a term for hickory fruits. In common use, a nut is, as the name implies. This most often comes up regarding allergies, where people are allergic specifically to peanuts. A nut in cuisine is a less restrictive category than a nut in botany. Any large, oily kernels found within a shell and used in food are called nuts. Nuts are an important source of nutrients for humans and wildlife. Because nuts generally have an oil content, they are a highly prized food. A large number of seeds are edible by humans and used in cooking, eaten raw, sprouted, or roasted as a food, or pressed for oil that is used in cookery. Nuts are also a significant source of nutrition for wildlife, Nuts used for food, whether true nut or not, are among the most common food allergens
7.
Cream
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Cream is a dairy product composed of the higher-butterfat layer skimmed from the top of milk before homogenization. In un-homogenized milk, the fat, which is less dense, in the industrial production of cream, this process is accelerated by using centrifuges called separators. In many countries, cream is sold in several grades depending on the total butterfat content, Cream can be dried to a powder for shipment to distant markets. Cream has high levels of saturated fat, Cream skimmed from milk may be called sweet cream to distinguish it from whey cream skimmed from whey, a by-product of cheese-making. Whey cream has a fat content and tastes more salty, tangy. In many countries, cream is usually sold partially fermented, sour cream, crème fraîche, Cream has many culinary uses in sweet, bitter, salty and tangy dishes. This is also the origin of butters yellow color, Cream from goats milk, or from cows fed indoors on grain or grain-based pellets, is white. Cream is used as an ingredient in foods, including ice cream, many sauces, soups, stews, puddings, and some custard bases. Whipped cream is served as a topping on ice cream sundaes, milkshakes, egg nog, irish cream is an alcoholic liqueur which blends cream with whiskey, and often honey, wine, or coffee. Cream is also used in Indian curries such as masala dishes, Cream is often added to coffee in the US and Canada. Both single and double cream can be used in cooking, double cream or full-fat crème fraîche are often used when cream is added to a hot sauce, to prevent any problem with it separating or splitting. Double cream can be thinned with milk to make an approximation of single cream, the French word crème denotes not only dairy cream, but also other thick liquids such as sweet and savory custards, which are normally made with milk, not cream. Different grades of cream are distinguished by their fat content, whether they have been heat-treated, whipped, in many jurisdictions, there are regulations for each type. In the United States, cream is sold as, Most cream products sold in the United States at retail contain the minimum permissible fat content for their product type. Half and half almost always contains only 10. 5% butterfat, not all grades are defined by all jurisdictions, and the exact fat content ranges vary. Cream must contain no less than 350 g/kg of milk fat, in Canada, light cream is very low-fat cream, usually with 5% or 6% butterfat. Specific product characteristics are generally uniform throughout Canada, but names vary by geographic and linguistic area and by manufacturer. It can be confusing, coffee cream may be 10% or 18% and half-and-half may be 3%, 5%, 6% or 10%, all depending on location
8.
Dessert
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Dessert is a confectionery course that concludes a main meal. The course usually consists of foods and beverages, such as dessert wine or liqueurs. In some parts of the world, such as much of central and western Africa, the term dessert can apply to many confections, such as cakes, tarts, cookies, biscuits, gelatins, pastries, ice creams, pies, puddings, custards, and sweet soups. Fruit is also found in dessert courses because of its naturally occurring sweetness. Some cultures sweeten foods that are more commonly savory to create desserts, the word dessert originated from the French word desservir, meaning to clear the table. Its first known use was in 1600, in a health education manual entitled Naturall and artificial Directions for Health, in his A History of Dessert, Michael Krondl explains it refers to the fact dessert was served after the table had been cleared of other dishes. Alternatives such as sweets or afters are also used in the United Kingdom and some other Commonwealth countries, including Hong Kong, sweets were fed to the gods in ancient Mesopotamia and India and other ancient civilizations. Dried fruit and honey were probably the first sweeteners used in most of the world, sugarcane was grown and refined in India before 500 BCE and was crystallized, making it easy to transport, by 500 CE. Sugar and sugarcane were traded, making available to Macedonia by 300 BCE. In South Asia, the Middle East and China, sugar has been a staple of cooking, sugarcane and sugar were little known and rare in Europe until the twelfth century or later, when the Crusades and then colonialization spread its use. Europeans began to manufacture sugar in the Middle Ages, and more sweet desserts became available, even then sugar was so expensive usually only the wealthy could indulge on special occasions. The first apple pie recipe was published in 1381, the earliest documentation of the term cupcake was in Seventy-five Receipts for Pastry, Cakes, and Sweetmeats in 1828 in Eliza Leslies Receipts cookbook. The Industrial Revolution in America and Europe caused desserts to be mass-produced, processed, preserved, canned, frozen foods, including desserts, became very popular starting in the 1920s when freezing emerged. These processed foods became a part of diets in many industrialized nations. Many countries have desserts and foods distinctive to their nations or region, sweet desserts usually contain cane sugar, palm sugar, honey or some types of syrup such as molasses, maple syrup, treacle, or corn syrup. The proportions of ingredients, along with the preparation methods, play a major part in the consistency, texture. Sugars contribute moisture and tenderness to baked goods, flour or starch components serves as a protein and gives the dessert structure. Fats contribute moisture and can enable the development of layers in pastries
9.
Monk
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A monk is a person who practices religious asceticism, living either alone or with any number of other monks. The concept is ancient and can be seen in many religions, in the Greek language the term can apply to women, but in modern English it is mainly in use for men. The word nun is typically used for female monastics, although the term monachos is of Christian origin, in the English language monk tends to be used loosely also for both male and female ascetics from other religious or philosophical backgrounds. However, being generic, it is not interchangeable terms that denote particular kinds of monk, such as cenobite, hermit, anchorite, hesychast. In Eastern Orthodoxy monasticism holds a special and important place. Orthodox monastics separate themselves from the world in order to pray unceasingly for the world and they do not, in general, have as their primary purpose the running of social services, but instead are concerned with attaining theosis, or union with God. However, care for the poor and needy has always been an obligation of monasticism, the level of contact though will vary from community to community. Hermits, on the hand, have little or no contact with the outside world. Orthodox monasticism does not have religious orders as are found in the West, basil the Great and the Philokalia, which was compiled by St. Nikodemos of the Holy Mountain and St. Makarios of Corinth. Hesychasm is of importance in the ascetical theology of the Orthodox Church. Meals are usually taken in common in a dining hall known as a trapeza. Food is usually simple and is eaten in silence while one of the brethren reads aloud from the writings of the Holy Fathers. The monastic lifestyle takes a deal of serious commitment. Within the cenobitic community, all monks conform to a way of living based on the traditions of that particular monastery. In struggling to attain this conformity, the comes to realize his own shortcomings and is guided by his spiritual father in how to deal honestly with them. For this same reason, bishops are almost always chosen from the ranks of monks, Eastern monasticism is found in three distinct forms, anchoritic, cenobitic, and the middle way between the two, known as the skete. One normally enters a community first, and only after testing and spiritual growth would one go on to the skete or, for the most advanced. However, one is not necessarily expected to join a skete or become a solitary, in general, Orthodox monastics have little or no contact with the outside world, including their own families
10.
Chartreuse (liqueur)
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Chartreuse is a French liqueur made by the Carthusian Monks since 1737 according to the instructions set out in a manuscript given to them by François Annibal dEstrées in 1605. It is composed of distilled alcohol aged with 130 herbs, plants, the liqueur is named after the monks Grande Chartreuse monastery, located in the Chartreuse Mountains in the general region of Grenoble in France. The liqueur is produced in their distillery in the town of Voiron. Until the 1980s, there was another distillery at Tarragona in Spain, Chartreuse gives its name to the colour chartreuse, which was first used as a term of colour in 1884. It is one of the handful of liquors that continue to age, the two types of Chartreuse are, Green Chartreuse is a naturally green liqueur made from 130 herbs and plants macerated in alcohol and steeped for about 8 hours. A last maceration of plants gives its colour to the liqueur, Yellow Chartreuse, which has a milder and sweeter flavour and aroma. Also made by the monks of Chartreuse are, Chartreuse VEP VEP stands for Vieillissement Exceptionnellement Prolongé and it is made using the same processes and the same secret formula as the traditional liqueur, and by extra long ageing in oak casks it reaches an exceptional quality. Chartreuse VEP comes in yellow and green. Élixir Végétal de la Grande-Chartreuse The same base of about 130 medicinal and aromatic plants and flowers and it can be described as a cordial or a liqueur, and is claimed to be a tonic. Liqueur du 9° Centenaire Created in 1984 to commemorate the 900 year anniversary of the foundation of the abbey and it is similar to Green Chartreuse but slightly sweeter. Chartreuse 1605 – Liqueur dElixir Created to commemorate the return of a manuscript concerning an elixir of long life to the Carthusian monks by Marshal François Annibal dEstrées. White Chartreuse Produced and sold between 1860 and 1900, furthermore, the monks make a Génépi. Génépi is the term in the Alps for a homemade or local liquor featuring local mountain flora. There are hundreds or even thousands of different Génépi liquors made, as they have been making Chartreuse from local plants for centuries, the monks have recently made a Génépi as a sideline product. It is labelled Génépi des Pères Chartreux and is only available locally in a 70cl bottle. Chartreuse has a strong characteristic taste. It is very sweet, but becomes both spicy and pungent and it is comparable to other herbal liqueurs such as Galliano, Liquore Strega or Kräuterlikör, though it is distinctively more vegetal. Like other liqueurs, its flavour is sensitive to serving temperature, if straight, it can be served very cold, but is often served at room temperature
11.
Cooking
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Cooking or cookery is the art, technology and craft of preparing food for consumption with the use of heat. The ways or types of cooking also depend on the skill, cooking is done both by people in their own dwellings and by professional cooks and chefs in restaurants and other food establishments. Cooking can also occur through chemical reactions without the presence of heat, such as in ceviche, preparing food with heat or fire is an activity unique to humans. It may have started around 2 million years ago, though evidence for it reaches no more than 1 million years ago. The expansion of agriculture, commerce, trade and transportation between civilizations in different regions offered cooks many new ingredients, New inventions and technologies, such as the invention of pottery for holding and boiling water, expanded cooking techniques. Some modern cooks apply advanced scientific techniques to food preparation to further enhance the flavor of the dish served, phylogenetic analysis suggests that human ancestors may have invented cooking as far back as 1.8 million to 2.3 million years ago. Re-analysis of burnt bone fragments and plant ashes from the Wonderwerk Cave, there is evidence that Homo erectus was cooking their food as early as 500,000 years ago. Evidence for the use of fire by Homo erectus beginning some 400,000 years ago has wide scholarly support. Archeological evidence, from 300,000 years ago, in the form of ancient hearths, earth ovens, burnt animal bones, and flint, are found across Europe, anthropologists think that widespread cooking fires began about 250,000 years ago, when hearths started appearing. More recently, the earliest hearths have been reported to be at least 790,000 years old, in the seventeenth and eighteenth centuries, food was a classic marker of identity in Europe. In the nineteenth-century Age of Nationalism cuisine became a symbol of national identity. Communication between the Old World and the New World in the Colombian exchange influenced the history of cooking, the Industrial Revolution brought mass-production, mass-marketing and standardization of food. Factories processed, preserved, canned, and packaged a wide variety of foods, in the 1920s, freezing methods, cafeterias and fast-food establishments emerged. Along with changes in food, starting early in the 20th century, governments have issued nutrition guidelines, the 1916 Food For Young Children became the first USDA guide to give specific dietary guidelines. Updated in the 1920s, these guides gave shopping suggestions for different-sized families along with a Depression Era revision which included four cost levels, in 1943, the USDA created the Basic Seven chart to make sure that people got the recommended nutrients. It included the first-ever Recommended Daily Allowances from the National Academy of Sciences, in 1956, the Essentials of an Adequate Diet brought recommendations which cut the number of groups that American school children would learn about down to four. In 1979, a guide called Food addressed the link between too much of certain foods and chronic diseases, but added fats, oils, most ingredients in cooking are derived from living organisms. Vegetables, fruits, grains and nuts as well as herbs and spices come from plants, while meat, eggs, mushrooms and the yeast used in baking are kinds of fungi
12.
United Kingdom
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The United Kingdom of Great Britain and Northern Ireland, commonly known as the United Kingdom or Britain, is a sovereign country in western Europe. Lying off the north-western coast of the European mainland, the United Kingdom includes the island of Great Britain, Northern Ireland is the only part of the United Kingdom that shares a land border with another sovereign state—the Republic of Ireland. The Irish Sea lies between Great Britain and Ireland, with an area of 242,500 square kilometres, the United Kingdom is the 78th-largest sovereign state in the world and the 11th-largest in Europe. It is also the 21st-most populous country, with an estimated 65.1 million inhabitants, together, this makes it the fourth-most densely populated country in the European Union. The United Kingdom is a monarchy with a parliamentary system of governance. The monarch is Queen Elizabeth II, who has reigned since 6 February 1952, other major urban areas in the United Kingdom include the regions of Birmingham, Leeds, Glasgow, Liverpool and Manchester. The United Kingdom consists of four countries—England, Scotland, Wales, the last three have devolved administrations, each with varying powers, based in their capitals, Edinburgh, Cardiff and Belfast, respectively. The relationships among the countries of the UK have changed over time, Wales was annexed by the Kingdom of England under the Laws in Wales Acts 1535 and 1542. A treaty between England and Scotland resulted in 1707 in a unified Kingdom of Great Britain, which merged in 1801 with the Kingdom of Ireland to form the United Kingdom of Great Britain and Ireland. Five-sixths of Ireland seceded from the UK in 1922, leaving the present formulation of the United Kingdom of Great Britain, there are fourteen British Overseas Territories. These are the remnants of the British Empire which, at its height in the 1920s, British influence can be observed in the language, culture and legal systems of many of its former colonies. The United Kingdom is a country and has the worlds fifth-largest economy by nominal GDP. The UK is considered to have an economy and is categorised as very high in the Human Development Index. It was the worlds first industrialised country and the worlds foremost power during the 19th, the UK remains a great power with considerable economic, cultural, military, scientific and political influence internationally. It is a nuclear weapons state and its military expenditure ranks fourth or fifth in the world. The UK has been a permanent member of the United Nations Security Council since its first session in 1946 and it has been a leading member state of the EU and its predecessor, the European Economic Community, since 1973. However, on 23 June 2016, a referendum on the UKs membership of the EU resulted in a decision to leave. The Acts of Union 1800 united the Kingdom of Great Britain, Scotland, Wales and Northern Ireland have devolved self-government
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