Solera 1852Hors-d'œuvre RusseHuîtres nativesConsommé Prince de GallesTurbotin à la PolignacVeuve Clicquot 1889Suprême de volaille à la MontpensierCôtelette d'agneau de lait à la RégenceCorbeille de pommes souffléeGiesler 1884Parfait de foie grasExtra dryBécassine rôtie sur canapéSalade de cœur de laitueChâteau Lafite 1875Nageoires de tortue à l'AméricaineMartinez 1863Asperges nouvelles Anglaise. Sauce mousseline.Ananas glacéSoufflé au fromageGrande Fin Champagne,Corbeilles de fruitsWaterloo 1815Café
Here is therecetteof thefilets de sole St-Augustin, to which both M. Charles, thechef, and M. Oddenino, its godfather, have set their signature—
Prenez une belle sole bien fraîche, enlevez-en les filets, pliez-les en deux, mettez-les dans une casserole avec un morceau de beurre, sel, poivre et un bon verre de champagne.
Faites cuire les filets de sole, aussitôt prêts retirez-les et faites réduire la cuisson aux trois-quarts, ensuite ajoutez-y une demie-pinte de crème et laissez réduire un moment le tout ensemble.
Mettez à part dans une casserole vingt-quatre queues d'écrevisses avec une truffe fraîche emmincie, un peu de beurre, sel et poivre, faites chauffer le tout doucement et mélangez ensuite votre sauce avec la garniture.
Dressez les filets de sole sur un plat rond, saucez par dessus, ajoutez un peu de fromage rapé pardessus, faites glacer au four et servez très chaud.
signatures
Take a large, perfectly fresh sole. Fillet it. Fold the fillets in two, and put them in a saucepan, with a piece of butter, salt, pepper, and a glassful of champagne. Let the fillets cook until they are done, then take them out, and boil down the stock to three-quarters, then add to it half a pint of cream, and boil it all down together, for a moment. In another saucepan (a silver one), put the tails of twenty-four crayfish, with a truffle, freshly cut up, a little butter, and a little salt and pepper. Let this get hot very slowly, and mix your sauce with the garnish. Arrange the fillets of sole on a round dish and glaze them over. Serve very hot.
I am beginning to flatter myself that I am a success in clerical circles. One week I took out to dinner my sister-in-law—who, I omitted to state, is the daughter of a dean; and the next week I successfully entertained a dear, simple-minded, white-haired old clergyman who had come from his parish in the North to London on business.
Two little boys home from Harrow are sitting at a table by an open window, looking through the frame of rose sprays and streamers of virginia-creeper to the turn of the road in the foreground, where the black wood of the sun-dial, put up to commemorate the battle of Waterloo, stands out against the rose red of the old brick wall behind it, where one of the posts of the village stocks still exists as a warning to evildoers, with beyond, in the middle distance, the great horse-chestnuts and the village cricketing ground, which serves as a promenade for the postmaster's geese. The whole landscape is closed in by a great forest of firs, on the outskirtsof which red roofs and the tarnished gold of thatch chequer the dark green. Behind the two little boys stands a curate fresh from Oxford, who is trying to hammer into their thick little heads the translation of
——cur apricumoderit campum——
his own thoughts all the time, like theirs, being on the cricket-ground, and not with Quintus Horatius Flaccus. That is the picture that always comes to me when I think of my old clerical friend.
He was a keen cricketer, and bowled underhand with a cunning break from the off which was too much for the yokels of the teams that our village eleven annually held battle with; and those daily two tiresome hours over, our holiday task done, he would bowl, at the net put up in the neighbouring field, as long as we chose to bat. His one dissipation now is a visit to London annually to see the Oxford and Cambridge cricket-match, and he always stays when he comes to London at my mother's house. Unexpected business had brought him south last week, and one evening he would have been alone had I not offered to take him out somewhere.
Where to take him was a puzzle. I did not think that he would appreciate the delicacy of Savoy, or Cecil, or Prince's, or Verrey's cookery; the refinements of the Berkeley and the Avondale, and the light touch of M. Charles's hand would be as naught to him. Luckily I rememberedthat last July he had been taken to dine at Frascati's, by a friend and old parishioner of his, and that the place and the dinner had made so great an impression on him that his conversation for the next day consisted chiefly of praise of the gorgeous palace in which he had been entertained. If Frascati's had proved such a success once, I saw no reason why it should not be so again, and suggested that we should dine there, a suggestion which met with decided approval; so I telegraphed to ask that a table might be reserved for me upstairs.
My previous experiences of Frascati's had been chiefly confined to the grill-room, a gorgeous hall of white marble, veined with black, with a golden frieze and a golden ceiling, where I often eat a humble chop or take a cut from the joint before going to listen to Dan Leno or some other mirth-provoker at the Oxford next door; but looking at the great restaurant after we had settled down into our seats I could quite understand that the building would appear as gorgeous as a pantomime transformation-scene to the eyes of any one notblaséby our modernnil admirariLondon. There are gold and silver everywhere. The pillars which support the balcony, and from that spring up again to the roof, are gilt, and have silver angels at their capitals. There are gilt rails to the balcony, which runs, as in a circus, round the great octagonal building; the alcoves that stretch back seem to be all gold and mirrors and electric light. What is not gold or shining glass is either light buff or delicate grey, and electric globes in profusion,palms, bronze statuettes, and a great dome of green glass and gilding all go to make a gorgeous setting. The waiters in black, with a silver number in their button-holes, hover round the tables; somewhere below a string band, which does not impede conversation, plays. My old tutor rubbed his hands gently and smiled genially round at the gorgeousness, while I told the light-bearded manager that what I required was the ordinarytable-d'hôtedinner, and picked out a Château Margaux from the long lists of clarets.
This was the menu of thetable-d'hôtedinner:
Hors-d'œuvre variés.Consommé Brunoise.Crème Fontange.Escalope de barbue Chauchat.Blanchaille.Filet mignon Victoria.Pommes sautées.Riz de veau Toulouse.Faisan rôti au cresson.Salade.Pouding Singapore.Glacé vanille.Fromage. Fruits.
A platter divided into radiating sections held a great variety ofhors-d'œuvre, the rosy shade of the lamp threw its light upon a magnificent bunch of grapes on the summit of a pile of other fruits, and the manager in the background kept a watchful eye upon the waiter who was putting theconsommé Brunoiseon the table. I could not help wondering whether my telegram had not insome way divulged the fact that I carried a fork under the banner of the Press, and that I was getting in consequence a little better treatment than the ordinary. Certainly my bunch of grapes looked like the one that the Israelitish spies brought back from Canaan, in comparison with the ones on the other tables, and thechefhad no niggard hand when he apportioned the truffles and little buttons of mushrooms to our dishes of theescalope de barbueand theriz de veau Toulouse.
My old tutor was considering the diners at the other tables benignantly, and having quite an unjustifiable belief that I know the face or everybody in London, asked me who they were. Whether we had come to dine on an exceptional night I do not know, but all our fellow-guests were in couples: the men, I should fancy, principally gentlemen who spend their days in offices in the City, or in banks, fine specimens, most of them, of young England; and the ladies with them, either their wives or ladies who will eventually honour them by becoming so, as handsome representatives of British womanhood as I have ever seen collected under one roof. Out of all this gathering of stalwart men and pretty ladies there was not a single face that I recognised, and I am afraid I went down in the good old man's estimation as being a walking dictionary of London celebrities. My old tutor said that theescalope de barbuewas excellent, and it certainly looked good. I tried the whitebait, and found it too dry. The fillet was good. Thechefhad surrounded theriz de veauwithtruffles and tiny mushrooms and many other good things, and my old tutor, who ate it, said that it was excellent.
The little tables on the ground floor had all filled by now, and the lady behind the long bar, with piles of plates on it, and with a long line of looking-glasses behind it reflecting many bottles, was very busy. A subdued hum of talking and the faint rattle of knives and forks against crockery mixed with the music of the band.
The pheasant was a fine plump bird; the ice was excellent. I insisted on my old tutor having a glass of port to end his dinner, and after much pressing—for one glass of wine is all he allows himself as a rule at a meal—he was over-persuaded. Then he rubbed his hands and beamed, and told me stories of his own schoolboyhood: how he once fought another boy, now a Colonial Governor, and smote him so severely on the nose that it bled; and of a dreadful escapade, which still weighs on his mind—nothing less than going to see a race-meeting, and being subsequently soundly birched.
This was the bill I paid:—Two dinners at 5s., 10s.; one bottle 6A, 7s.; half-bottle 61, 5s. 6d.; total, £1: 2: 6.
My old tutor went away with his enthusiasm of the summer still unimpaired; and when next I have a country cousin to take out to dinner I shall go to Frascati's.
8th November.
The Victory Chapter of the Knights of the Pelican and the Eagle, perfect and puissant princes of Rose Croix, has been closed, and gentlemen in evening clothes are being helped into their great-coats in the entrance corridor of Mark Masons' Hall by the rotund sergeant who keeps guard there in a glazed box. Most of these gentlemen have mysterious flat tin cases, which they hand over to the sergeant or another official to be taken care of for them until spring brings round again another meeting of the Chapter.
There is no unnecessary waiting in the Mark Masons' Hall, for it is now a quarter-past seven, and dinner has been ordered next door, at the Freemasons' Tavern, at seven. A few yards of pavement only lie between the lamps of Mark Masons' Hall and the glass shelter before the doors of the Tavern, and in twos and threes the gentlemen in evening dress hurry from one door to the other.
Great Queen Street is quite a Masonic quarter, for opposite to the Tavern are two shops in which there is a brave show of Masonic jewellery, great candelabra, pillars, swords, highly-coloured pictures, and other adjuncts of Masonry. A humble house of refreshment, which also appeals to Freemasons for custom, faces the Tavern. The Tavern is not what the name implies. It is a restaurant, with a public dining-room, with a fine ballroom, and with many private dining-rooms. Its outside is imposing. Two houses stand side by side. One is of red brick, with windows set in white stone, and is Elizabethan in appearance. The other, of grey stone, is of a style of architecture which might be called "Masonic." From the pillars of the second story there rises an arch on which are carved the figures of the zodiac. In front of this are stone statues representing four of the Masonic virtues, of which Silence, with her finger on her lip, is the most easily identified. In all the details of the building there is some reference to Freemasonry and its attributes.
At the entrance to the Tavern stand two great janitors. Facing the doorway, at the end of a wide hall, is a long flight of stairs broken by a broad landing and decorated with statues. Up and down this ladies and gentlemen are passing, and I ask one of the janitors what is going on in the ballroom. "German Liederkranz. Private entertainment. What dinner, sir? Victory Chapter. Drawing-room," is the condensed information given by the big man, and he points a white-gloved hand to a passage branching offto the right. On one side of the passage is a door leading into a bar where three ladies in black are kept very busy in attending to the wants of thirsty Freemasons. On the other side is a wide shallow alcove in the wall fitted with shelves and glazed over, and in this is a curious collection of plate, great salvers, candelabra, and centrepieces. Beside the alcove is a glass door, and outside it is hung a placard with "Gavel Club. Private" upon it. At the end of the passage a little staircase leads up to higher regions, and on the wall is an old-fashioned clock with a round face and very plain figures, and some oil paintings dark with age.
On the first landing there is a placard outside a door with "Victory Chapter" on it, and higher up outside another door another placard with "Perfection Chapter" on it. From the stream of guests and waiters which is setting up the stairs it is evident that there are many banquets to be held to-night.
The drawing-room is white-and-gold in colour. Four Corinthian pillars, the lower halves of which are painted old-gold colour, with gold outlining the curves of their capitals, support a highly-ornamented ceiling, the central panel of which is painted to represent clouds, with some little birds flitting before them. The paper is old-gold in colour with large flowers upon it. There is some handsome furniture in the room—a fine cabinet, a clock of elaborate workmanship, and some good china vases. The curtains to the windows are of red velvet. At the end of the room farthest from the door is a horseshoe tablewith red and white shaded candles on it, ferns, chrysanthemums, and heather in china pots, pines, and hothouse fruits, and at close intervals bottles of champagne and Apollinaris. At the other end of the room, where stands a piano, with a screen in front of it, the gentlemen in evening clothes are chatting, having put their coats and hats on chairs and piano wherever room can be found. The waiters, in black with white gloves, are putting the last touches to the decorations.
Dinner is announced; a move is made to the table, and each man finds his place marked for him. There is a precedence in Freemasonry, as at Court, and this is adhered to in arranging the places at table.
The Victory is a Chapter which is very much in touch with the army and navy, and looking round the table, the company, but for the sombreness of their attire—for one or two Orders at the buttonhole, and here and there a decoration at the throat, are the only spots of colour—might be hosts and guests at some military mess dinner. The "Most Wise," who sits at the head of the table, does not belong to either of the services, but on one side of him is the heir to a dukedom, who led at one time a troop of the Household Cavalry, and on the other one of the most popular of our citizen soldiers, equally at home on parade as in his civic chair when Master of one of the City Companies. These are flanked again by a well-known brigade-surgeon and a cheery Admiralty official. The gentleman who has just said grace, in two Latin words, left very pleasant recollectionsbehind him when as ex-Lord Mayor he left the Mansion-House. All round the table are faces with the sharp soldierly cut or naval bluffness.
The "Grand Secretary" has ordered the dinner, and in the whole length and breadth of the world that hospitable Freemasonry covers, no man knows better how to construct a menu than he does:—
Crevettes.Tortue clair.Filets de sole Meunière.Vol-au-vent aux huîtres natives.Faisan Souvaroff.Selle de mouton.Céleri braisé Bordelaise.Laver. Pommes Parisienne.Poularde rôtie.Lard grillé. Salade.Bombe glacée Duchesse.Os à la moëlle.Dessert. Café.
I have eaten some good dinners at the Freemasons' Tavern, and others not so good. To-night the cook is not up to his best form, and has not responded to the inspiration of the menu. The turtle soup is not like that of the excellent Messrs. Ring and Brymer, or that of Mr. Painter; thefaisan Souvaroffis dry, and the cook's nerve has failed him when the truffles had to be added; but, on the other hand, thesole Meunièreand thevol-au-ventare admirable, and the marrow-bones are large and scalding-hot.
The genial old custom of taking wine is part of all Masonic dinners, and after the "Most Wise" has drunk to the other guests, much friendly challenging takes place. The marrow-bones having been disposed of, the ex-Lord Mayor, the Chaplain of the Chapter, says a grace as short as that before meat, and then follow the loyal toasts. It is the custom of the Chapter that speeches should be short, and the toasts of Her Majesty and the Prince of Wales, and the few Masonic toasts that follow, occupy very little time. Then the cigars are lit, and the formal order at table is broken up and little knots are formed.
One by one the guests who have an appointment elsewhere, or who are going to the theatre, say good-night and go off; but a remnant still remain, and these make an adjournment to a cosy little clubroom on the top story of Freemasons' Hall, where good stories are told, and soda-water-bottle corks pop until long after midnight.
15th November.
There is a small Masonic dining-club, called the Sphinx Club, which dines at the Freemasons' Tavern, and which I mention because the dinner I last ate in company with my brother Sphinxes was one of the best efforts of the chef and of the manager Mons. Blanchette—which means that it was very good indeed. The club was founded as an antidote to the large amount of soft soap that Freemasons habitually plaster each other with in after-dinner speeches. No Sphinx is allowed to say anything good of any brother Sphinx, and when acandidate is put up for the club his proposer says all the ill he knows or can invent about his past life. A candidate can only become a member of the club by being unanimously blackballed. It is needless to say that the best of temper and good fellowship is the rule amongst the Sphinxes, and the Freemasons' Tavern seems to always have a very good dinner for them. This was the menu of their last banquet—
Huîtres.Tortue clair.Rouget à la Grenobloise.Caille à la Souvaroff.Agneau rôti. Sauce menthe.Choux de mer. Pommes noisettes.Bécasse sur canapé.Pommes paille. Salade de laitues.Os à la moëlle.Petit soufflé glacé rosette.Fondu au fromage.Dessert.Café.
He was the junior subaltern when I commanded H company in the old regiment, and a very good subaltern he was. It was only the other day that I read how in one of the first skirmishes in an Indian trouble he had distinguished himself by standing over a wounded man and keeping off the hillmen till assistance came; and it seemed strange to meet him now in crumpled, sun-scorched clothes, with a soft handkerchief round his neck, and with a very thin white face, walking up the Haymarket.
"They hit me, you know," he said, in answer to a question. "The wound in my shoulder healed directly, but the wound in the neck gave a lot of trouble, and the doctors packed me home as soon as they could."
I particularly wanted to hear of the deed that the boy had done, and asked him to come and dine at a club; but his dress clothes were stored away somewhere in the Punjab—where, he did not know—with the heavy baggage of the regiment, and his London tailor had not made him newones yet. Besides, he would not be able to put on a collar for weeks, perhaps months, and though he would be glad to dine quietly with me, he asked that it might be somewhere where he would not feel uncomfortable at not being in dress clothes. We were standing at the top of the Haymarket, my eye caught the two great smoked salmon hung up in Scott's window, and I asked the junior subaltern if oysters and a lobsterà l'Américainewere to his taste.
He had not eaten any oysters, except the Karachi ones, which are brought in ice to the towns of the Punjab, since he left England six years ago; and though he did not know what his surgeon and doctor would say to his eating lobster, he was prepared to risk their wrath. Half-past seven was the hour I appointed to meet him, and then I went into Scott's to secure a table and to order dinner.
Scott's, springing from its ashes, has become a gorgeous place, with pillars of some material which looks like black marble inlaid with mother-of-pearl, with stained glass and much ornamentation in worked brass, and with a great plate-glass window which displays a show of ice and fish and lobsters and crabs and salad-stuff that looks most appetising.
Inside, it may be said to be divided into four parts. There is the wide entrance hall, at either side of which are marble counters with many plates and little bottles upon them, and piles of sandwiches made with fish delicacies, and piles of slices of brown bread and butter. Behind the counters stand men in white samite, who areconstantly opening oysters, and behind them are mirrors with, on shelves above the glass, piles of little kegs which suggest how suitable a small barrel of oysters is as a Christmas present. In the midst of this entrance hall sacred to the oysters a staircase leads down to the lower regions, "The Dive," as it is labelled, where there are comfortable curved divans with a little table as the pearl in the midst of these brown leather shells, and on the walls a Japanese fantasy in tiles where strange fish swim in and out of weeds. Upstairs on the first floor are the regular dining-rooms with red blinds, red shades to the electric lamps, and a warm red paper; and behind the hall, with its oyster bars, is the grill-room, shut off from draughts by a great screen of glass and brown wood which reaches from floor to ceiling.
I ordered our dinner in the grill-room. A dozen of oysters, some mock-turtle soup,homard à l'Américaine, and a steak.
At 7.30 to the second the junior subaltern was there, and I smiled inwardly as I recognised the cut of the Calcutta tailor in his black coat, well creased by having been jumped on to make it fit into a bullock trunk.
I took him into the grill-room, where the manager had kept a corner table for us, and after a look round at the neat little room, with its mirrors framed in white marble veined with black; its red marble pilasters with gilt capitals; its grill, at which the white-clothed cook, with a table of chops and steaks at his elbow, stands; its little glass case in the corner, in which a ladyin black keeps accounts in big books; its stained glass skylight; its yellowish-brown cornice with many figures upon it; its many little tables at which stolid and respectable citizens were giving their wives dinners, or, if alone, were reading the evening papers: he turned his attention to his oysters.
The first time that a man tastes a native oyster after six years of exile is a solemn moment, and I would not disturb him while he ate them; but when there were only empty shells on his plate, and he had drunk his glass of Chablis, I began to ask questions.
"Tell me all about that day on the spur I have read of, and how you came to be recommended for the V.C.," I said.
The junior subaltern took a great gulp of the mock turtle and began. "You remember J. Smith—he was a lance-corporal when you commanded the company." "Corporal," I amended. "Well, corporal. He did ripping well that day. He's colour-sergeant of the company now, and there was one time when, as we were retiring, some of the devils got right on our flank and enfiladed us. Well, Colour-Sergeant Smith just gave one yell and went for them, and old Kelly, who used to be your bat-man, and Pat Grady went with him, and they killed six of the Mamunds."
"My boy," I said, "I want to know whatyoudid, and not what Colour-Sergeant Smith did."
"This is ripping good soup," said the subaltern.
It was very good soup. The cook, divining that I had an invalid as a guest, had put a liberalmixture of real turtle with the mock turtle, and it was practically turtle soup. I had sipped the Beaune, and found it a little tart, and the manager brought us a fresh bottle before I opened my second parallel with the advent of a really splendid dish of lobster.
"I want to know now," I said, with a touch of the manner with which I used to ask him if all the entries in the small books of his half-company were brought up to date, "what happened when you stood over that wounded man, and three big hairy hillmen all made a rush at you at once, and got to close quarters before the men could get back to bayonet them."
The junior subaltern was very much occupied with his steak. "Old Major So-and-So was just senior to you in the regiment?" he asked at last, and I said that that was so. "Well, he was ripping cool that day, and he made a joke that the men talked about afterwards. We had destroyed the mud huts that they called a village, and we were waiting till the wounded had got well to the rear before retiring. The Major was in command of our companies that day, for the Colonel was with the companies in reserve. Well, the Major was sitting on a great rock, looking at the country——" "What sort of country is it?" I interposed. "Oh, just mountains and ravines and nullahs, and that sort of thing—a beastly sort of a place," the subaltern said, believing that he was conveying the fullest information, and then went on. "Well, the Major was sitting on the rock smoking that old meerschaum of a nigger'shead which he'd had for years. A bullet came and smashed the pipe to atoms. He spat out the pipe-stem and then shook his fist at the place where the shot had come from. 'You blackguards,' he said, 'you're not fit company for a gentleman to smoke a meerschaum with; I'll only treat you to clays in future.' Well, the men were amused by this, and——"
"Young man," I said severely, "I knew that pipe, and it is a good thing it is gone. That steak you have disposed of was good, and these herring-roes I have ordered for you while you were blathering are excellent. Eat them, and then get to business at once."
The junior subaltern ate the roes, which were perfect; and when the coffee and the brandy were brought, he looked at me to see if I was really in earnest, and began again, "Do you remember James Pilch, who was the company's cook?"
"No, my boy," I said, "I do not remember James Pilch, nor do I want to. Waiter, my bill."
The bill was brought. Oysters, 3s.; lobster, 8s.; soup, 2s.; grill, 3s.; vegetables, 6d.; wine, 7s.; bread and butter, 4d.; coffee, 1s.; liqueurs, 5s.; roes, 2s.; total, £1: 11: 10.
This paid I turned to the subaltern. "Young man," I said, "I am now going to personally conduct you to the club smoking-room, and if I have to sit up with you all night with a stick I intend to be told how you came to be recommended for the V.C."
The junior subaltern groaned.
22nd November.
"I want father to take me to see 'The Liars,'" said pretty Miss Carcanet ("Brighteyes" to her friends), "but he says that he sees too many of them as it is in his club smoking-room, and won't go with me."
There was naturally only one thing to do, and that was to offer to take Lady Carcanet and Miss Brighteyes to the play at the Criterion.
Sir George was evidently relieved at not having to go to the theatre, and thanked me. "It is just the play that ought to suit you," he added, "for I hear it's all about menus and sauces."
Lady Carcanet, however, could not go to the play. She was retiring to Brighton to escape the fogs, and did not know when she would come back. Sir George settled it all, however, over the walnuts and the port. He had to preside at a political dinner one day in the coming week, and if I would take Miss Brighteyes out to dinner and to the play that nightit would take a responsibility off his shoulders. "Let the old woman get away to Brighton, and don't say anything till she's out of the way. I am all for letting the girl enjoy herself freely; but Maria thinks that no unmarried girl should stir without two chaperons and a maid to guard her." I nodded assent to Sir George's opinions, but I knew that he would never have dared to call Lady Carcanet "the old woman" to her face.
I bought the tickets for "The Liars," and on the morning of the day I was to have the responsibility of chaperoning Miss Brighteyes I went to the Criterion, to the East Room, to order my dinner and choose my table.
M. Lefèvre, the manager, is an old acquaintance of mine, for once before the East Room was under his direction, and now, with M. Node and Alfred as his adjutant and sergeant-major, he still keeps a watchful eye over all that takes place there. He is an enthusiast on cookery, and should one day write a book on the introduction of good foreign cookery into England, for he talks of M. Coste and Maître Escoffier, and the other great pioneers of culinary progress, with real enthusiasm.
There are three tables, one of which I always take, if possible, when I dine in the East Room. One is the little table in the corner by the entrance from the ante-room, another a table sheltered by a glass screen, and the third a table in the corner at the far end of the room. I told Alfred to keep me the table at the far end of the room; and then M. Lefèvre—tall, with athin beard, with strong, nervous hands, that he clasps and unclasps as he talks—arrived, and we talked over our menu. Caviar I preferred to oysters, for I did not know whether Miss Brighteyes cared for shellfish, and then we passed to the consideration of the soup.
I suggested that it should be a consommé, as I did not want a heavy dinner, and M. Lefèvre hit on exactly the right thing, aconsommé de gibier. Next came the fish, and as the details of the fillet of sole with soft herring-roe, and the sharp taste of prawn and crayfish to make the necessary contrast were unfolded, I nodded my head.Cailles à la Sainte Alliancewe settled on at once, and then came the difficulty of theentrée. I wanted a perfectly plain dish, and in a grilled chicken wing and breast we found our way out of our difficulty. There was a novelty, a method of cooking bananas that M. Lefèvre, who believes that bananas are not sufficiently appreciated, wanted us to try.
The menu completed read thus:—
Caviar.Potage consommé à la Diane.Filets de sole aux délices.Suprêmes de volaille grillés.Carottes nouvelles à la crème.Laitues braisées en cocotte.Cailles à la Sainte Alliance.Salade de chicorée frisée.Croûtes à la Caume.Soufflé glacé à la mandarine.
Then, having nothing in particular to do for a quarter of an hour, I walked round the buildingwith M. Lefèvre, looked in at the Great Hall where the statue of Shakespeare gazes contemplatively down upon the chairman's head at big public dinners; the hall next to it, which is only one degree smaller in size; the Masonic temple and the Chapter-room; and the prettiest room of all, the room in which the French dinner is served, on the walls of which is an Oriental design of roses which would not have been out of place in one of the pleasure chambers of Akbar at Agra.
In the evening, before Miss Brighteyes, who was to be escorted as far as the ante-room to the East Room by Sir George, arrived, I had a few minutes in which to go and see that all was ready at my table, and to look round to see whether there was anybody whom I knew dining. It was, I should think, the first occasion on which I have dined in the East Room and have not recognised a single face; but all the ladies appeared very smart, all the men were well groomed, the usual type of diners at a good restaurant. If I had looked at the book in which the names of people ordering dinners are noted, I should no doubt have found that there were a dozen people among the well-dressed diners whose names are familiar in our mouths as household words.
The little ante-room, with its green and cream walls, its mirrors, its big fireplace, and its comfortable chairs, is cosy enough to have a soothing effect on a worse-tempered man than myself; and my patience was not much tried, for Sir George formally handed over Miss Brighteyesto me not five minutes after the time at which I had ordered dinner.
Miss Brighteyes looked very delightful in a dress of some white gossamer material with spangly adornments, which resembled diamonds, scattered over it. She wore a diamond brooch and a necklet of pearls with a diamond clasp, which had been her birthday presents from her father on her seventeenth and eighteenth birthdays.
When Miss Brighteyes gets up on her society high horse she reduces me to comparative silence. While I was being given some details as to beautiful decorations at St. George's on the occasion of her cousin's wedding, I tried in vain to make Miss Brighteyes understand that the caviar she was eating deserved some attention, but she was not to be turned from her account of an aisle decorated with chrysanthemums and palms.
Had a man dared to talk to me about the Grafton Supper Club while he was drinking the delicious consommé I should have reproved him, and asked him to reserve conversation for the interludes of the repast; but Miss Brighteyes, not thinking in the least of the serious responsibility of eating a good dinner, chattered gaily of Miss Mary Moore's black and white dress at the supper a week gone by, and reeled off a catalogue of names from the Peerage of the men who had been her partners at the little informal dance that followed the supper.
While I ate with appreciation thedélices de sole, I was told why Miss Brighteyes preferred Princes' to Niagara as a skating-rink, orvice versa, I forget which.
With thesuprême de volailleI was given a short account of a party at the Bachelors' Club to see a magic-lantern entertainment, and when thecailles à la Sainte Alliancewere brought up Miss Brighteyes was beginning to tell me of some charades, at her aunt's house, acted by children. But the quails were a dish in the presence of which I felt that small talk must cease. "Miss Brighteyes," I said gravely, "cast your eyes around this room. You see dainty panels of dark green traced over with gold, you see red and gold cornices, a ceiling of cream and gold studded with lights innumerable, bronze velvet curtains, yellow-shaded lamps, fine napery, glass, and silver. All this is but the framing to what is contained in this little earthenterrine. Into the interior of a little ortolan M. Gastaud himself, thechef cuisinier, has introduced a little block of truffle and other delicacies. That little ortolan has been imbedded in a quail, and this sacred alliance, over which M. Jeannin,chef des cuisiniers, has smiled, has been served up cooked to the instant for your delectation. Is this a moment, then, young lady, to talk of children's charades? Is not thankful silence better?"
Miss Brighteyes appreciated the solemnity of the moment, and also ate the bananas—which she said were very good—in silence. It was not until she had begun her soufflé that she found voice to tell me about a new and very smart cycling club of which she had been asked to be an original member.
I paid the bill: couverts, 2s.; caviar, 4s.; potage, 2s.; filets de sole, 3s.; suprêmes devolaille et légumes, 8s.; cailles, 10s.; salade, 1s.; croûtes à la Caume, 2s.; soufflé glacé, 2s.; vin, "'62" (a capital bottle of claret), 5s.; eau minérale, 6d.; liqueurs, 3s.; café, 6d.; total, £2: 3s.
"Now," I said to Miss Brighteyes, "we will go down to the theatre and listen in comfort to a discussion as tosauce Arcadienneandsauce Marguérite."
29th November.
Since I wrote the above Mons. Lefèvre has had, through temporary ill-health and overwork, to resign his position as manager at the Criterion, being succeeded by Mons. Gerard. Mons. Cassignol has succeeded Mons. Jeannin as the king of the kitchen.
The decorations of the East Room have been altered, and it is now resplendent in white, gold, and moss-green. The West Room is now all pink, and a gilt musicians' gallery has been put up in the redecorated entrance-hall.
Mons. Lefèvre being an enthusiast on the subject of bananas in cookery, I asked him if he would give therecetteof thecroûtes à la Caume, and as he said "certainly," and seemed pleased to do it, I put in a request for therecetteof thefilets de sole aux délices, and that was given me as well.
I also asked Mons. Lefèvre to draw out for me two menus of what he would consider distinctive east-room dinners for four people and for ten. They were sent to me and admirably thought out dinners they are. This is the feast for four—
Caviar.Consommé Prince de Galles. Crème de santé.Truites de rivière à la Cléopâtre.Epaule d'agneau de lait à la Boulangère.Petits pois nouveaux à la crème.Caneton Nantais farci à la Rouennaise.Salade Victoria.Soufflé glacé à l'orange.Friandises.
And this for ten—
Huîtres natives.Potage clair à la tortue. Crème Raphaël.Darne de saumon au court-bouillon.Cassolettes de laitances à l'Américaine.Cailles à la Mascotte.Noisettes de chevreuil à la Cumberland.Haricots verts nouveaux.Purée de champignons.Chapons du Mans à la truffe.Salade à la crème.Asperges d'Argenteuil. Sauce mousseline.Glacé Alaska.Diablotins à la Joinville.Dessert.
Rangez vos filets de soles dans un plat beurré; arrosez-les de vin blanc et faites-les pocher pendant dix minutes. Egoutez ensuite vos filets et dressez-les sur un plat oval. Faites réduire rapidement la cuisson avec un peu de bon velouté et un morceau de beurre d'écrevisses. Quand votre sauce est prête, jetez-y des queues d'écrevisses et recouvrez en vos filets de soles. Dressez aux extrémités du plat des quenelles d'écrevisses décorées à la truffe, et servez.
Arrange your filleted soles on a buttered dish, sprinkle them with white wine, and cook them for ten minutes. Then drain the fillets, and arrangethem on an oval dish. Boil down the liquor rapidly, with a little goodveloutésauce and a piece of crayfish butter. When your sauce is ready, throw into it the tails of the crayfish, and cover the fillets of sole with it. Round the edge of the dish place quenelles of crayfish decorated with truffles, and serve.
Vous préparez vos croûtes avec de la brioche en tranches d'un centimètre d'épaisseur, que vous faites rôtir légèrement au four après les avoir saupoudrées au sucre. Vous les dressez en couronne sur un plat rond, au milieu, mais avec quelques losanges d'ananas au centre. Vous prenez des bananas pas trop mûres, mais surtout bien saines. Vous les jetez avec leur peau dans de l'eau froide que vous mettez a bouillir. Après deux minutes d'ébullition, les bananes sont cuites. Vous les retirez, vous les épluchez, et les rangez sur votre plat autour des croûtons. Vous arrosez l'ananas et les bananes d'une sauce abricot parfumée au Kirsch, et vous servez bien chaud, après avoir décoré de quelques fruits confits. C'est très simple. Toutes les ménagères peuvent faire ça. C'est cependant la façon la plus exquise de manger la banane.