Cakes & Ale / A Dissertation on Banquets Interspersed with Various Recipes, More or Less Original, and anecdotes, mainly veracious

Shooting luncheons—Cold tea and a crust—Clear turtle—Such larks!—Jugged duck and oysters—Woodcock pie—Hunting luncheons—Pie crusts—The true Yorkshire pie—Race-course luncheons—Suggestions to caterers—The “Jolly Sand boys” stew—Various recipes—A race-course sandwich—Angels’ pie—“Suffolk pride”—Devilled larks—A light lunch in the Himalayas.

There is no meal which has become more “expanded” than a shooting luncheon. A crust of bread with cheese, or a few biscuits, and a flask of sherry sufficed for our forebears, who, despite inferior weapons and ammunition, managed to “bring ’em down” quite as effectually as do the shootists of this period. Most certainly and decidedly, a heavy luncheon is a mistake if you want to “shoot clean” afterwards. And bear this in mind, all ye “Johnnies” who rail at your host’s champagne and turtle, after luncheon, in a comfortable pavilion in the midst of a pheasant battue, and whose very beaters would turn up their noses at a pork pie and a glass of old ale, that there is nothing so good to shoot upon as cold tea, unless it be cold coffee. I have tried both, and for a shooting luncheon par excellence commend me to a crust and a pint of cold tea, eaten whilst sitting beneath the shelter of an unpleached hedge, against the formal spread which commences with a consommé, and finishes with guinea peaches, and liqueurs of rare curaçoa. Of course, it is assumed that the shooter wishes to make a bag.

But as, fortunately for trade, everybody does not share my views, it will be as well to append a few dishes suitable to a scratch meal of this sort.

First of all let it be said that a

Roast Loin of Pork,

washed down with sweet champagne, is not altogether to be commended. I have nothing to urge against roast pork, on ordinary occasions, or champagne either; but a woodcock takes a lot of hitting.

Such a pudding as was sketched in the preceding chapter is allowable, as is also the Lancashire Hot-Pot.

Shepherd’s Pie,

i.e. minced meat beneath a mattress of mashed potatoes, with lots of gravy in the dish, baked, is an economical dish, but a tasty one; and I have never known much left for the beaters. Rabbit Pie, or Pudding, will stop a gap most effectually, and

Plover Pudding

—the very name brings water to the lips—is entitled to the highest commendation.

This is the favourite dish at the shooting luncheons of a well-known Royal Duke, and when upon one occasion the discovery was made that through some misunderstanding said pudding had been devoured to the very bones, by the loaders, the—well, “the band played,” as they say out West. And a stirring tune did that band play too.

Such Larks!

Stuff a dozen larks with a force-meat made from their own livers chopped, a little shallot, parsley, yolk of egg, salt, bread crumbs, and one green chili chopped and divided amongst the twelve. Brown in a stewpan, and then stew gently in a good gravy to which has been added a glass of burgundy.

This is a plât fit for an emperor, and there will be no subsequent danger of his hitting a beater or a dog. Another dainty of home invention is

Jugged Duck with Oysters.

Cut the fleshy parts of your waddler into neat joints, and having browned them place in a jar with nine oysters and some good gravy partly made from the giblets. Close the mouth of the jar, and stand it in boiling water for rather more than an hour. Add the strained liquor of the oysters and a little more gravy, and turn the concoction into a deep silver dish with a spirit lamp beneath. Wild duck can be jugged in the same way, but without the addition of the bivalves; and a mixture of port wine and Worcester sauce should be poured in, with a squeeze of lemon juice and cayenne, just before serving.

Another dish which will be found “grateful and comforting” is an old grouse—the older the tastier. Stuff him with a Spanish onion, add a little gravy and seasoning, and stew him till the flesh leaves the bones. All these stews, or “jugs” should be served on dishes kept hot by lighted spirit beneath them. This is most important.

A Woodcock Pie

will be found extremely palatable at any shooting luncheon, although more frequently to be met with on the sideboards of the great and wealthy. In fact, at Christmas time, ’tis a pie which is specially concocted in the royal kitchen at Windsor Castle, to adorn Her Most Gracious Majesty’s board at Osborne, together with the time-honoured baron of specially fed beef. This last named joint hardly meets my views as part of a breakfast menu; but here is the recipe for the woodcock pie.

Bone four woodcocks—I don’t mean take them off the hooks when the gentleman is not in his shop, but tell your cook to take the bones out of one you’ve shot yourself—put bones and trimmings into a saucepan with one shallot, one small onion, and a sprig of thyme, cover them with some good stock, and let this gravy simmer awhile. Take the gizzards away from the heart and liver, pound, and mix these with some good veal force-meat. Place the woodcocks, skin downwards, on a board; spread over each two layers of force-meat, with a layer of sliced truffles in between the two. Make your crust, either in a mould, or with the hands, put a layer of force-meat at the bottom, then two woodcocks, then a layer of truffles, then the other two woodcocks, another layer of truffles, and a top layer of force-meat, and some thin slices of fat bacon. Cover the pie, leaving a hole for the gravy, and bake in a moderate oven. After taking out pour in the gravy, then close the orifice and let the pie get cold before serving.

N.B.—It will stimulate the digging industry if one or two whole truffles have been hidden away in the recesses of the pie.

Another good pie I have met with—in the north country—was lined with portions of grouse and black game (no bones), with here and there half a hard-boiled egg. Nothing else except the necessary seasoning.

With regard to

Hunting Luncheons

it cannot be said that your Nimrod is nearly as well catered for as is the “Gun.” For, as a rule, the first-named, if he be really keen on the sport of kings has to content himself, during the interval of a “check,” with the contents of a sandwich-case, and a flask, which may contain either brown sherry or brandy and water—or possibly something still more seductive. I have heard of flasks which held milk punch, but the experience is by no means a familiar one. If your Nimrod be given to “macadamising,” instead of riding the line, or if he sicken of the business altogether before hounds throw off, he can usually “cadge” a lunch at some house in the neighbourhood, even though it may only “run to” bread and cheese—or, possibly, a wedge of a home-made pork-pie—with a glass, or mug, of nut brown ale. Not that all ale is “nut brown,” but ’tis an epithet which likes me well. Would it were possible to give practical hints here as to the true way to manufacture a pork-pie! To make the attempt would, I fear, only serve to invite disaster; for the art of pork-pie making, like that of the poet, or the play-actor, should be born within us. In large households in the midland counties (wherein doth flourish the pig tart) there is, as a rule, but one qualified pie-maker—who is incapable of any other culinary feat whatever. I have even been told that it requires “special hands” to make the crust of the proper consistency; and having tasted crusts and crusts, I can implicitly believe this statement. Here is a recipe for a veritable savoury

Yorkshire Pie.

Bone a goose and a large fowl. Fill the latter with the following stuffing:—minced ham, veal, suet, onion, sweet herbs, lemon peel, mixed spices, goose-liver, cayenne, and salt, worked into a paste with the yolks of two eggs. Sew up the fowl, truss it, and stew it with the goose for twenty minutes in some good beef and giblet stock, with a small glass of sherry, in a close stewpan. Then put the fowl inside the goose, and place the goose within a pie-mould which has been lined with good hot-water paste. Let the goose rest on a cushion of stuffing, and in the middle of the liquor in which he has been stewed. Surround him in the pie with slices of parboiled tongue and chunks of semi-cooked pheasant, partridge, and hare, filling in the vacancies with more stuffing, put a layer of butter atop, roof in the pie with paste, bake for three hours, and eat either hot or cold—the latter for choice.

For a skating luncheon

Irish Stew

is the recognised entrée, served in soup-plates, and washed down with hot spiced ale.

In the way of

Race-course Luncheons

our caterers have made giant strides in the last dozen years. A member of a large firm once told me that it was “out of the question” to supply joints, chops, and steaks in the dining-rooms of a grand stand, distant far from his base of operations, London. “Impossible, my dear sir! we couldn’t do it without incurring a ruinous loss.” But the whirligig of time has proved this feat to be not only possible, but one which has led to the best results for all concerned. In the matter of chops and steaks I hope to see further reforms introduced. These succulent dainties, it cannot be too widely known, are not at their best unless cut fresh from loin or rump, just before being placed on the gridiron. The longer a cut chop (raw) is kept the more of its virtue is lost. It might, possibly, cause a little extra delay, and a little extra expense, to send off loins and rumps from the butcher’s shop, instead of ready-cut portions, but the experiment would answer, in the long run. The same rule, of course, should apply to restaurants and grill-rooms all over the world.

During the autumn and winter months, race-course caterers seem to have but one idea of warm comforting food for their customers, and the name of that idea is Irish stew. This is no doubt an appetising dish, but might be varied occasionally for the benefit of the habitual follower of the sport of kings. Why not pea-soup, jugged hare (hares are cheap enough), hot-pot, Scotch broth, mullagatawny, hotch-potch, stewed or curried rabbit, with rice, shepherd’s pie, haricot ox-tails, sheep’s head broth (Scotch fashion), and hare soup! What is the matter with the world-renowned stew of which we read in The Old Curiosity Shop—the supper provided by the landlord of the “Jolly Sandboys” for the itinerant showmen? Here it is again:

“‘It’s a stew of tripe,’ said the landlord, smacking his lips, ‘and cowheel,’ smacking them again, ‘and bacon,’ smacking them once more, ‘and steak,’ smacking them for the fourth time, ‘and peas, cauliflowers, new potatoes, and sparrowgrass, all working up together in one delicious gravy.’ Having come to the climax, he smacked his lips a great many times, and taking a long hearty sniff of the fragrance that was hovering about, put on the cover again with the air of one whose toils on earth were over.

“‘At what time will it be ready?’ asked Mr. Codlin faintly. ‘It’ll be done to a turn,’ said the landlord, looking up at the clock, ‘at twenty-two minutes before eleven.’

“‘Then,’ said Mr. Codlin, ‘fetch me a pint of warm ale, and don’t let nobody bring into the room even so much as a biscuit till the time arrives.’”

And I do vow and protest that the above passage has caused much more smacking of lips than the most expensive, savoury menu ever thought out. True, sparrowgrass and new potatoes, and any peas but dried or tinned ones are not as a rule at their best in the same season as tripe; but why not dried peas, and old potatoes, and rice, and curry powder, and onions—Charles Dickens forgot the onions—with, maybe, a modicum of old ale added, for “body”—in this stew, on a cold day at Sandown or Kempton? Toujours Irish stew, like toujours mother-in-law, is apt to pall upon the palate; especially if not fresh made. And frost occasionally interferes with the best-laid plans of a race-course caterer.

“I don’t mind a postponed meeting,” once observed one of the “readiest” of bookmakers; “but what I cannot stand is postponed Irish stew.”

Than a good bowl of

Scotch Broth,

what could be more grateful, or less expensive?

Shin of beef, pearl barley, cabbages, leeks, turnips, carrots, dried peas (of course soaked overnight), and water—“all working up together in one delicious gravy.”

Also

Hotch Potch.

With the addition of cutlets from the best end of a neck of mutton, the same recipe as the above will serve for this dish, which it must be remembered should be more of a “stodge” than a broth.

There are more ways than one of making a “hot-pot.” The recipe given above would hardly suit the views of any caterer who wishes to make a living for himself; but it can be done on the cheap. The old lady whose dying husband was ordered by the doctor oysters and champagne, procured whelks and ginger beer for the patient, instead, on the score of economy. Then why not make your hot-pot with mussels instead of oysters? Or why add any sort of mollusc? In the certain knowledge that these be invaluable hints to race-course caterers, I offer them with all consideration and respect.

The writer well remembers the time when the refreshments on Newmarket Heath at race-time were dispensed from a booth, which stood almost adjoining the “Birdcage.” Said refreshments were rough, but satisfying, and consisted of thick sandwiches, cheese, and bread, with “thumb-pieces” (or “thumbers”) of beef, mutton, and pork, which the luncher was privileged to cut with his own clasp-knife. Said “thumbers” seem to have gone out of favour with the aristocracy of the Turf; but the true racing or coursing sandwich still forms part of the impedimenta of many a cash-bookmaker, of his clerk, and of many a “little” backer. ’Tis a solid, satisfying sandwich, and is just the sort of nourishment for a hard worker on a bitter November day. Let your steak be grilling, whilst you are enjoying your breakfast—some prefer the ox-portion fried, for these simple speculators have strange tastes—then take the steak off the fire and place it, all hot, between two thick slices of bread. The sandwich will require several paper wrappings, if you value the purity of your pocket-linings. And when eaten cold, the juices of the meat will be found to have irrigated the bread, with more or less “delicious gravy.” And, as Sam Weller ought to have said, “it’s the gravy as does it.”

“But what about the swells?” I fancy I hear somebody asking, “Is my Lord Tomnoddy, or the Duke of Earlswood to be compelled to satisfy his hunger, on a race-course, with tripe and fat bacon? Are you really advising those dapper-looking, tailor-made ladies on yonder drag to insert their delicate teeth in a sandwich which would have puzzled Gargantua to masticate?” Not at all, my good sir, or madam. The well-appointed coach should be well-appointed within and without. Of course the luncheon it contains will differ materially according to the season of the year. This is the sort of meal I will provide, an you will deign to visit the Arabian tent behind my coach, at Ascot:

Lobster mayonnaise, salmon cutlets with Tartar sauce (iced), curried prawns (iced), lobster cutlets, chaud-froid of quails, foie gras in aspic, prawns in ditto, plovers’ eggs in ditto, galantine of chicken, York ham, sweets various, including iced gooseberry fool; and, as the pièce de résistance, an

Angel’s Pie.

Many people would call this a pigeon pie, for in good sooth there be pigeons in it; but ’tis a pie worthy of a brighter sphere than this.

Six plump young pigeons, trimmed of all superfluous matter, including pinions and below the thighs. Season with pepper and salt, and stuff these pigeons with foie gras, and quartered truffles, and fill up the pie with plovers’ eggs and some good force-meat. Make a good gravy from the superfluous parts of the birds, and some calf’s head stock to which has been added about half a wine-glassful of old Madeira, with some lemon-juice and cayenne. See that your paste be light and flaky, and bake in a moderate oven for three hours. Pour in more gravy just before taking out, and let the pie get cold.

This is a concoction which will make you back all the winners; whilst no heiress who nibbles at it would refuse you her hand and heart afterwards.

This is another sort of

Pigeon Pie

which is best served hot, and is more suited to the dining-room than the race-course.

Line a pie dish with veal force-meat, very highly seasoned, about an inch thick. Place on it some thin slices of fat bacon, three Bordeaux pigeons (trimmed) in halves, a veal sweetbread in slices, an ox palate, boiled and cut up into dice, a dozen asparagus tops, a few button mushrooms (the large ones would give the interior of the pie a bad colour) and the yolks of four eggs. Cover with force-meat, and bake for three hours. Some good veal gravy should be served with this, which I have named

Suffolk Pride.

It is a remarkable fact in natural history that English pigeons are at their best just at the time when the young rooks leave the shelter of their nests. Therefore have I written, in the above recipe, “Bordeaux” pigeons.

Here is a quaint old eighteenth-century recipe, which comes from Northumberland, and is given verbatim, for a

Goose Pie.

Bone a goose, a turkey, a hare, and a brace of grouse; skin it, and cut off all the outside pieces—I mean of the tongue, after boiling it—lay the goose, for the outside a few pieces of hare; then lay in the turkey, the grouse, and the remainder of the tongue and hare. Season highly between each layer with pepper and salt, mace and cayenne, and put it together, and draw it close with a needle and thread. Take 20 lbs. of flour, put 5 lbs. of butter into a pan with some water, let it boil, pour it among the flour, stir it with a knife, then work it with your hands till quite stiff. Let it stand before the fire for half an hour, then raise your pie and set it to cool; then finish it, put in the meat, close the pie, and set it in a cold place. Ornament according to your taste, bandage it with calico dipped in fat. Let it stand all night before baking. It will take a long time to bake. The oven must be pretty hot for the first four hours, and then allowed to slacken. To know when it is enough, raise one of the ornaments, and with a fork try if the meat is tender. If it is hard the pie must be put in again for two hours more. After it comes out of the oven fill up with strong stock, well seasoned, or with clarified butter. All standing pies made in this way.

Verily, in the eighteenth century they must have had considerably more surplus cash and time, and rather more angelic cooks than their descendants!

During cold weather the interior of the coach should be well filled with earthenware vessels containing such provender as hot-pot, hare soup, mullagatawny, lobster à l’Américaine, curried rabbit, devilled larks—with the matériel for heating these. Such cold viands as game pie, pressed beef, boar’s head, foie gras (truffled), plain truffles (to be steamed and served with buttered toast) anchovies, etc. The larks should be smothered with a paste made from a mixture of mustard, Chili vinegar, and a little anchovy paste, and kept closely covered up. After heating, add cayenne to taste.

Gourmets interested in menus may like to know what were the first déjeuners partaken of by the Tsar on his arrival in Paris in October 1869.

On the first day he had huîtres, consommé, œufs à la Parisienne, filet de bœuf, pommes de terre, Nesselrode sauce, chocolat.

Next day he ate huîtres, consommé, œufs Dauphine, rougets, noisettes d’agneau maréchal, pommes de terre, cailles à la Bohémienne, poires Bar-le-Duc.

The writer can recall some colossal luncheons partaken of at dear, naughty Simla, in the long ago, when a hill station in India was, if anything, livelier than at the present day, and furnished plenty of food for both mind and body. Our host was the genial proprietor of a weekly journal, to which most of his guests contributed, after their lights; “sport and the drama” falling to the present writer’s share. Most of the food at those luncheons had been specially imported from Europe; and although the whitebait tasted more of the hermetical sealing than of the Thames mud, most of the other items were succulent enough. There were turtle soup, and turtle fins; highly seasoned pâtés of sorts; and the native khansamah had added several dishes of his own providing and invention. A young florican (bustard) is by no means a bad bird, well roasted and basted; and though the eternal vilolif (veal olives) were usually sent away untasted, his snipe puddings were excellent. What was called picheese (twenty-five years old) brandy, from the atelier of Messrs. Justerini and Brooks, was served after the coffee; and those luncheon parties seldom broke up until it was time to dress for dinner. In fact, our memories were not often keen as to anything which occurred after the coffee, and many “strange things happened” in consequence; although as they have no particular connection with high-class cookery, they need not be alluded to in this chapter.

But, as observed before, I am of opinion that luncheon, except under certain circumstances, is a mistake.

CHAPTER VI

DINNER

Origin—Early dinners—The noble Romans—“Vitellius the Glutton”—Origin of haggis—The Saxons—Highland hospitality—The French invasion—Waterloo avenged—The bad fairy “Ala”—Comparisons—The English cook or the foreign food torturer?—Plain or flowery—Fresh fish and the flavour wrapped up—George Augustus Sala—Doctor Johnson again.

It is somewhat humiliating to reflect that we Britons owe the art of dining to our first conquerors the Romans—a smooth-faced race of voluptuaries whose idea of a bonne bouche took the form of a dormouse stewed in honey and sprinkled with poppy-seed. But it was not until the Normans had fairly established themselves and their cookery, that the sturdy Saxon submitted himself to be educated by the foreign food-spoiler; and at a later period the frequent invasions of France by Britain—when money was “tight” in the little island—were undoubtedly responsible for the commencement of the system of “decorating” food which so largely obtains to-day.

The name “dinner” is said—although it seems incredible that words should have become so corrupted—to be a corruption of dix heures, the time at which (A.M.), in the old Norman days, the meal was usually partaken of; and the time at which (P.M.), in later years, when none of the guests ever knew the hour, in that loose-and-careless period, the meal was occasionally partaken of at Limmer’s and at Lane’s, in London town. Froissart, in one of his works, mentions having waited upon the Duke of Lancaster at 5 P.M., “after his Grace had supped”; and it is certain that during the reigns of Francis I. and Louis XII. of France, the world of fashion was accustomed to dine long before the sun had arrived at the meridian, and to sup at what we now call “afternoon tea time.” Louis XIV. did not dine till twelve; and his contemporaries, Oliver Cromwell and the Merry Monarch, sat down to the principal meal at one. In 1700, two was the fashionable time; and in 1751 we read that the Duchess of Somerset’s hour for dinner was three. The hour for putting the soup on the table kept on advancing, until, after Waterloo, it became almost a penal offence to dine before six; and so to the end of the century, when we sit down to a sumptuous repast at a time when farm-labourers and artisans are either snug between the blankets, or engaged in their final wrangle at the “Blue Pig.”

The Romans in the time of Cicero had a light breakfast at 3.30 A.M., lunched at noon, and attacked the cœna at periods varying between 3 and 7 P.M.—according to the season of the year. They commenced the first course with eggs, and each noble Roman was supposed to clear his palate with an apple at the conclusion of the third course. “A banquet with Vitellius,” we read, “was no light and simple repast. Leagues of sea and miles of forest had been swept to furnish the mere groundwork of the entertainment. Hardy fishermen had spent their nights on the heaving wave, that the giant turbot might flap its snowy flakes on the Emperor’s table, broader than its broad dish of gold. Many a swelling hill, clad in the dark oak coppice, had echoed to ringing shout of hunter and deep-mouthed bay of hound, ere the wild boar yielded his grim life, by the morass, and the dark grisly carcase was drawn off to provide a standing dish that was only meant to gratify the eye. Even the peacock roasted in its feathers was too gross a dainty”—especially the feather part, we should think—“for epicures who studied the art of gastronomy under Caesar; and that taste would have been considered rustic in the extreme which could partake of more than the mere fumes and savour of so substantial a dish. A thousand nightingales had been trapped and killed, indeed, for this one supper, but brains and tongues were all they contributed to the banquet; while even the wing of a roasted hare would have been considered far too coarse and common food for the imperial table.” Talk about a bean-feast!

According to Suetonius (whose name suggests “duff”) the villain Nero was accustomed to dine in a superb apartment, surrounded with mechanical scenery, which could be “shifted” with every course. The suppers of “Vitellius the Glutton” cost, on the average, more than £4000 a-piece—which reads like a “Kaffir Circus” dinner at the Savoy—and the celebrated feast to which he invited his brother was down in the bill for £40,350. Now a-nights we don’t spend as much on a dinner, even when we invite other people’s wives. “It consisted”—I always think of Little Dombey and the dinner at Doctor Blimber’s, on reading these facts—“of two thousand different dishes of fish, and seven thousand of fowls, with other equally numerous meats.”

“Sharp-biting salads,” salted herrings, and pickled anchovies, were served, as hors d’œuvres during the first course of a Roman banquet, to stimulate the hunger which the rest of the meal would satisfy; but although Vitellius was, according to history, “a whale on” oysters, they do not appear to have been eaten as a whet to appetite. And it was the duty of one, or more, of the Emperor’s “freedmen” to taste every dish before his imperial master, in case poison might lurk therein. A garland of flowers around the brows was the regular wear for a guest at a “swagger” dinner party in ancient Rome, and, the eating part over, said garland was usually tilted back on the head, the while he who had dined disposed himself in an easy attitude on his ivory couch, and proffered his cup to be filled by the solicitous slave. Then commenced the “big drink.” But it must be remembered that although the subsequent display of fireworks was provided from lively Early Christians, in tar overcoats, these Romans drank the pure, unadulterated juice of the grape, freely mixed with water; so that headaches i’ th’ morn were not de rigueur, nor did the subsequent massacres and other diversions in the Amphitheatre cause any feelings of “jumpiness.”

The Roman bill-of-fare, however, does not commend itself to all British epicures, one of whom wrote, in a convivial song—

My pen loves to linger long over the gastronomies of those shaven voluptuaries, the ancient Italians; and my Caledonian readers will forgive the old tales when it is further set forth that the Romans introduced, amongst other things,

Haggis

into Bonnie Scotland. Yes, the poet’s “great chieftain o’ the puddin’ race” is but an Italian dish after all. The Apician pork haggis[3] was a boiled pig’s stomach filled with fry and brains, raw eggs, and pine-apples beaten to a pulp, and seasoned with liquamen. For although some of the Romans’ tastes savoured of refinement, many of them were “absolutely beastly.” The idea of pig’s fry and pine-apples mixed is horrible enough; but take a look into the constitution of this liquamen, and wonder no longer that Gibbons wrote his Decline and Fall with so much feeling and gusto. This sauce was obtained from the intestines, gills, and blood of fishes, great and small, stirred together with salt, and exposed in an open vat in the sun, until the compound became putrid. When putrefaction had done its work, wine and spices were added to the hell-broth, which was subsequently strained and sent into the Roman market. This liquamen was manufactured in Greece, and not one of all the poets of sunny Italy seems to have satirised the “made-in-Greece” custom, which in those days must have been almost as obnoxious as the “made-in-Germany” or the “made-in-Whitechapel” scare of to-day.

The usual farinaceous ingredient of the Roman haggis was frumenty, but frequently no grain whatever was applied; and instead of mincing the ingredients, as do the Scots, the ancients pounded them in a mortar, well moistened with liquamen, until reduced to pulp. We are further told in history that a Roman gladiator was capable, after playing with eggs, fish, nightingales’ tongues, dormice, and haggis, of finishing a wild boar at a sitting. But as the old lady remarked of the great tragedy, this happened a long time ago, so let’s hope it isn’t true.

The Saxon dining-table was oblong, and rounded at the ends. The cloth was crimson, with broad gilt edgings hanging low beneath the table, and, it is to be feared, often soiled by the dirty boots of the guests, who sat on chairs with covered backs, the counterfeit presentments of which are still to be seen in the Tottenham Court Road. The food consisted of fish, fowls, beef, mutton, venison, and pork—wild and domestic—either boiled, baked, or broiled, and handed to the company by the attendants on small sples. A favourite “fish joint” of the old Saxon was a cut out of the middle of a porpoise; and bread of the finest wheaten flour reposed in two silver baskets at each end of the table, above the salt, the retainers having to content themselves with coarser “household” out of a wooden cradle. Almost the only vegetable in use amongst the Saxons was colewort, although the Romans had brought over many others, years before; but hatred of anything foreign was more rampant in early Saxon days than at present. Forks were not introduced into England until during the reign of King “Jamie”: so that our ancestors had perforce to “thumb” their victuals. The fair Queen Elizabeth (like much more modern monarchs) was accustomed to raise to her mouth with her virgin fingers a turkey leg and gnaw it. But even in the earliest days of the thirteenth century, each person was provided with a small silver basin and two flowered napkins of the finest linen, for finger-washing and wiping purposes. Grapes, figs, nuts, apples, pears, and almonds, constituted a Saxon dessert; and in the reign of Edward III. an Act of Parliament was passed, forbidding any man or woman to be served with more than two courses, unless on high days and holidays, when each was entitled to three.

Here is the bill for the ingredients of a big dinner provided by a City Company in the fifteenth century: “Two loins of veal and two loins of mutton, 1s. 4d.; one loin of beef, 4d.; one dozen pigeons and 12 rabbits, 9d.; one pig and one capon, 1s.; one goose and 100 eggs, 1s. 0½d.; one leg of mutton, 2½d.; two gallons of sack, 1s. 4d.; eight gallons of strong ale, 1s. 6d.; total, 7s. 6d.” Alas! In these advanced days the goose alone would cost more than the “demmed total.”

Cedric the Saxon’s dining table, described in Ivanhoe, was of a much simpler description than the one noted above; and the fare also. But there was no lack of assorted liquors—old wine and ale, good mead and cider, rich morat (a mixture of honey and mulberry juice, a somewhat gouty beverage, probably), and odoriferous pigment—which was composed of highly-spiced wine, sweetened with honey. The Virgin Queen, at a later epoch, was catered for more delicately; and we read that she detested all coarse meats, evil smells, and strong wines. During the Georgian era coarse meats and strong wines were by no means out of favour; and Highland banquets especially were Gargantuan feasts, to be read of with awe. The dinner given by Fergus MacIvor, in honour of Captain Waverley, consisted of dishes of fish and game, carefully dressed, at the upper end of the table, immediately under the eye of the English stranger. “Lower down stood immense clumsy joints of beef,” says the gifted author, “which, but for the absence of pork, abhorred in the Highlands, resembled the rude festivity of the banquet of Penelope’s suitors. But the central dish was a yearling lamb, called a “hog in har’st,” roasted whole. It was set upon its legs, with a bunch of parsley in its mouth, and was probably exhibited in that form to gratify the pride of the cook, who piqued himself more on the plenty than the elegance of his master’s table. The sides of this poor animal”—the lamb, not the cook, we suppose is meant—“were fiercely attacked by the clansmen, some with dirks, others with the knives worn in the same sheath as the dagger, so that it was soon rendered a mangled and rueful spectacle.”

A spectacle which reminds the writer of a dinner table at the Royal Military College, Sandhurst, in the early sixties.

“Lower down,” continues Sir Walter, “the victuals seemed of yet coarser quality, though sufficiently abundant. Broth, onions, cheese, and the fragments of the feast, regaled the sons of Ivor, who feasted in the open air.”

The funeral baked meats used after the interment of the chief of the Clan Quhele (described in The Fair Maid of Perth) were also on a very extensive scale, and were, like the other meal, “digested” with pailfuls of usquebaugh, for which no Highland head that supported a bonnet was ever “the waur i’ th’ morn.” And the custom of placing bagpipers behind the chairs of the guests, after they have well drunk, which is still observed in Highland regiments, was probably introduced by the aforesaid Fergus MacIvor, who really ought to have known better.

And so the years rolled on; and at the commencement of the nineteenth century, old England, instead of enjoying the blessings of universal peace, such as the spread of the Gospel of Christianity might have taught us to expect, found herself involved in rather more warfare than was good for trade, or anything else. The first “innings” of the Corsican usurper was a short but merry one; the second saw him finally “stumped.” And from that period dates the “avenging of Waterloo” which we have suffered in silence for so long. The immigration of aliens commenced, and in the tight little island were deposited a large assortment of the poisonous seeds of alien cookery which had never exactly flourished before. The combat between the Roast Beef of old England and the bad fairy “Ala,” with her attendant sprites Grease, Vinegar, and Garlic, commenced; a combat which at the end of the nineteenth century looked excessively like terminating in favour of the fairy.

It has been repeatedly urged against my former gastronomic writings that they are unjustly severe on French cookery; that far greater minds than mine own have expressed unqualified approval thereof; that I know absolutely nothing about the subject; and that my avowed hatred of our lively neighbours and their works is so ferocious as to become ridiculous. These statements are not altogether fair to myself. I have no “avowed hatred” of our lively neighbours; in fact, upon one occasion on returning from the celebration of the Grand Prix, I saw a vision of——but that is a different anecdote. My lash has never embraced the entire batterie de cuisine of the chef, and there be many French plats which are agreeable to the palate, as long as we are satisfied that the matériel of which they are composed is sound, wholesome, and of the best quality. It is the cheap restaurateur who should be improved out of England. I was years ago inveigled into visiting the kitchen of one of these grease-and-garlic shops, and——but the memory is too terrible for language. And will anybody advance the statement that a basin of the tortue claire of the average chef deserves to be mentioned in the same breath with a plate of clear turtle at Birch’s or Painter’s? or that good genuine English soup, whether ox-tail, mock-turtle, pea, oyster, or Palestine, is not to be preferred to the French purée, or to their teakettle broth flavoured with carrots, cabbages, and onions, and dignified by the name of consommé?

Then let us tackle the subject of fish. Would you treat a salmon in the British way, or smother him with thick brown gravy, fried onions, garlic, mushrooms, inferior claret, oysters, sugar, pepper, salt, and nutmeg, en Matelote, or mince him fine to make a ridiculous mousse? Similarly with the honest, manly sole; would you fry or grill him plain, or bake him in a coat of rich white sauce, onion juice, mussel ditto, and white wine, or cider, à la Normande; or cover him with toasted cheese à la Cardinal?

The fairy “Ala” is likewise responsible for the clothing of purely English food in French disguises. Thus a leg of mutton becomes a gigot, a pheasant (for its transgressions in eating the poor farmer’s barley) a faisan, and is charged for at special rates in the bill; whilst the nearest to a beef-steak our lively neighbours can get is a portion of beef with the fibre smashed by a wooden mallet, surmounted by an exceedingly bilious-looking compound like axle-grease, and called a Châteaubriand; and curry becomes under the new régime, kari.

Undoubtedly, the principal reason for serving food smothered in made-gravies lies in the inferiority of the food. Few judges will credit France with the possession of better butcher’s-meat—with the exception of veal—than the perfidious island, which is so near in the matter of distance, and yet so far in the matter of custom. And it is an established fact that the fish of Paris is not as fresh as the fish of London. Hence the sole Normande, the sole au gratin, and the sole smothered in toasted cheese. But when we islanders are charged at least four times as much for the inferior article, in its foreign cloak, as for the home article in its native majesty, I think the time has come to protest. It is possible to get an excellent dinner at any of the “Gordon” hotels, at the “Savoy,” the “Cecil,” and at some other noted food-houses—more especially at Romano’s—by paying a stiff price for it; but it is due to a shameful lack of enterprise on the part of English caterers that a well-cooked English dinner is becoming more difficult to procure, year after year. There be three purely British dishes which are always “hoff” before all others on the programme of club, hotel, or eating-house; and these are, Irish stew, liver-and-bacon, and tripe-and-onions. Yet hardly a week passes without a new dîner Parisien making its appearance in the advertisement columns of the newspapers; whilst the cheap-and-nasty table d’hôte, with its six or seven courses and its Spanish claret, has simply throttled the Roast Beef of Old England.

“Sir,” said Dr. Johnson, after examining a French menu, “my brain is obfuscated after the perusal of this heterogeneous conglomeration of bastard English ill-spelt, and a foreign tongue. I prithee bid thy knaves bring me a dish of hog’s puddings, a slice or two from the upper cut of a well-roasted sirloin, and two apple-dumplings.”

“William,” said George Augustus Sala to the old waiter at the “Cheshire Cheese,” “I’ve had nothing fit to eat for three months; get me a point steak, for God’s sake!”

The great lauder of foreign cookery had only that day returned from a special mission to France, to “write up” the works of the cordon bleu for the benefit of us benighted Englishmen. No man in the wide wide world knew so much, or could write so much, on the subject of and in praise of the fairy “Ala,” as George Sala; and probably no man in the wide wide world so little appreciated her efforts.

But how has it come about that the fairy “Ala” has gained such headway in this island of ours? The answer must commence another chapter.

CHAPTER VII

DINNER (continued)