in certain streets in Philadelphia. She carries an old basket in which
the snails repose on freshly sprinkled leaves. These are not sold as
food, but for cleaning the outside of windowpanes. The snail is damped
and placed upon the glass, where it at once moves around and devours
all insects and foreign matter, leaving the pane as bright and clear
as crystal. There are old-established business places in Philadelphia
where the upper windows, when cleaned at all, are always cleaned by
snails. There is also a fine market for snails among the owners of
aquariums, as they keep the glass clean and bright.
[Illustration]
[Illustration: CHAPTER IX
DISHES OF HISTORY]
“Only a pomegranate is he who, when he gapes his
mouth, displays the contents of his heart.”
JAPANESE PROVERB.
History and cookery are linked together so closely that a study of the
one science implies, or should imply, a study of the other. For the
best part of a century and a half the notable names of contemporary
history are allied to dishes which perpetuated their glory and have
come down to us as ornaments alike of the monarchy and the menu.
The period is of course that of the fourteenth and fifteenth Louis of
France, and for several (mainly esoteric) reasons that brilliant and
fascinating age produced most of the classic dishes of high cookery,
dishes which have become, so to say, _standardized_, and which every
chef who respects the traditions of his art serves, or ought to serve,
in precisely the same manner in which they were designed by their
original inventors.
The average diner, when he sees on the menu of his Masonic banquet,
his annual Mansion House dinner, or his City Company feast, the name
of some historic celebrity tacked on to the roast, the entrée or the
sweet, recks little of its origin and inner meaning. To him it is
just something to be eaten, nothing more or less. And yet, if the
chef be competent, properly trained, and alive to his educational
responsibilities, these dishes have each their own story, their own
interest, and their own special and peculiar virtue.
Take as an instance _Côtelettes de Mouton à la Maintenon_. These
succulent dainties perpetuate for all time the memory of a lady,
who, whatsoever her faults, was at least charming, interesting,
and something more than passing fair. When the _Grand Monarque_
became queasy and past his prime, Madame invented, out of her own
powdered head, these cutlets, which in their envelopes of paper (_en
papillotes_) guarded the royal digestion against the evils of too much
grease. Again, _Cailles à la Mirepoix_ owe their origin to the Marshal
of that name; _Poulardes à la Montmorency_ were actually first cooked
by the Duke de Montmorency; _Petites Bouchées à la Reine_ are called
after Maria Leczinska, wife of Louis Quinze; and _filets de Volaille à
la Bellevue_ were evolved for the King by the Pompadour, who excelled
in the dainty manipulation of her silver _batterie de cuisine_.
The Regent Orleans is responsible for _pain à la d’Orléans_, a very
light and digestible form of bread; and his daughter, the Duchesse de
Berri, first conceived and executed those delightful morsels _filets
de lapereau à la Berri_. The Duchess de Villeroy, afterwards Maréchale
de Luxembourg, a brilliant light of the Court of the fifteenth Louis,
thought out, cooked, and christened the _poulets à la Villeroy_, which
remain, and deservedly so, a toothsome and delightful dish, even unto
this day. The _Chartreuse à la Mauconseil_ is called after the Marquise
of that name; and the _Vol-au-Vent à la Nesle_, which is still often
met with, though not always classically cooked, derives its name from
the Marquis de Nesle (not he of the Tower), who refused a peerage “to
remain premier marquis of France.”
In rather earlier days the Marquis de Béchamel invented a cream sauce
for turbot and cod which still, if somewhat perverted, perpetuates his
name. _Gigot à la Mailly_ was the result of profound study on the part
of the first mistress of Louis XV, who by her culinary art attempted,
and succeeded, in alienating the royal affection from her own sister,
who was an undesirable rival. _Soupe à la Condé_ was, in later years,
called after the famous cousin of Louis XVIII; and the Prince de
Soubise, notorious under Louis XV for giving great dinners, and paying
nobody but his cooks and the young ladies of the opera, lent his name,
through his cook, Bertrand, to the onion sauce which we still hold dear.
French cooks of the seventeenth and eighteenth centuries who did
honour to their employers by christening magnificent creations after
them only copied previous Apician artists, who, according to the “De
Opsoniis,” named their inventions after Varro, Julius Matius, Julius
Fronto, Celsinius, Vitellius, Commodus, and Didius Julianus. But the
chefs of the golden age of cookery also delighted to honour men of
comparatively humble station who took a keen and semi-professional
interest in the art of _la gueule_, as Montaigne calls it.
There was, for instance, a certain _petit abbé_, _le père Douillet_,
to whom much honour is done in those four delightful volumes of
cook-lore entitled “Les Soupers de la Cour.” They were published in
1755, and were written or compiled by one Manon, a literary cook of
the period to whom reference has already been made. The _abbé_ appears
to have been much appreciated by the author, for his books contain
delectable recipes for _Poulets_, _Brochet_, _Merlans_, _Cailles_, and
_Champignons_, all _au Père Douillet_, not, it will be noticed, _à la
(manière de) Père Douillet_, but just _au Père Douillet_, a rare and
great distinction.
The best-known official cooks of Louis XV were Moustier and Vincent
de la Chapelle. The latter is responsible for a very serious and
noteworthy cookery book which has never lacked honour in its own and
other countries. De la Gorse mentions a dinner given by the King, at
St. Hubert, where all the dishes were prepared by the distinguished
guests, such as the Prince de Beaufremont, the Marquis de Polignac, the
Duke de Goutant, the Duke d’Ayen, the Duke de Coigny, and the Duke de
la Vallière; the King himself contributed a _Poularde au Basilic_.
Such a famous gourmet as Richelieu naturally has left his mark in
culinary literature. We have the _Chartreuse à la Cardinal_, _Boudin
de poulet à la Richelieu_, _Gigot à la Richelieu_, and many more. The
rather famous _potage à la Camerani_, a most excellent concoction, is
called after a notability of that name, to whom Grimod de la Reynière
dedicated volume one of his immortal “Almanach des Gourmands,” as “one
of the most erudite epicures of France.”
King Stanislas Leszcnyski of Poland invented the _Baba_ to make amends
for the harshness of his own name, which the French tongue found hard
to pronounce. Its original ingredients were German yeast, flour,
butter, eggs, cream, sugar, saffron, candied peel, raisins, currants,
and Madeira, Malaga, or rum. According to Brillat-Savarin, the _Baba_
is especially beloved by women; “it renders her more plastic, and man
more expansive--only to look at it the eyes laugh and the heart sings.”
Who thinks nowadays of the battle when he degustates _Poulet à la
Marengo_? And yet nothing is more authentic than its inception on
that memorable occasion. The battle occurred, it may be remembered,
on 14 June, 1800. Napoleon had, naturally, a somewhat hurried meal.
There was no butter in camp, but plenty of sound olive oil. So the
_casserole_ was bottomed with oil, to which was added the garlic
and the mignonette. The fowl was then moistened with white wine and
garnished with sippets of toast, mushrooms, and morels, in default of
truffles. The result was pronounced to be exquisite. Nowadays we omit
the mignonette and substitute a bay leaf, thyme, and parsley; garlic
is thought to be too strong, so we use shalot; the mushrooms are still
permitted, but we ignore the morels. And so we have the _Poulet à la
Marengo_.
Literature has been honoured by Carême in his _Soupe à la Lamartine_,
history in _Potage à la Dumesnil_, philosophy in _Purée Buffon_, and
just before the death of the great artist he invented a vegetable soup
which he christened _Soupe à la Victor Hugo_. This same cook paid the
doctor who cured him of indigestion by dedicating to him his _Perche
à la Gaubert_. In rather later years we find a _Poularde à la George
Sand_ invented by Azèma, formerly chef at Prince’s. It is stewed in
white wine, flavoured with crayfish, butter and tails, truffles and
olives, with a garnishing of _feuilletage_.
The stage is ever prominent in gastronomic annals; it must suffice to
mention _Filets de Sole à la Belle Otèro_, _Pêche Melba_, _Croustades à
la Coquelin_, _Salade Rachel_, and _Consommé Sarah Bernhardt_, all of
which are nowadays fairly standard dishes.
Although no man was ever more susceptible to flattery and adulation
than Alexandre Dumas (_père_), yet there were marked degrees in the way
in which he accepted such complimentary tribute and homage, varying
from the mere _merci, mon cher_, in reply to congratulations on a
recently published book, to a cordial embrace and the swearing of an
everlasting friendship to the man who praised his cooking.
Dumas’s partiality for travelling and hunting developed his culinary
instincts, and he has related in his “Journey through Spain” how dire
necessity suggested to him the excellence of salad mixed without oil or
vinegar. References to cookery are scattered here and there all through
his works, particularly in his “Impressions de Voyage,” and again in
his “Propos d’Art et de Cuisine,” wherein occurs the famous “Causerie
Culinaire,” embodying the recipe for “macaroncello” and the delightful
address to his readers, “Je prie Dieu qu’il vous tienne en bon appétit,
vous conserve en bon estomac, et vous garde de faire de la littérature.”
The author of “An Englishman in Paris” describes how he watched Dumas
cook a whole dinner, consisting of “soupe aux choux,” a wonderful carp,
“ragout de mouton à la hongroise,” “rôti de faisans,” and a “salade
japonaise.” He adds: “I never dined like that before or after--not even
a week later, when Dr. Véron and Sophie made the _amende honorable_ in
the Rue Taitbout.”
In the kitchen, as in the theatre, the great novelist was master of all
difficulties. He delighted to make a triumph of an opportunity of which
others would only have made a failure. For himself he would have been
content with a couple of eggs; but if, as he wrote, he heard the cook
complaining, “What shall I do? There are twenty to dinner this evening,
and I have only three tomatoes left for my sauce! It is impossible!”
then the master would lift his head and cry, “Let me see what I can do!”
So saying, he would rush headlong into the kitchen just as he was in
his usual working dress, with his shirt-sleeves rolled up above his
elbows, and calling everybody in the place round him to watch his
prowess, he would labour among the stewpans for a good hour, ordering
all those who had followed him to the kitchen to different menial
tasks--one to slice the carrots, one to peel potatoes, one to chop up
herbs--turning them all into scullions in fact.
The blustering, boisterous genius as easily dominated the kitchen as
he did the literary world of the time. His cooking was energy and
bustle personified. Meat and butter were mingled with fine wines in the
saucepans, half a dozen sauces were being watched in the _bain-marie_,
and all the while he was cracking jokes and laughing at them most
loudly himself.
It was a wonderful and inspiring sight, and, as may be imagined, Dumas
seasoned the conversation as well as the dishes with the spice of his
wit and humour. No matter how serious his thoughts had been a few
moments before, it seemed as if the atmosphere of the kitchen had the
power to dissipate them. He forgot all his ever-present cares, and was
radiant with grease and hilarity.
Then suddenly, without the slightest warning, he would utter a
melodramatic scream and rush out of the kitchen to his study. He had
remembered the final _dénoûment_ of a scene he had left unfinished. He
would reinstate himself at his writing-table and take up the thread of
the story as if no interruption whatever had occurred. Many a dish that
delighted his guests was cooked in this extraordinary fashion, between
two thrilling chapters, and the wonderful part about his culinary work
was that the very dishes and ingredients seemed in some unaccountable
way to accommodate themselves to his casual and erratic manner. What
would have been utterly ruined under any other chef seemed to succeed
even extra well under his neglect.
Lacroix (_le bibliophile Jacob_) said of him: “Assuredly it is a great
attainment to be a romancist, but it is by no means a mediocre glory to
be a cook. Romancist or cook, Dumas is a chef, and the two vocations
appear in him to go hand in hand, or, rather, to be joined in one.”
Dumas often said, “When I have time I shall write a cookery book.” This
was to be the crowning work of his literary career. He was constantly
enumerating the vast sums which he alleged had been offered to him by
various publishing houses for the right to produce this _magnum opus_.
It is not generally known that in the agreement which he made with the
brothers Michael Lévy, in connexion with the rights of reproduction of
his works already written and those that he had contracted to write
in the future, he made the single exception of the famous forthcoming
cookery book.
The great work “La Grande Dictionnaire de la Cuisine,” of 1152 pages,
was eventually written in 1869; the manuscript was delivered to the
publisher, Alphonse Lemerre, in 1870, and whilst the book was in the
press the author died and the Franco-Prussian War broke out.
Its publication was therefore delayed until 1873, when it appeared with
a dedication to D. J. Vuillemot, a noted _hôtelier_, who had managed
the Café de la France, and had then opened on his own account, in
1862, a restaurant near the Madeleine, which proved a most disastrous
failure. He had been previously the proprietor of the Hôtel de la
Cloche et de la Bouteille at Compiègne. Dumas had made his acquaintance
when hunting in the vicinity, and was afterwards in the habit of taking
refuge with him when he wanted to be undisturbed in his literary work.
The arrest of some of the personages in “Monte Cristo” takes place at
Vuillemot’s hotel, and Dumas christened after him the famous _Lapin
à la Vuillemot_, which, he says, “You must absolutely have killed
yourself.”
The great dictionary is perhaps something of a disappointment. It is
laboured, unspontaneous, and, save in the characteristic preface,
hardly worthy of its illustrious author. Nevertheless it is vast in its
comprehensiveness, for, besides every imaginable dish, old and new, of
the so-called legitimate cuisine, it includes receipts for lambs’ tails
_glacées à la chicorée_, elephants’ feet, fillets of kangaroo flesh,
snails _à la Provençale_, and directions as to the right treatment of
the _babiroussa_, or wild Asian pig.
Contrary to his usual custom elsewhere, Dumas gives full credit to the
other culinary authors whom he quotes, and he includes recipes from
such acknowledged authorities as Brébant, Grimod de la Reynière, Magny,
Grignon, Carême, Véfour, and others.
He gives thirty-one methods of cooking carp, and sixteen for treating
artichokes. There is to be found also the Javanese formula for cooking
halcyons’ nests, and an elaborate essay on the hocco.
The appendix consists of the celebrated “Etude sur la Moutarde,” which
is a most flagrant _réclame_ of _la maison Bornibus_, but is amusing
for its sheer effrontery and impudence. There was always something
colossal about the man, even when he wrote about mustard.
In Molière’s “Le Bourgeois Gentilhomme” (Act iv. sc. 1), in the scene
between Dorante and Dorimène, we find this delightful passage:--
“Si Damis s’en était mêlé, tout serait dans les règles; il y aurait
partout de l’élégance et de l’érudition, et il ne manquerait pas de
vous exagérer lui-même toutes les pièces du repas qu’il vous donnerait,
et de vous faire tomber d’accord de sa haute capacité dans la science
des bons morceaux; de vous parler d’un pain de rive à biseau doré,
relevé de croûte partout, croquant tendrement sous la dent; d’un vin à
séve veloutée, armé d’un verre qui n’est point trop commandant; d’un
carré de mouton gourmandé de persil; d’une longe de veau de rivière,
longue comme cela, blanche, délicate, et qui, sous les dents, est une
vraie pâte d’amande; de perdrix relevées d’un fumet surprenant; et
pour son opéra, d’une soupe à bouillon perlé, soutenue d’un jeune gros
dindon, cantonnée de pigeonneaux et couronée d’oignons mariés avec de
la chicorée.”
From this dinner-programme the taste of the day may fairly be gauged,
and it will not be forgotten that it is in this immortal play that the
famous line occurs:--
Je vis de bonne soupe, et non de beau langage;
which is so often quoted and misquoted.
But cooks are a trying and troublesome race, with extraordinarily
perverse traditions of their own, a frequent antipathy to learn
anything new, and an absolutely ridiculous partiality to “improve”
old-fashioned dishes according to their own ideas. There ought to
be condign punishment meted out to any cook who makes any so-called
alteration or improvement to any well-known standardized dish, of which
the composition, flavour, and artistic completeness have been settled
once and for all, and to touch which is something akin to sacrilege.
Really good, intelligent, careful cooks get on in their profession, and
often end up by opening establishments of their own. Many a restaurant
proprietor has qualified as a first-class chef.
Does any one, by the way, know the origin of the word “restaurant”?
You may search your encyclopædia in vain; but the matter is really as
simple as shelling peas. The first public eating-house, as distinct
from the _rôtisseur_, who cooked food “to be eaten off the premises,”
was opened in Paris by a cook called Boulanger in 1750. Over his shop
he displayed a sign bearing this inscription in kitchen Latin: “Venite
omnes qui stomacho laboretis, et ego restaurabo vos.” This was taken
up, gallicized, and passed into common parlance. Hence our modern use
of the term, which, after all, is only a hundred and fifty years old.
In rereading an old book by the never-to-be-forgotten Guy de Maupassant
I came across a delightful passage which so aptly describes the
feelings of a true gourmet that I am tempted to transcribe it here for
the benefit of all who belong to that noble fraternity. “To be wanting
in the sense of taste is to have a stupid mouth, just as one may have
a stupid mind. A man who cannot distinguish between a langouste and a
lobster, between a herring--that admirable fish that carries within it
all the savours and aromas of the sea--and a mackerel or a whiting, is
comparable only to a man who could confound Balzac with Eugène Sue,
and a symphony by Beethoven with a military march composed by some
regimental bandmaster.”
This delicacy of taste was obviously denied to Mr. G. Bernard Shaw’s
Uncle James in “Man and Superman,” of whom it is written:--
“Uncle James had a first-rate cook; he couldn’t digest anything except
what she cooked. Well, the poor man was shy and hated society. But his
cook was proud of her skill, and wanted to serve up dinners to princes
and ambassadors. To prevent her from leaving him, that poor old man had
to give a big dinner twice a month, and suffer agonies of awkwardness.”
Another writer of to-day, of quite peculiar charm and knowledge, Mr. E.
H. Cooper, in his novel “A Fool’s Year,” has a delightful description
of a modern London dinner-party, of the sort too often met with in the
houses of those who ought to know so much better.
“Mr. Hopper’s dinner was a thing to be remembered rather than eaten.
‘The things ought to be put into a museum of curiosities,’ said St.
Ives, looking round him wearily; ‘not on a decent English dinner-table.
I’ve had some turtle-soup and a bit of tongue smothered in jam, and now
I’m hungry. Would there be a row if I sent for some bread and cheese?
Strawberries as big as peaches, and peaches as big as young footballs,
may be very remarkable to look at, but I’m not going to eat them. That
waiter looks kind; I’m going to ask him to bring me a piece of Stilton
hidden between two biscuits. Don’t give me away, Lady Merton. I’ll do
you a good turn when I find you starving at a banquet of this kind. But
you know better than to come to one without eating a couple of muffins
and half a pound of plum-cake first.’”
The clamour as to the inefficiency of the typical “plain cook” is
incessant and fully justified. The remedies suggested are usually
futile or inexpedient. Nothing is more difficult than to get a simple
meal well cooked. Nothing is more easy, in London at any rate, than to
get a misdescribed semi-French dinner evilly cooked. Is there no way
out of this quandary? Yes. It consists in the training and apprenticing
of British-born boys to the profession of cookery.
For many years past all the leading men-cooks in clubs, restaurants,
and large private establishments have been, practically without
exception, foreigners, whether French, Swiss, or Italian.
In Braithwaite’s “Rules and Orders for the Government of the House of
an Earl,” published in the seventeenth century, the author writes: “In
ancient times noblemen contented themselves to be served with such as
had been bred in their own houses, but of late times none could please
some but Italians and Frenchmen.”
It is much the same in our own day. The profession of cookery among
Britons has died out, and, as a result, we are fed, outside our own
homes, by scores of intelligent, well-educated, practised foreign
cooks, who do their work, for the most part, excellently, but who could
be replaced in time by the genuine home-trained article.
Although France, and particularly the Midi, has produced the greatest
cooks, there is no reason why England should lag behind. It is certain
that many purely insular dishes, such as Irish stew, roast beef and
Yorkshire pudding, tripe and onions, and such-like, can never be
properly cooked by foreigners. They have not the tradition, and are too
anxious to impart their own personal touch to the dish.
It is quite true that a really great chef is as rare as a really
great poet or a really great general. But there is a lesser grade
of thoroughly competent chef who may most certainly be evolved from
the well-educated middle-class boy of to-day. The efforts of the Food
and Cookery Association of London towards this end should be actively
supported by all those who are interested in the nationalization of the
kitchen and the reform of our digestion.
[Illustration]
[Illustration: CHAPTER X
LENTEN FARE
_Festina lente_]
The most strenuous Lenten faster on record was, I venture to think, St.
Macarius, who was annually in the habit of passing forty days and forty
nights in a standing position with no more substantial support than a
few raw cabbage-leaves on each recurring Sunday.
Simeon Stylites was even more abstemious, for he ate nothing from the
beginning to the end of Lent, passing his time in praying and bowing
from his columnar elevation. An admiring monk has placed it upon record
that, possibly by way of assuaging the pangs of hunger, Simeon made on
one day twelve hundred and forty-four separate and distinct bows.
It is doubtless an excellent thing to have the strength of mind and
body to be able to act up to one’s convictions. We should find it
difficult to realize the idea of a Bishop of London never breaking his
fast till the evening, and then being satisfied with a solitary egg,
an inch of bread, and a cup of milk and water; such, however, was the
daily Lenten fare of St. Cedd, a predecessor of Dr. Winnington Ingram
in the Metropolitan diocese.
It is told of St. Francis of Assisi that he ate nothing dressed by
fire, unless he were very ill, and even then he caused it to be covered
with ashes, or dipped into cold water. His common daily food was dry
bread strewn with ashes, but--the historian adds--he did not condemn
his followers to the rigorous diet which he himself observed. “Brother
Ass,” as he familiarly called that self, was, in his own opinion,
worthy of no better fare.