THE EAST ROOM (CRITERION, PICCADILLY CIRCUS)
"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 night
it 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 a thin 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, a _consommé 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 Alliance_ we settled on at once, and then came the difficulty
of the _entrée_. 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 building with 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
Brighteyes to 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 the _délices de sole_, I was told why
Miss Brighteyes preferred Princes' to Niagara as a skating-rink, or
_vice versa_, I forget which.
With the _suprême de volaille_ I was given a short account of a party
at the Bachelors' Club to see a magic-lantern entertainment, and when
the _cailles à la Sainte Alliance_ were 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 earthen _terrine_.
Into the interior of a little ortolan M. Gastaud himself, the _chef
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 de volaille 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 to _sauce Arcadienne_ and _sauce
Marguérite_."
29_th 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 the _recette_ of the _croûtes à la Caume_,
and as he said "certainly," and seemed pleased to do it, I put in a
request for the _recette_ of the _filets 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.
_Suprêmes de soles aux délices_
_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
arrange them on an oval dish. Boil down the liquor rapidly, with a
little good _velouté_ sauce 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.
_Croûtes à la Caume_
_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._
[Illustration]
You prepare your pieces of bread, or brioche, in slices about half an
inch in thickness, and bake (or toast) them lightly in the oven, after
having sprinkled them with sugar. Arrange them in the form of a crown
upon a round dish, placing them in the middle, but with some pieces of
pineapple in the centre. Take some bananas, not too ripe, but perfectly
sound and good, throw them into cold water with their skins on, and let
them boil. After boiling for two minutes the bananas will be done. Take
them out of the water, peel them, and arrange them on the dish, round
the croûtons. Sprinkle the pineapple and the bananas with apricot sauce
flavoured with kirsch, and serve very hot, after having ornamented the
dish with preserved fruits.