The Book of Household Management Part 222

_Mode_.--Place a very thin piece of cold toast between 2 slices of thin bread-and-b.u.t.ter in the form of a sandwich, adding a seasoning of pepper and salt. This sandwich may be varied by adding a little pulled meat, or very fine slices of cold meat, to the toast, and in any of these forms will be found very tempting to the appet.i.te of an invalid.

1878. Besides the recipes contained in this chapter, there are, in the previous chapters on cookery, many others suitable for invalids, which it would be useless to repeat here. Recipes for fish simply dressed, light soups, plain roast meat, well-dressed vegetables, poultry, simple puddings, jelly, stewed fruits, &c. &c., all of which dishes may be partaken of by invalids and convalescents, will be found in preceding chapters.

DINNERS AND DINING.

CHAPTER XL.

1879. Man, it has been said, is a dining animal. Creatures of the inferior races eat and drink; man only dines. It has also been said that he is a cooking animal; but some races eat food without cooking it. A Croat captain said to M. Brillat Savarin, "When, in campaign, we feel hungry, we knock over the first animal we find, cut off a steak, powder it with salt, put it under the saddle, gallop over it for half a mile, and then eat it." Huntsmen in Dauphiny, when out shooting, have been known to kill a bird, pluck it, salt and pepper it, and cook it by carrying it some time in their caps. It is equally true that some races of men do not dine any more than the tiger or the vulture. It is not a _dinner_ at which sits the aboriginal Australian, who gnaws his bone half bare and then flings it behind to his squaw. And the native of Terra-del-Fuego does not dine when he gets his morsel of red clay.

Dining is the privilege of civilization. The rank which a people occupy in the grand scale may be measured by their way of taking their meals, as well as by their way of treating their women. The nation which knows how to dine has learnt the leading lesson of progress. It implies both the will and the skill to reduce to order, and surround with idealisms and graces, the more material conditions of human existence; and wherever that will and that skill exist, life cannot be wholly ign.o.ble.

1880. Dinner, being the grand solid meal of the day, is a matter of considerable importance; and a well-served table is a striking index of human, ingenuity and resource. "Their table," says Lord Byron, in describing a dinner-party given by Lord and Lady Amundevillo at Norman Abbey,--

"Their table was a board to tempt even ghosts To pa.s.s the Styx for more substantial feasts.

I will not dwell upon ragouts or roasts, Albeit all human history attests That happiness for man--the hungry sinner!-- Since Eve ate apples, much depends on dinner."

And then he goes on to observe upon the curious complexity of the results produced by human cleverness and application catering for the modifications which occur in civilized life, one of the simplest of the primal instincts:--

"The mind is lost in mighty contemplation Of intellect expended on two courses; And indigestion's grand multiplication Requires arithmetic beyond my forces.

Who would suppose, from Adam's simple ration, That cookery could have call'd forth such resources, As form a science and a nomenclature From out the commonest demands of nature?"

And we may well say, Who, indeed, would suppose it? The gulf between the Croat, with a steak under his saddle, and Alexis Soyer getting up a great dinner at the Reform-Club, or even Thackeray's Mrs. Raymond Gray giving "a little dinner" to Mr. Sn.o.b (with one of those famous "roly-poly puddings" of hers),--what a gulf it is!

1881. That Adam's "ration," however, was "simple," is a matter on which we have contrary judgments given by the poets. When Raphael paid that memorable visit to Paradise,--which we are expressly told by Milton he did exactly at dinner-time,--Eve seems to have prepared "a little dinner" not wholly dest.i.tute of complexity, and to have added ice-creams and perfumes. Nothing can be clearer than the testimony of the poet on these points:--

"And Eve within, due at her home prepared For dinner savoury fruits, of taste to please True appet.i.te, and not disrelish thirst Of nectarous draughts between....

.... With dispatchful looks in haste She turns, on hospitable thoughts intent, What choice to choose for delicacy best, What order so contrived as not to mix Tastes not well join'd, inelegant, but bring Taste after taste, upheld with kindliest change-- * * * * *

"She _tempers dulcet creams_....

.... _then strews the ground With rose and odours._"

It may be observed, in pa.s.sing, that the poets, though they have more to say about wine than solid food, because the former more directly stimulates the intellect and the feelings, do not flinch from the subject of eating and drinking. There is infinite zest in the above pa.s.sage from Milton, and even more in the famous description of a dainty supper, given by Keats in his "Eve of Saint Agnes." Could Queen Mab herself desire to sit down to anything nicer, both as to its appointments and serving, and as to its quality, than the collation served by Porphyro in the lady's bedroom while she slept?--

"There by the bedside, where the faded moon Made a dim silver twilight, soft he set A table, and, half-anguish'd, threw thereor A cloth of woven crimson, gold, and jet.

"While he, from forth the closet, brought a heap Of candied apple, quince, and plum, and gourd; With jellies smoother than the creamy curd, And lucent syrups tinct with cinnamon; Manna and dates, in argosy transferr'd From Fez; and spiced dainties, every one, From silken Samarcand to cedar'd Lebanon."

But Tennyson has ventured beyond dates, and quinces, and syrups, which may be thought easy to be brought in by a poet. In his idyl of "Audley Court" he gives a most appetizing description of a pasty at a pic-nic:--

"There, on a slope of orchard, Francis laid A damask napkin wrought with horse and hound; Brought out a dusky loaf that smelt of home, And, half cut down, a pasty costly made, Where quail and pigeon, lark and leveret, lay Like fossils of the rock, with golden yolks Imbedded and injellied."

We gladly quote pa.s.sages like these, to show how eating and drinking may be surrounded with poetical a.s.sociations, and how man, using his privilege to turn any and every repast into a "feast of reason," with a warm and plentiful "flow of soul," may really count it as not the least of his legitimate prides, that he is "a dining animal."

1882. It has been said, indeed, that great men, in general, are great diners. This, however, can scarcely be true of any great men but men of action; and, in that case, it would simply imply that persons of vigorous const.i.tution, who work hard, eat heartily; for, of course, a life of action _requires_ a vigorous const.i.tution, even though there may be much illness, as in such cases as William III. and our brave General Napier. Of men of thought, it can scarcely be true that they eat so much, in a general way, though even they eat more than they are apt to suppose they do; for, as Mr. Lewes observes, "nerve-tissue is very expensive." Leaving great men of all kinds, however, to get their own dinners, let us, who are not great, look after ours. Dine we must, and we may as well dine elegantly as well as wholesomely.

1883. There are plenty of elegant dinners in modern days, and they were not wanting in ancient times. It is well known that the dinner-party, or symposium, was a not unimportant, and not unpoetical, feature in the life of the sociable, talkative, tasteful Greek. Douglas Jerrold said that such is the British humour for dining and giving of dinners, that if London were to be destroyed by an earthquake, the Londoners would meet at a public dinner to consider the subject. The Greeks, too, were great diners: their social and religious polity gave them many chances of being merry and making others merry on good eating and drinking. Any public or even domestic sacrifice to one of the G.o.ds, was sure to be followed by a dinner-party, the remains of the slaughtered "offering"

being served up on the occasion as a pious _piece de resistance;_ and as the different G.o.ds, G.o.ddesses, and demiG.o.ds, worshipped by the community in general, or by individuals, were very numerous indeed, and some very religious people never let a day pa.s.s without offering up something or other, the dinner-parties were countless. A birthday, too, was an excuse for a dinner; a birthday, that is, of any person long dead and buried, as well as of a living person, being a member of the family, or otherwise esteemed. Dinners were, of course, eaten on all occasions of public rejoicing. Then, among the young people, subscription dinners, very much after the manner of modern times, were always being got up; only that they would be eaten not at an hotel, but probably at the house of one of the _heterae_. A Greek dinner-party was a handsome, well-regulated affair. The guests came in elegantly dressed and crowned with flowers. A slave, approaching each person as he entered, took off his sandals and washed his feet. During the repast, the guests reclined on couches with pillows, among and along which were set small tables.

After the solid meal came the "symposium" proper, a scene of music, merriment, and dancing, the two latter being supplied chiefly by young girls. There was a chairman, or symposiarch, appointed by the company to regulate the drinking; and it was his duty to mix the wine in the "mighty bowl." From this bowl the attendants ladled the liquor into goblets, and, with the goblets, went round and round the tables, filling the cups of the guests.

1884. The elegance with which a dinner is served is a matter which depends, of course, partly upon the means, but still more upon the taste of the master and mistress of the house. It may be observed, in general, that there should always be flowers on the table, and as they form no item of expense, there is no reason why they should not be employed every day.

1885. The variety in the dishes which furnish forth a modern dinner-table, does not necessarily imply anything unwholesome, or anything capricious. Food that is not well relished cannot be well digested; and the appet.i.te of the over-worked man of business, or statesman, or of any dweller in towns, whose occupations are exciting and exhausting, is jaded, and requires stimulation. Men and women who are in rude health, and who have plenty of air and exercise, eat the simplest food with relish, and consequently digest it well; but those conditions are out of the reach of many men. They must suit their mode of dining to their mode of living, if they cannot choose the latter. It is in serving up food that is at once appetizing and wholesome that the skill of the modern housewife is severely tasked; and she has scarcely a more important duty to fulfil. It is, in fact, her particular vocation, in virtue of which she may be said to hold the health of the family, and of the friends of the family, in her hands from day to day. It has been said that "the destiny of nations depends on the manner in which they are fed;" and a great gastronomist exclaims, "Tell me what kind of food you eat, and I will tell you what kind of man you are." The same writer has some sentences of the same kind, which are rather hyperbolical, but worth quoting:--"The pleasures of the table belong to all ages, to all conditions, to all countries, and to all eras; they mingle with all other pleasures, and remain, at last, to console us for their departure.

The discovery of a new dish confers more happiness upon humanity than the discovery of a new star."

1886. The gastronomist from whom we have already quoted, has some aphorisms and short directions in relation to dinner-parties, which are well deserving of notice:--"Let the number of your guests never exceed twelve, so that the conversation may be general. [Footnote: We have seen this varied by saying that the number should never exceed that of the Muses or fall below that of the Graces.] Let the temperature of the dining-room be about 68. Let the dishes be few in number in the first course, but proportionally good. The order of food is from the most substantial to the lightest. The order of drinking wine is from the mildest to the most foamy and most perfumed. To invite a person to your house is to take charge of his happiness so long as he is beneath your roof. The mistress of the house should always be certain that the coffee be excellent; whilst the master should be answerable for the quality of his wines and liqueurs."

BILLS OF FARE.

JANUARY.

1887.--DINNER FOR 18 PERSONS.

_First Course._

Mock Turtle Soup, removed by Cod's Head and Shoulders.

Stewed Eels. Vase of Red Mullet.

Flowers.

Clear Oxtail Soup, removed by Fried Filleted Soles.

_Entrees._

Riz de Veau aux Tomates.

Ragot of Vase of Cotelettes de Pore Lobster. Flowers. a la Roberts.

Poulet a la Marengo.

_Second Course._

Roast Turkey.

Pigeon Pie.

Boiled Turkey and Vase of Boiled Ham.

Celery Sauce. Flowers.

Tongue, garnished.

Saddle of Mutton.

_Third Course._