A Brief History of Life in Victorian Britain by Michael Paterson Page A
Authors: Michael Paterson
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house in London, gives some indication of how many courses there were and what they comprised:
87 Eaton Place, Diner, du 30 mars, 1878
Potages
Consommé à la Doria
Crème d’Asperges Faubonne
Poissons
Suprème de Saumon Richelieu
Turbot sauce Crevette
Entrées
Cotelettes Hasseur aux Pointes
Mousselines à la Princesse
Relèves
Quartier d’Agneau sauce Menthe
Jambon à la Gelée et Mirabelles
Salade assortie
Punch au thé
Rôts
Ramier de Bordeaux
Asperges d’Argenteuil sauce Maltaise
Entremets
St. Honore aux Pistachio
Abricots à l’Almedorine
Corbeilles de Glaces 3
The accompanying of each course with an appropriate wine was an important part of the ritual. A contemporary book described the rules governing this:
Sherry is always drunk after soup, hock either with oysters before the soup or with fish after the soup, and Chablis sometimes takes the place of hock. Champagne is drunk immediately after the first entrée has been served, and so during the remainder of dinner until dessert. Claret, sherry, port, and Madeira are the wines drunk at dessert. 4
These rigid conventions were eminently risible. Thackeray, in his
Book of Snobs
, pokes gentle fun at them:
Everybody has the same dinner in London, and the same soup, saddle of mutton, boiled fowls and tongue, entrees, champagne, and so forth. I own myself to being no better than my neighbours in this respect, and rush off to the pastrycook’s for sweets, &c.; hire sham butlers and attendants, have a fellow going round the table with still and dry champagne, as if I knew his name, and it was my custom to drink those wines every day of my life. I am as bad as my neighbours; but why are we so bad, I ask? – why are we not more reasonable?
If we receive great men or ladies at our houses, I will lay a wager that they will select mutton and gooseberry tart for their dinner; forsaking the entrees which the men in Berlin white gloves are handing round on the Birmingham plated dishes. Asking lords and ladies who have great establishments of their own, to French dinners and delicacies, is like inviting a grocer to a meal of figs, or a pastrycook to a banquet of raspberry tarts. They have had enough of them. And great folks, if they can, take no count of your feasts, and grand preparations, and can but eat mutton like men. 5
Herbs and Spices
Something very familiar to us appeared at Victorian tables, and that was curry. The British connection with India dated back more than two hundred years to the founding of the East India Company, and many thousands of families had members or acquaintances who had been to the sub-continent. They brought back with them some of the eating habits they had acquired, and one was the use of spicy powder to sharpen the taste of meat or vegetables. As with so many imported foods (‘chop suey’ is another example), the ‘curry’ consumed in Britain would not have been recognized in its place of origin. The term itself is thought to have been a corruption of the Tamil word
karbi
, meaning sauce, and it came to be a general term for any Indian food that was prepared with sauces. Curry powder – a blending of more or less whatever spices were available in an Indian kitchen – was a British invention, and is likely to have horrified Indian cooks. Curries had been an accepted part of the national diet in the eighteenth century, and by the 1860s commercially produced powder, as well as curry paste, was widely available in the shops. A New York chef described how the powder should be made:
One ounce of coriander seeds, two ounces of cayenne, a quarter ounce of cardoman seeds, one ounce salt, two ounces of turmeric, one ounce ginger, half an ounce of mace and a third of an ounce of saffron. 6
And Mrs Beeton advised on how to prepare the dish:
Put all the ingredients in a cool oven, where they should remain one night; then pound them in a mortar, rub them through a sieve, and mix thoroughly together; keep the powder in a
87 Eaton Place, Diner, du 30 mars, 1878
Potages
Consommé à la Doria
Crème d’Asperges Faubonne
Poissons
Suprème de Saumon Richelieu
Turbot sauce Crevette
Entrées
Cotelettes Hasseur aux Pointes
Mousselines à la Princesse
Relèves
Quartier d’Agneau sauce Menthe
Jambon à la Gelée et Mirabelles
Salade assortie
Punch au thé
Rôts
Ramier de Bordeaux
Asperges d’Argenteuil sauce Maltaise
Entremets
St. Honore aux Pistachio
Abricots à l’Almedorine
Corbeilles de Glaces 3
The accompanying of each course with an appropriate wine was an important part of the ritual. A contemporary book described the rules governing this:
Sherry is always drunk after soup, hock either with oysters before the soup or with fish after the soup, and Chablis sometimes takes the place of hock. Champagne is drunk immediately after the first entrée has been served, and so during the remainder of dinner until dessert. Claret, sherry, port, and Madeira are the wines drunk at dessert. 4
These rigid conventions were eminently risible. Thackeray, in his
Book of Snobs
, pokes gentle fun at them:
Everybody has the same dinner in London, and the same soup, saddle of mutton, boiled fowls and tongue, entrees, champagne, and so forth. I own myself to being no better than my neighbours in this respect, and rush off to the pastrycook’s for sweets, &c.; hire sham butlers and attendants, have a fellow going round the table with still and dry champagne, as if I knew his name, and it was my custom to drink those wines every day of my life. I am as bad as my neighbours; but why are we so bad, I ask? – why are we not more reasonable?
If we receive great men or ladies at our houses, I will lay a wager that they will select mutton and gooseberry tart for their dinner; forsaking the entrees which the men in Berlin white gloves are handing round on the Birmingham plated dishes. Asking lords and ladies who have great establishments of their own, to French dinners and delicacies, is like inviting a grocer to a meal of figs, or a pastrycook to a banquet of raspberry tarts. They have had enough of them. And great folks, if they can, take no count of your feasts, and grand preparations, and can but eat mutton like men. 5
Herbs and Spices
Something very familiar to us appeared at Victorian tables, and that was curry. The British connection with India dated back more than two hundred years to the founding of the East India Company, and many thousands of families had members or acquaintances who had been to the sub-continent. They brought back with them some of the eating habits they had acquired, and one was the use of spicy powder to sharpen the taste of meat or vegetables. As with so many imported foods (‘chop suey’ is another example), the ‘curry’ consumed in Britain would not have been recognized in its place of origin. The term itself is thought to have been a corruption of the Tamil word
karbi
, meaning sauce, and it came to be a general term for any Indian food that was prepared with sauces. Curry powder – a blending of more or less whatever spices were available in an Indian kitchen – was a British invention, and is likely to have horrified Indian cooks. Curries had been an accepted part of the national diet in the eighteenth century, and by the 1860s commercially produced powder, as well as curry paste, was widely available in the shops. A New York chef described how the powder should be made:
One ounce of coriander seeds, two ounces of cayenne, a quarter ounce of cardoman seeds, one ounce salt, two ounces of turmeric, one ounce ginger, half an ounce of mace and a third of an ounce of saffron. 6
And Mrs Beeton advised on how to prepare the dish:
Put all the ingredients in a cool oven, where they should remain one night; then pound them in a mortar, rub them through a sieve, and mix thoroughly together; keep the powder in a
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