Literary Feast  ·  Read the passage. Cook the meal.
A bill of fare

A Love Story

by William Harvey Christie

A LOVE STORYWILLIAM HARVEY CHRISTIE
Our binding, not the publisher's

“Of the fish, the soles were à la Rowena, the salmon à l'amour. Emily flirted with the wing of a chicken sauté au suprême, coquetted with perdrix perdu masqué à la Montmorenci, and tasted a boudin à la Diebitsch. The wines were excellent--the Geisenheim delicious--the Champagne sparkling like a pun of Jekyll's. But nothing aroused the attention of the Viscount Chambéry so much as a liqueur, which Mr. Græme assured him was new, and had just been sent him by the Conte de Desir. The dessert had been some time on the table, when the Viscount addressed his host.”

From a cookbook of 1896

A cook of roughly the same moment, setting down the same dish.

1896  ·  Farmer
Chicken Soup with Wine

3 lb. fowl 2 quarts cold water 2 slices carrot 1 tablespoon salt ½ teaspoon peppercorns 1 onion, sliced 2 stalks celery Bit of bay leaf 2 tablespoons Sauterne wine 1 teaspoon beef extract 1 cup cream Salt Pepper Wipe and cut up fowl. Cover with water, and add carrot, salt, peppercorns, onion, celery, and bay leaf. Bring quickly to boiling-point, then let simmer until meat is tender. Remove meat and strain stock. Chill, remove fat, reheat, and add wine, beef extract, and cream. Season with salt and pepper.

Sources: The passage is from William Harvey Christie, A Love Story, free to read in full at Project Gutenberg. The recipe is from Farmer, The Boston cooking-school cook book of 1896, also free in full. Both are in the public domain in the United States. The binding above is ours — ochre cloth, grapes stamp.

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