Literary Feast  ·  Read the passage. Cook the meal.

Memoirs of the Court of Marie Antoinette, Queen of France, Complete: Being the Historic Memoirs of Madam Campan, First Lady in Waiting to the Queen

by Mme. (Jeanne-Louise-Henriette) Campan

2 meals in this book

MEMOIRS OF THE COURT OF MARIE ANTOINETTE, QUEEN OF FRANCE, COMPLETE: BEINGTHE HISTORIC MEMOIRS OF MADAM CAMPAN, FIRST LADY IN WAITING TO THE QUEENMME. (JEANNE-LOUISE-HENRIETTE) CAMPAN
Our binding, not the publisher's
A bill of fare

“As soon as the Queen rose, the wardrobe woman was admitted to take away the pillows and prepare the bed to be made by some of the valets de chambre. She undrew the curtains, and the bed was not generally made until the Queen was gone to mass. Generally, excepting at St. Cloud, where the Queen bathed in an apartment below her own, a slipper bath was rolled into her room, and her bathers brought everything that was necessary for the bath. The Queen bathed in a large gown of English flannel buttoned down to the bottom; its sleeves throughout, as well as the collar, were lined with linen. When she came out of the bath the first woman held up a cloth to conceal her entirely from the sight of her women, and then threw it over her shoulders. The bathers wrapped her in it and dried her completely. She then put on a long and wide open chemise, entirely trimmed with lace, and afterwards a white taffety bed-gown. The wardrobe woman warmed the bed; the slippers were of dimity, trimmed with lace. Thus dressed, the Queen went to bed again, and the bathers and servants of the chamber took away the bathing apparatus. The Queen, replaced in bed, took a book or her tapestry work. On her bathing mornings she breakfasted in the bath. The tray was placed on the cover of the bath. These minute details are given here only to do justice to the Queen’s scrupulous modesty. Her temperance was equally remarkable; she breakfasted on coffee or chocolate; at dinner ate nothing but white meat, drank water only, and supped on broth, a wing of a fowl, and small biscuits, which she soaked in a glass of water.”

1845  ·  Acton
COFFEE, CHOCOLATE, ETC

Page Coffee 587 To roast Coffee 588 A few general directions for 589 making Coffee Excellent Breakfast Coffee 590 To boil Coffee 591 Café Noir 592 Burnt Coffee, or Coffee _à la 592 militaire_ (In France vulgarly called _Gloria_) To make Chocolate 592 A Spanish recipe for making 592 and serving Chocolate To make Cocoa 593

Recipe from Modern cookery for private families of 1845.

A dish that matters

“That wretch Hebert, the deputy of Chaumette, and editor of the disgusting paper Pere Duchesne, a writer of the party of which Vincent, Ronsin, Varlet, and Leclerc were the leaders--Hebert had made it his particular business to torment the unfortunate remnant of the dethroned family. He asserted that the family of the tyrant ought not to be better treated than any sans-culotte family; and he had caused a resolution to be passed by which the sort of luxury in which the prisoners in the Temple were maintained was to be suppressed. They were no longer to be allowed either poultry or pastry; they were reduced to one sort of aliment for breakfast, and to soup or broth and a single dish for dinner, to two dishes for supper, and half a bottle of wine apiece. Tallow candles were to be furnished instead of wag, pewter instead of silver plate, and delft ware instead of porcelain. The wood and water carriers alone were permitted to enter their room, and that only accompanied by two commissioners. Their food was to be introduced to them by means of a turning box. The numerous establishment was reduced to a cook and an assistant, two men-servants, and a woman-servant to attend to the linen.”

1861  ·  Beeton
SOUP, BROTH AND BOUILLON

91. IT HAS BEEN ASSERTED, that English cookery is, nationally speaking, far from being the best in the world. More than this, we have been frequently told by brilliant foreign writers, half philosophers, half _chefs_, that we are the _worst_ cooks on the face of the earth, and that the proverb which alludes to the divine origin of food, and the precisely opposite origin of its preparers, is peculiarly applicable to us islanders. Not, however, to the inhabitants of the whole island; for, it is stated in a work which treats of culinary operations, north of the Tweed, that the "broth" of Scotland claims, for excellence and wholesomeness, a very close second place to the _bouillon_, or common soup of France. "_Three_ hot meals of broth and meat, for about the price of ONE roasting joint," our Scottish brothers and sisters get, they say; and we hasten to assent to what we think is now a very well-ascertained fact.

Recipe from The Book of Household Management of 1861.

Sources: Every passage above is quoted verbatim from Memoirs of the Court of Marie Antoinette, Queen of France, Complete: Being the Historic Memoirs of Madam Campan, First Lady in Waiting to the Queen, free to read in full at Project Gutenberg. The recipes come from cookbooks of the period, also free in full. All are in the public domain in the United States. The binding is ours — oxblood cloth, teapot stamp.

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