Evening star. [volume] (Washington, D.C.) 1854-1972, 1888-12-31
ON BILLS OF FARE.
Bad French Bound to Go-Just Little
Good French VIII Be Tolerated.

From the New York Sun.
Landlord w. d. Garrison, Of the Grand
Union hotel, is the champion of reform that
will be highly appreciated by all patrons of
restaurants. 1t is proposed. first to make the
French on bills Of fare dramatically and or
Geographically correct, and, second, to Danish
it as much as possible. He has an idea that
the native American would like to know what
he is going to eat when he points to the things
on the bill Of fare that he win hazard, for it 10
not everybody who dares attempt the pronun-
citation Of even 30 simple phrase as s'Filet de
beuf a la jardienere," and it is not every sec
ond man who can tell from it whether he will
get fish, flesh, or vegetables. Those who un-
derstand French, on the other hand, are fire.
quently amused at the expense of the hotel
keeper by ludicrous mistakes in spelling on
the bills.
''we don't want to be the laughing stock Of
the public any longer" said Mr.. Garrison, yes
terday. "Our cooks seem to have q passion
for twisting all names of dishes into more or
less bad French. and it is generally worse after
1t passes the printer. The bill of fare, politely
called a menu, is made out by the chef and the
steward. A messenger from the printer brings
in the bills for to-morrow's dinner this even
ing, and at the same time takes away the copy
for the day after. The soups and entrees are
changed daily, but almost all of the other
dishes stand from week to week. There are on
an average perhaps fifteen changes every day.
The cook writes out the alterations, and we are
in great luck If they appear correctly printed
on the following day. There are very few job
houses where any Of the workmen understand
French, and I imagine that such work as bills
of fare is given to apprentices. Formerly the
house of Borden & Kane had nearly all the
hotel work in the city, and at that time there
were few if any errors; but since that firm dis
solved the work has been divided among q
good many concerns"
"What kind of errors are most annoying?"
"Oh, little ones that make the bill look like
the work OF an ignoramus, as, for instance, far
dimere' for .jardiniere,' potatoes croquettes'
for potato croquettes; 'an' for 'au.' in such
phrases as 'au win blanc and the like. Per-
haps the most frequent and irritating error is
the use OF the plural noun in names of sauces,
as "a la Rothschllds' But then the whole termi-
nology of the American kitchen is confused
and imperfect. Why, at a dozen different ho-
tells you may eat the same dish under as many
different names. We want to attain uniformity
in this matter. For that purpose, and some
other kindred ones, about thirty hotels have
entered into printing organization, and we
purpose to use plain English terms wherever
possible. French cannot be discarded alto
gether, because there are many things, like
meat sauces, that have distinctly French
names that could not be translated. The lite
IdturS Vi the culslue IN TRANCE lb sOmetnlnS
tremendous, and valuable, too. Every chef
has his library, and some of them whom
know have collections of books that will vie
in numbers and value with the best private
libraries of scholars These books are authority
on terms, and the sauce once invented must be
known by its original name in order to be
known at all. Now, a la Rothschild doesn't
convey any meaning to you unless you are a
learned cook, but to the chef it CONVEYS as
distinct an idea as does H . to the chemist, or
stalactites to the geologist. There are great
many phrases, therefore, that must be retained.
but there is no use in spelling beef 'beuf,' or
potatoes .pommes de terre. That suggests
another absurdity of our present bills. Here,
for instance, on the bill of my own hotel where
We have tried to introduce English, find this:
Fresh salmon a la Hollandsise, Parisienne
potatoes Why 'Parisienne,' which is a
French adjective, in front of potatoes" which
is English3 Simple Partisan would be better
every way.
But our printing association will remedy
these things. The Hoffman house has long
done its own printing and has therefore had
things right. We have that hotel in the asso-
citation, and we shall utilize its plant and en-
plOy the cOmpetent men now Qed there -