Evening star., 1901-11-16
Cocoa.
DINNER.
Vegetable Soup,
Brown Stew of Beef, Dumplings,
Buttered Carrots, Cold Slaw,
Fruit Cake,
CURIOUS ENGLISH MENUS.


Pompeiian Apples and Butter Made I'm
the Reign of Queen Elizabeth.
From London Answers.
There has been no more eccentric banquet
served than that partaken of in Liverpool
recently by couple of well-known anti
quaries.
Practically, the dinner was vegetarian
one, consisting, it did, of apples, bread,
butter and wine. The apples were at least
1.S00 years old, having been taken from a
Theoretically sealed jar unearthed Mt Pom
peii The bread was made from wheat
looted from recently opened Egyptian
tomb, the hieroglyphics thereon showing it
to have been grown in the reign of that
Pharaoh who knew not Joseph, and who
afterward perished, together with his
armies, in the Red sea. The butter, dis
covered on a stone shelf in an ancient and
long disused well. dated from the days of
Good Queen BeSS,' while the wine was
old when Columbus boy, and came
from vault in Corinth.
Dinners of sauces have been not infre-
quentfy tried by epicures craving for new
gastronomic sensations One of the most
famous was given some few years back by
an eccentric member of a well-known West
End club. The soup was represented by
gravy sauce; and, in lieu of fish, oyster
and lobster sauces were handed round.
Egg sauce did duty for a joint, and bread
sauce recalled the memory of pheasant;
while the absent plum pudding was sug-
gested by brandy sauce.
Flower breakfasts threatened to become
a society fad the season before last. 7 he
viands at these unique repasts were en-
tirely composed of flowers, and infinite was
the ingenuity expended in devising new and
appetizing dishes Salad made from tie
snowy, warm-tasting blossoms of the naS-
turtium, alternated with caper Jelly ard
myrtle-f1ower soup. Usually the flowers CT
a particular species of pumpkin vine con-
stituted the principal dish. They were yell
low in color. fleshy and about the size of
hve-shflling piece. The edible blooms were
plucked before the petals We're fully ex-
panded, baked or stewed in fresh milk, and
favored with cloves, which latter, every
one knows, are merely the unexpanded
flowers OF an evergreen plant from the In
dian archipelago. The feast was finished
off with plentiful supply of candied rose
leaves, yiolets etc.
OF strange gastronomic fads of Individual
eccentrics there is literally no end.
A member of an adjoining establishment
invariably orders a whole chicken. pheas-
ant and turkey for his lunch in order that
he may pick out the tit-bits. A Piccadilly
hotel boasts of a regular client who orders
pea soup for dinner every day throughout
the year, winter and summer alike. In a
restaurant in the same neighborhood is a
corner reserved for an elderly gentleman
whose name, although he has dined there
regularly every evening for years, nobody
seems to know. He exhibits both taste
and originality in the ordering of his meaf
until he reaches the dessert stage. For
| this he insists, regardless of season or Of
cost, upon having six pearS-none OF which
he ever eats
Death dinners, as they were called were
a gruesome fad of London society early in
the sos. There is still living a certain lady
OF high rank who, not so very long ago.
used annually to give one of these somber
banquets in memory of her dead husband
The room was draped in black and mauve,
the linen was mauve, the ladies wore
dresses to match while 10
attired in black silk knee breeches, black
coats and mauve silk stockings The menu
was modelled after the memoriam cards in
fashion. and even the viands were either
black, mauye or white
An alphabetical dinner was given only
the other day at one of the best known
Strand hotels: Every item ON the menu
began with the letter c. Banquets at
which the guests reclined on couches and
fed themselves with their fingers, as did
the fashionab bies of Augustan Rome con-
stituted another society fad that was ex-
ceedlngly popular for awhile. OF course
the menus for these queer dinners had to
be so contrived to permit of the guests
feeding themselves with the minimum of
discomfort and grease. Among the items
comprised in a bill of fare that lies before
me as write are boullon in cups aspara-
gus, fried smelts, lamb chops en- papillote
Woodcock and cheese straws
The most eccentric diner the world has
ever seen was certain regular customer
OF a famous Partisan restaurant known to
the walters as the butter man." He ate
next to nothing, but his soup toureen, filled
with a consomme specially prepared for
h1rn. was always put before him. He took
few spoonfuls and had it taken AWAY.
Next came whole fllet of beef, which he
barely tasted The next course consisted of
fine fat capon or four quails, but which,
ever 1t was he consumed of it but one
mouthful, together with two lettuce leaves
ana one radish. His dessert consisted OF
four grapes-never single one more~and
tiny cup of black and highly concentrated
coffee A bottle of the best claret and an
other of champagne were invariably served
with the repast, but he only wetted his lips
with drop from each and let them 20.
He took two of these meals day, and the
price for each meal was I2O francs. But
this was not all. Every time the butter
man got up from his extraordinary meal
ne gave 40 francs to the head waiter, 70
francs to his table waiter, 10 francs to the
lady cashier and francs to the porter.
Ihus each meal came to 200 francs. or fS
sterling! One day the mysterious million
aire doubled his tips all around: the next
day he went away and was never seen
again.
-