FoodNet

Breakfasts, luncheons, and ball suppers

1887

Page 11

Presented as published in 1887. Historical recipes may not meet modern food-safety standards. Cook from the modern interpretation, not the original instructions.
Rolls ; Bread cut up ; Biscuits ; D’Artois ; Savarins ; Plum Pudding; Pound, Gingerbread, and Plum Cakes; a Bunch of Grapes, and just one bottle of good old Brown Sherry or Madeira to wash down the cake, make this sort of Luncheon quite good enough even for an epicure. E 2 CHAPTER VII. TRAVELLING LUNCHEONS. A FEW words on the subject of Travelling Luncheons the Author thinks may be acceptable. In the winter travel- ling is hungry work, and if a long journey has to be taken it is rather difficult to know how long it may last, how long one may be snowed up in a drift, or how long delayed by a break-down' of the locomotive ; and to add to other inconveniences it is worse than a nuisance to be starved. In the summer the dust and heat make one thirsty, hot, and uncomfortable. A good lunch and a glass of good champagne assist to while away the tediousness of the journey, oil the wheels of life, and improve the temper. Luncheons at the railway stations are greatly im- proved, but necessarily it depends on the consumption whether the sandwiches are freshly cut, the chicken freshly roasted, and in summer both are liable to be sprinkled with dust, a sauce which, so far as the Author is a judge, im- proves neither the taste nor digestion, so he stro7igly advises every one who prefers a nice clean luncheon to take their own. Luncheon baskets, as a rule, he considers badly designed; a large tin case with no divisions, one or two large bottles, which take up nearly all the -room, and assist in spoiling wine if decanted into them, three or four tumblers, and there you are — no room for what is really requisite ; so he is conceited enough to think that a basket TRAVELLING LUNCHEONS. 51 that he has designed, with the assistance of Messrs. Farrow & Jackson, is a great improvement on any he lias seen. It contains a dish in which a pie can be baked, a tin case with a division, in which cold poultry, game, or meat can be taken, on one side, and bread, cake, plum pudding, or pastry on the other ; it is designed to hold two pint bottles, one for champagne or claret (those of Messrs. Barton & Co., the well-known wine-merchants of 59, St. James^ Street, S.W., we strongly recommend), the other for sherry or Salutaris water. Instead of two tumblers and two small glasses, which take up much room, it is fitted with two large and two small cups of transparent horn, fitting one inside the other, and taking up the room of one tumbler only; they are exceedingly light, clean, and nice. It is, of course, fitted with pepper, salt, and mustard, knives, forks, two plates, and a portable table is fastened outside, which he considers is a great ad- vantage, in fact an absolute necessity for comfort. He gives a list of things which he considers adapted for Travelling Luncheons, and for which receipts are given : Pies — Beefsteak. Chicken. Grouse. Pheasant. Partridge. Veal and Ham. Meats — Cold Beef. „ Stewed Beef „ Ham. „ Tongue. „ Lamb Cutlets in Aspic. Slices of Galantines. „ Ballotines. Poultry and Game — Filets of Chicken. „ Grouse. „ Pheasant. „ Partridge, ,, Galena. Sweets — Plum Pudding. D’Artois. Puffs. Mince Pies. Cakes of all sorts. Lemon Biscuits. CHAPTER VIII. SHOOTING LUNCHEONS,