Food and Fine Dining

Quality and Taste, Not Quantity and Cost, ensure the most charming effect in table decoration

Quality and Taste, Not Quantity and Cost, ensure the most charming effect in table decoration. (Easy French Cookery 1910)

A superb selection of delightful articles on historical foods, dining, etiquite, and the menus, events and social gatherings around food on special occasions.

Artistic Cookery - Introduction - 1870

Artistic Cookery - Introduction - 1870

Formerly, the science of good living, the research after delicate viands, were the privileges of the few; nowadays epicures may be counted by legions.

 

Artistic Cookery - Hot Hors D'œuvres - 1870

Hot hors-d'oeuvre are any light dishes served at dinner, immediately after the soup or fish. Dry 'hors-d'oeuvre', such as: fries, 'croustades', cases, 'croquettes', and patties, are generally dished up on a folded napkin, placed on a dish.

 

Still Hanging On. St. Louis Globe-Democrat, August 17, 1903.

The Baking Powder Controversy - 1907

The baking powder industry was thriving. The company Royal Baking Powder capitalized on the traditional cream of tartar while Calumet and Clabber Girl aimed to be more modern by using alum, which was cheaper and much stronger than other baking powder acids. However, in 1899, Royal managed to bribe the Missouri legislature to pass a law banning the sale of all alum baking powders in the state.

 

Dinner Service-American Style-And Bill of Eare

Bill of Fare - Dinner Menu - 1916

Should the menu be intended for dinner including ladies, it must be composed of light, fancy dishes with a pretty dessert; if, on the contrary, it is intended for gentlemen only, then it must be shorter and more substantial.

 

Maillard’s Kitchen – Floored with Cement; The Walls of Brick Painted White

Club and Hotel Kitchens in New York - 1906

In New York City, with hotels such as the Waldorf, the Manhattan, the St. Regis, and the Astor, the case is different, while Sherry and Delmonico have developed their restaurants to perfection which has brought them prestige and corresponding profit.

 

The Difference Between a Glutton and a  Gourmet

Composing and Serving a Dinner - 1915

In the selection and serving of dinner, there is just as much care required as there is in its preparation. It is necessary to know what sort of food is in season, which should always be preferable, particularly in fish, game, and fowl.

 

Breakfast for Children

Concerning Breakfasts: A Brief History and Typical Fare

It is an old American idea that luncheon or supper may be light, dinner varied and heavier, but breakfast must be wholesome and nourishing. This is based on the belief that it is natural for man and beast to wake up in the morning with a desire for food and unnatural to try to do the hardest work of the day with but a pretense at eating.

 

Concerning Kitchen Cutlery - 1921

Concerning Kitchen Cutlery - 1921

As a general thing the man in the family has kept the table carving knife in trim but has paid little attention to the unfortunate kitchen knives, and so they have been used and the housekeeper has '"made them do."

 

Cabin Class Steamship Galley

Culinary Department of an Ocean Liner - 1907

There are first, second and third-class passengers, secondary officers, engineers, stokers, ordinary seamen, stewards, and possibly other classes to be provided for in accordance with their classes and at the different hours assigned. And on board ship, every meal is served exactly to the stroke of the clock.

 

Belle De Graf

Culinary Terms and Methods - 1922

Terminology for cooking has changed little since the 1920s, and Mr. De Graf provides an easy to follow description that can be your recipe for success in the kitchen.

 

A Painting by Danish Artist Peter Severin Krøyer

Danish Family Dinners - 1905

In an article contributed to the 1905 Church Family Newspaper, by A. Skovgaard-Pedersen, on Danish customs, we learn that in Danish family’s dinner is eaten about twelve, and a peculiarity of Danish dinners is that they generally begin with a course of what is called " spoon food."

 

Open Air Salles-a-Manger of French Town and Country Life

Delights of Food Eaten Al Fresco - 1916

The French have no halfway measures; they live either in a sealed-up house or practically au grand air. They sew, gossip, receive their friends and make open-air living-rooms of their gardens from the moment the first buds of spring appear.

 

Luncheonette Department of the Cafe Paulista

Epicurus - The Fine Art of Dining - 1908

Dining is a fine art, of which the mere satisfying of appetite is an important part indeed, but one that is far from being the whole. For dinner, as De Quincey has well observed, is not only the principal meal of the day, and therefore the meal of hospitality, but it also involves “the spirit of festal joy and elegant enjoyment, of anxiety, laid aside, and of honorable social, pleasure put on like a marriage garment.”

 

The Evolution of the Menu - 1906

The Evolution of the Menu - 1906

Professional humor frequently finds in the simple enumeration of the dishes of a meal a good opportunity for the introduction of "shop."   At a judge's dinner given to members of the Bar to meet a distinguished legal luminary, neat miniature briefs, tied with red tape, lay beside each man's plate, endorsed in professional jargon with the visitor's name, "With you the Attorney-General." etc.

 

FRENCH SERVICE (Service à la Française)

French Table Service - 1916

Although recognizing the priority of both services, it will be well to mention the difference existing between them and the English and the American service; first, they differ in the classification of the bills of fare and certain changes in the table service, these alone are enough to be interesting.

 

Fresh Fruit Courses

Fresh Fruit Courses - 1916

The fruit luncheons had been started on a small scale some months ago, and met with so great a success that they led the way to the present opening of this pretty saloon, cozy and warm in winter, light, airy, and cool in summer, and just the ideal place to meet and entertain a friend.

 

THE BISCUIT-BAKERY.

How The Royal Navy Was Fed - 1901

The Royal Victoria Yard is a big place with many different departments, although some of these concern themselves with the clothing and not the feeding of the hundred thousand men employed on her Majesty's ships.

 

Fancy Folded Napkin

How to Fold Napkins Properly - 1889

The folding of the serviette, or table napkin, was always a matter of attention; at the present moment it is doubly so when the luxury of table decorations are carried to such an extent that ingenuity is constantly on the strain, not only to produce every possible variety of cartes de menu, but even fanciful stands to hold them or the guests' name cards in a prominent position.

 

Galley of an Ocean Liner

Kitchens of Ocean Liners - 1904

Summer kitchens, with their electrical conveniences, and winter kitchens, with nil that they can boast of, whether in home or hotel, fade in glory before that kitchen of kitchens, the culinary department of an ocean liner.

 

Vegetable Cutter - 1916

Kitchen Utensils - 1916

The heavy polished copper vessels suggested a great hotel rather than a home; yet they were the kind and shape that were then in common use. In simpler homes they were made of iron instead of copper, because of the saving in expense.

 

Kitchen Utensils

Kitchen Utensils and Cooking Terms - 1869

Every kitchen, large or small, should be provided with the best possible utensils; this is a rule which any sensible person must admit; for it is unreasonable to expect cooking to be well done without the necessary implements.

 

La Salle à Manger - 1908

La Salle à Manger - 1908

In the world of thought, in the world of dress, in travel, in home life, in entertaining, in all social settings, what our grandfathers and grandmothers called luxuries have become necessities. But, nowhere is the advance of delicacy, or perhaps one should call it the increased cultivation of a fastidious taste, more clearly evidenced than in the art of dining.

 

Lists of Kitchen Utensils - 1883

New Housewife's Kitchen Utensil List - 1883

The following lists are given for the purpose of assisting those who are about to furnish their kitchen in selecting the necessary articles. With kitchen utensils, as with everything else, the purchaser must first consider the extent of his resources; and it is frequently the case that articles must be dispensed with which everyone acknowledges it is desirable to possess.

 

Hollandaise Sauce Calls For the Best of Materials

New Light on Holandaise Sauce - 1920

A true Hollandaise Sauce calls for an overgenerous amount of butter and many eggs to make it as thick as one would wish. But more than that, its making is a precarious process at best.

 

1586. — Ballotines de dinde à la gelée, pour grosse pièce (dessin 192).

Pictorial From La Cuisine Classique - 1882

Most of the these beautiful classic pieces are primarily erected on a flat surface and simply placed on the pedestals. This simplifies the work without changing the appearance of the cuisine pieces themselves.

 

Cocktail Tableau for the $2,500 per Plate Dinner

Serving a Dinner for $2,500 per Plate in 1915

When Madame Jackson Crocker Gouraud asked through the New York American for original suggestions for serving a dinner for a special occasion, for which she offered $5,000, the American Gastronom submitted the following Menu, explanations, and designs, for serving the same.

 

Types of Parisians waiting in line in a Super-Grocery. Part 1

Standing In The Food Line In Paris - 1916

STANDING in the food line in Paris is both an amusing and an aggravating period of the feminine day's work. Don't make the mistake of thinking that this means getting something for nothing in these necessitous war times.

 

Dinner Giving

Table Etiquette in the 1900s

A host or hostess should never allude to the quality of the dishes or contents—either is in poor taste. The guests will discover their excellence without assistance.

 

Tea Wagon - Hospitality On Wheels

Tea Wagon - Hospitality On Wheels

A tea-wagon is a convenient addition to household equipment. Its general utility may be appreciated when it is used to convey the dishes to and from the table for breakfast, luncheon, and dinner.

 

Dining Room with Elaborate Wall Paper

The Dining Room As It Should Be - 1912

It is a self-evident fact that the dining apartment, more than any other, must be bright and cheerful, for it is the family meeting-place three times a day, and perfect harmony makes not only for happiness but also for good digestion.

 

The Fine Art of Dinner Serviettes - 1873

The Fine Art of Dinner Serviettes - 1873

Although this Manual is devoted strictly to the folding of Dinner Serviettes, it must not be concluded that Serviettes should be used at dinners only, for they are necessary at all meals, be it breakfast, luncheon, or supper. Except on ceremonious occasions, they are for these minor repasts folded simply, and without any elaboration.

 

Danish Bacon

The Making of Danish Bacon

The chief advantage of the Danish bacon over that coming from other countries is its uniform quality. While in London, the writer visited the Smithfield Market and was shown sides of bacon from various countries.

 

The Merits of the Chafing Dish - 1913

The Merits of the Chafing Dish - 1913

Try to consider it, for a while, in a more wholesome connection, and see if you can not derive benefit from its employment at sensible meals for the family in the middle of the day and commonplace any night in the week suppers.

 

The Physiology of Taste

The Physiology of Taste - 1854

Savarin was naturally a thoughtful man, and an epicure.  The simplest meal satisfied him, for all that he required was that it should be prepared artistically; and he maintained that the art of cookery consisted in exciting the taste.

 

Twenty-Thousand-Dollar Banquet - 1910

Twenty-Thousand-Dollar Banquet - 1910

Probably the greatest catering feat ever accomplished in the state of Illinois was handled by the Richelieu Catering Co. of Chicago in Springfield, on the anniversary of Lincoln's one hundredth birthday.

 

Warren’s Cooking Pot - 1883

Warren’s Cooking Pot - 1883

For travelers camping out there is probably no invention in the world in relation to cooking as useful as Captain Warren's cooking pot. A few bricks may be collected and ranged round with spaces between, filled with a little coke or coal, and the pot placed on the top.

 

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