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Tortue liée à l’Anglaise
Thick turtle soup
Consommé de Volaille Royale
Chicken consommé garnished with diced royale
Filets de Saumon à la Indienne
Salmon filets poached in butter and curry spices served atop a bed of rice
Turbot, sauce Homard et Hollandaise
Turbot dressed in a Hollandaise sauce flavoured with lobster meat
Petites Briantines d’Huitree à la Princesse
Small pastries topped with oysters poached in white wine and topped with truffle slivers and asparagus tips
Crême de Faisans a la Richelieu
Breasts of pheasant stuffed with truffles and dressed is a cream sauce based on chicken stock and flavoured with truffle, mushrooms and nutmeg
Côtelettes de Mouton à la Provençale
Sautéed mutton cutlets dressed in a tomato sauce and garnished with stuffed mushrooms
Poulardes et Langues à la Bohémienne
Sautéed chicken and cured ox tongue casseroled in tomato, fennel and capsicum and served atop saffron rice
Aloyau de Bœuf braisé, garni à la Française
Braised sirloin of beef garnished with asparagus tips, braised lettuce and cauliflower and small potatoes stuffed with minced vegetable and dressed in a Hollandaise sauce
Hanche de Venaison
Roast haunch of venison
Caneton nouveaux au Creson
Young ducklings served with puréed watercress topped thickened with boiled egg
Mauviettes bardées, sur Croûte
Spit roasted boned larks wrapped in bacon and served atop a croutons
Petits Pois à l’Anglaise
Peas tossed in parsley butter
Gelées de Liquer garnies d’Ananas
Liquor jellies garnished with glazed pineapple
Gâteaux Princesse garnis de Glace
Small cakes filled with vanilla cream and dried fruits, glazed in pink and white icing.
Petits Baignets à l’Allemande
Small fritters filled with cherries soaked in a kirsch flavoured syrup.
Hûre de Sanglier à la Gelée
Jellied whole stuffed wild boar’s head
Menu dated 23rd February 1870
Dinner at Gloucester House, Piccadilly, hosted by His Royal Highness Prince George, the Duke of Cambridge.
Prince George, the Duke of Cambridge, was the cousin of Queen Victoria; grandson of King George III; and served as Commander-in-Chief of the British Army from 1856.
The Duke’s private residence was Gloucester House in Picadilly which was the venue for this 16 course dinner in 1870. Guests were served under the watchful gaze of a whole stuffed wild-boar’s head set in jelly and decoratively displayed on the dining-room sideboard appearing at the end of the menu-card as Hûre de Sanglier à la Gelée.
The dinner commenced with a heavy seafood theme as tureens of thick turtle soup were served ahead of lightly spiced poached salmons; turbot dressed in lobster sauce; and pastries filled with oysters poached in white wine and truffle.
The Duke’s fondness for game meats is also well represented with plates of spit-roasted larks, creamed pheasant breasts and whole young ducklings in watercress cream, appearing alongside haunches of roast venison.
Just two years after this dinner the Duke noted in his diary, his passion for game hunting and meats after a visit to the Sandringham estate of Queen Victoria’s eldest son, the Prince of Wales. The Duke of Cambridge noted:
“In spite of much rain had one of the finest days' sport I ever saw, killing 1,766 head of game, of which 1,083 were pheasants and 68 partridges; besides hares and rabbits.”
Cakes, liqueur jellies and German cherry fritters drizzled in kirsch syrup concluded this dinner that was undoubtedly one of the grandest of its time. It’s little wonder then, that on 9th December 1889, the Duke of Cambridge again took to his diary to note:
“My poor old Cook, Le Cours, died on Saturday from bronchitis. As good a Cook as any in England!”.
Upon the Duke's death in 1904, the title 'Duke of Cambridge' became extinct for over 100 years until the 2011 royal wedding of Prince William of Wales to Catherine Middleton, when the couple were styled the Duke and Duchess of Cambridge.
Prince George The Duke of Cambridge
