>*: x^ ov ^ N f-V-VV \ y ,---> % V Xv S TH STEWARD'S HANDBOOK AND GUIDE TO PARTY CATERING. IN FIVE PARTS. PART i. HOTEL STE WARDING AND COMPOSITION OF BILLS OF FARE. PART 2. RESTAURANT STEWARDING AND PUBLIC PARTY CATERING. PART 3. CATERING FOR PRIVATE PARTIES, AND HEAD WAITERS AND THEIR TROOPS. PART 4. A DICTIONARY OF DISHES AND CULINARY TERMS AND SPECIALTIES. PART 5. HOW TO FOLD NAPKINS. JESSUP WHITEHEAD. SIXTH EDITION.. CHICAGO. JESSUP WHITEHEAD & CO., PUBS., 1903. Entered according to Act of Congress in the Office of the Librarian, at Washington, by Jessup Whitehead, 1887 and 1889. All rights reserved. TA L.IBRARV STATE ' '10L M'ANU'L .CALIFORNIA : ?oi, PREFACE. In the preparation of this volume my aim has been to supply just such a book as I wished for myself when I was a beginner in hotel employment and aw how much there was before me to learn before I could reach the paying positions. It has fallen to my lot to be the first to write down what have hitherto been the unwritten rules of hotel management; as the hotel system of this coun- try is advancing and expanding, I have looked upwards and not downwards for my examples; and I beg the reader, who may find some things contrary to his preconceived notions of hotel interiors, to note that I have not made the mistake of imagining that I had to invent a code or system, but have only had to state the facts as they exist already; the expressions of opinion or advocacy of special rules are but the links to make the whole plan coherent, where otherwise it would be broken by the difference in practice of different hotel-keepers. It is due to those who will disagree with me on some points to admit that my friends, the editors, who have published some of the matter serially, found some statements so op- posed to their previous ideas they even hesitated to print them; the doctrine which they seemed to think most monstrous is that laid down in " The Steward ^ and His Management of Help," beginning at the bottom of page 23. Perhaps they read it hastily or misconstrued it Though not too dogmatical to review my own work and reconsider it, I have not, after a year's interval, found a word to change, and have in the same time passed through experiences with two hotel keepers which showed that they, at least, did not misunderstand, and the rule is sound, always premising that the incoming man is a real steward and is com- petent. It is a formal investment of the steward with his authority that is advo- cated, the old and efficient hands do not really leave, they are trained to the sys- tem and bow and accept the new dictator. The "clean sweep" business is named in connection with corruption and misdoing. Let us suppose a case or call it reality if you will: A man is sent for by a hotel proprietor to be steward, and the proprietor says: "My help all seem to be unmanageable; they are in- subordinate, noisy, quarrelsome, independent, insolent; I want you to change all t this; it is injuring my business." The new steward finds a too-good barkeeper, a . pet of the proprietor, too, is giving the hands whisky, and this ill-advised liberal- ity with his employer's property is making the barkeeper the most popular man I!5 in the house, but is keeping the hands half drunk and unmanageable. AH the O power the steward has over the barkeeper is to notify him not to treat his hands any more, but that does not help much, for his hands are then sulky and sullen, U PREFACE. his bitter enemies. That Is the time for a "clean sweep," or else the steward must back down and leave. In another place it may be a colored girl, my lady's pam- pered and bejewelled maid, who is the power behind the throne; who orders the cooks and sends the waiters away on errands, and the new steward finds that when he gives his directions the help all look to the pet maid to see whether they are to obey him or not If the decaying proprietor of such a declining business *s this symbolizes wants reform there must be a "clean sweep," not necessarily of che maid, too, but new hands must come in who have not learned to look that way for orders. In short, I have entertained the idea of writing this book for years past, and made observations accordingly so extensive and thorough as to be able to claim a full preparation for the task before it was undertaken. The interior of a large hotel is not a place of pleasure for the employe's. All the heads of departments are autocrats in their sphere if they are good men ; if they are bad men they may be tyrants. In regard to the dictionary, -which will commend itsejf at a glance, H only needs to be said that in the anticipation that it will find a welcome not only among hotel stewards and chefs, but among diners-out, bons-vivants, club men, restaura- teurs, printers who set up bills of fare, editors with gastronomical proclivities, and the polite world in general, I have made it as light reading as was practicable, by embodying the brightest and best paragraphs on every subject in turn by the best writers wherever they could be found. This is the dictionary of that peculiar culinary language, which is not to be found in the regular dictionaries of any tongue, however complete otherwise; it is the language of epicurism and of the table. Possibly the practice which has prevailed for some time of interpolating poetical quotations in the bill of fare might be improved by the introduction of informatory paragraphs about some special kind of game, fish, or novelty in sweets, turning the attention of those who dine upon one leading feature of the dinner by giving an intimation of its quality, its rarity, its merits, its relation to literature, its origin. Suitable quotations of that kind will be found abundant in this volume. They might be accredited to "The Epicurean Dictionary," which will be fair and impartial to all, for it has been found neither expedient nor even possible to name Zhe authors whose words are placed in quotation marks herein; some of them, it is true, belong to the most famous names, but the greater part are the words of un- known contributors to current literature whose terse sentences offered the briefest explanation of the subjects jiamed. J. W. CONTENTS. THE HOTEL STEWARD AND HIS DUTIES. The Steward Out of Fash- ion. A New Class of Stewards. Stewards of Other Days. "The Evil Which Men Do Lives After Them." The Pernicious Commission System. Some- thing Less Manly. A Specimen Letter. The Steward the Superior Officer. The Steward Deals Only With the Head Men. The Steward as Buyer. The Steward Puts In His Fancy Work. All Stewards Carve. Assistant Carvers. The Steward and the Bill of Fare. The Steward Who Does Not Know. The Steward Is the Overseer First and Last. The Steward as a Worker. The Steward Manages the Meats. Stewards Needed Everywhere. The Steward and the Landlady. The Steward and the Housekeeper. The Steward and the Headwaiter. The Steward and His Adversaries. The Steward and the Storekeeper. The Steward and His Store-room. The Steward and the Care of Meats. The Steward and His Management of Help. The Steward and the Hands' Pay-Day. The Steward and the Clerks. The Steward and the Proprietor. The Inside Steward's Special Duties. The Wine-room Steward's Special Duties. The Steward and the Dairy. The Steward and the Dish-room. The Steward and His Workshops. When the Steward's Good Time Comes. Who Shall Be Stewards ? Promote the Good Cooks Pages 3 to 30. STOREKEEPING AND BOOK-KEEPING. How Stores Are Issued and Charged. Blank Requisitions. The Storekeeper Must Rise Early. Store- room Hours. The Store-room Issue Book. Example of Written Book (pages 34-35) Mammoth Requisition List Showing All Articles Needed In Hotels (page 36). Pastry Requisition of Same House (page 37). Largest Form of Issue Book and Grand Total of All Departments (pages 38-39) The Same by a Simpler System (pages 40-41). Changing Cooks in a Large Hotel. How the New Chef Begins His Duties. The Drinking Habits of Cooks. Pages 30 to 45. HOW TO WRITE THE BILL OF FARE. The American Hotel Dinner Bill the Standard. The Hotel Press and "Recent Improvements. Bill of Fare or Menu? Headings or No Headings? What Should the Headings Be? Serv- ing Potatoes With Fish. Always Serve Fish On Small Plates. Which First, Joints or Entrees? Three Royal Examples. The Place for the Cold Meats. Current Criticisms. A Representative Italian Bill of Fare. The Dinner In Courses. The Sorbet or Punch. Those Everlasting Relishes. Specimen Bill of Fare. How Many Dishes? One Soup or Two? How Many Kinds of Fish? How Many Entrees? How Many Vegetables? How Many Kinds of Pastry? Conclusions In Regard To the Dinner Bill. Lunch and Dinner or Dinner and Supper? How Much for Lunch? What Sort of Dishes for Lunch? The Breakfast Bill of Fare. Specimen Breakfast Bills. About the (iii) Iv CONTENTS. American Breakfast. A Small Pattern, But Sufficient. The American Sup- per or Tea. Rising Equal to the Emergency. Combination of Dinner and Supper With Newly Printed Bills Each Day. List of Dishes for Breakfast and Supper Bills ............................................ Pages 45 to 76. RESTAURANT STEW ARDING. Comparison of the Hotel and Restaurant Sys- tems. The Rise of the Restaurant. A Typical American Restaurateur. The Restaurant Steward and the Market Men. How to "Stand In" with the Market Men. Keeping Provisions. A Specimen First-class Restaurant Bill of Fare. A Few Entrees and a Little Management. The Merchants' Lunch House and Bill of Fare. The Bakery Lunch. The Place and not the Man. The Man and not the Place. The Bar-room Free Lunch. A Russian Restaurant. The Oyster and Fish Restaurant and Bill of Fare. How the Pay is Col- lected. The Common Meal Check. The Written Order Check. 1 he Hidden Watch System. The Great American Restaurant System. The Bouillons- Duval System. Spiers and Pond's London Restaurant System, pages 76 to 100. The London Check System ...................................... Page 202. American Hotel Check System ................................... Page 203. CLUB STEWARDING AND CATERING. About Clubs in General. Partr Catering. Mistakes in Entertaining. Rules for Party Catering. Some F.r ceptions. Ball Suppers. How to Set the Tables. Small Tables. What; to Set Upon Them. Difference in Cost of Suppers. Quantities and Qualitf.es What Decorated Meat Dishes Consist Of. What the Ornamental Baskets of Cake Contain. What the Moulded Ices and Jellies Are. Setting Long Tables. When They Dance in the Dining Room. The Stand-up Supper. The Bazar Supper. The Handed Supper. The Ornamental Handed Supper ........................ " .................................. Pages loo to 117. CATERING FOR PRIVATE PARTIES. Large an* Small Catering Busi- nesses. Lady Caterers. More Rules for Stewards and Caterers. Ball Supper for 200. Provisions and Materials Used. A Young Lady's Birthday Recep- tion for 50. Snow-bound Dinner. Church Festival. Club Reception. Cold Lunch for 300. Private Reception. Experience of an English Manager. Dinners at Various Prices. Base Ball or Cricket Lunches, Various Prices. A Quotation Menu ........................................ Pages 125 to 135. FANTASIES OF PARTY GIVERS. A Pink Dinner in Washington. A Yellow Dinner in Boston. A White Dinner in London. A Violet Supper. A Dinner in Scarlet and Black. A Pink Rose Dinner. A White Lily Din- ner. A Mermaid Dinner. Crowns, Stars and Diamonds. The Plateau. Changing Fashions in Wine Glasses. A Figurative Dinner. A Vari-colored Dinner in Buffalo. A Tropical Dinner in New York. Fish Dinners in Paris. French Dinner Table Decorations. Imitating Lucullus. Royal Soup. The Same Idea With a Purpose In It. Floral Decorations at President Ar- thur's State Dinners. President Cleveland's Table. Floral Decorations at the Princess' Ball. Tens of Thousands of Flowers. Decorated Dishes at Mrs. Vanderbilt's Reception. Mrs. Vanderbilt's Diamond Ball. The Progressive Dinner Novelty. The Lady Had a New Idea. Couldn't "Call Off" the En- trees. Notions In Silver. The Vienna Coffee Fashion. Different China for CONTENTS. Each Course. Candles and Glass Shades Notions in Ices. Changing Dec- orations for Each Meal. A Boating Club's Fantasy. Scene Painted Ball Suppers. Sea Caverns and Fairy Grottoes. A Sea Shell Dinner. A Wed- ding Banquet. Grand Wedding Receptions. Wedding Breakfasts and the Prices Charged. Eight Specimen Menus. Something About the Cost. Ten Dollars per Plate. Five Dollars per Plate Without Wine. Six Dollars With Wine at the Cafe Royal. Two Dollars Without Wine. A Ten-dollar Meal for Five Dollars. Dinners at Thirty Dollars. Temperance Catering. Tipsy Fruit at a Temperance Banquet. Prohibitionists and Fashionable Cookery. Too Rich for His Blood. Sarcastic, But Suggestive ......... Pages 135 to 157 STEWARDING AND CATERING ON A GRAND SCALE. Stewarding at Harvard University. At Vassar College. At Windsor Castle. At a Peni- tentiary. Steamship Stewarding. Purchasing for a Large Hotel. The American Game List. Lunch for 5,600 people. The American Clam Bake How It Is Done. The American Barbecue. The Improved Barbecue.- The Primitive Barbecue An Electric Lighted Barbecue. How an Ox Wa^ Boiled Whole. The Number, Weights and Price for 3,000. The French Governmental Banquet to 3,ooo Mayors. A Railway Eating House in Sweden Breakfast for 10,500 people. Catering at the Manchester Exhibition. How 30,000 Children Were Fed. Catering for the Multitude. Stewarding for the Sultan. The Army Hospital Steward. Exposition Catering. Catering at the Piedmont Exposition. Training a Storekeeper. The Store-room Stock Book ..................................................... Pages 157 to 184. THE HEADWAITER AND HIS TROOPS. The Headwaiter. The Head- waiter's Importance. The Headwaiter Does No Waiting. Scarcity of Good Headwaiters. The Foreign Headwaiter. In American Hotels. Organizing the Troops. Waiter's Uniforms. Telling Off the Watches. Watch On, Watch Off. Let the Headwaiters Tell It. Another Headwaiter Talks. What the Dining Room Chief Talks About. Waiters Drill for a Banquet. Who Are the Best Waiters? Waiters' Wages and Tips Cherubs at the Hotels Rough on the Waiters. London Waiters. Paris Waiters. Disci- pline in Paris Restaurants. Accommodating Waiters. Tricky Waiters. Merlin Waiters. A German Baron Waiter. How Waiters Fight Duels. Female Waiters. New York Waiter Girls. A Dining Room Juno. The Pennsylvania-Dutch Waitress. The Mischief of Pretty Waiter Girls. Girls on a Strike. Another Strike of Waitresses. Respect Instead of Money. Colored Waiters. Trc ibles Common to All. The Tyranny of the Chef. Another Trouble. A Few Types of Waiters. Just a Plain Waiter. A Wait- ter's Valentine. A Waiter's Wife. A Treasure of a Waiter. Waiters' Christ- mas .................................... . ................. Pages 184 to 218. I'A.ZEtT I"V. IN THE DICTIONARY OF DISHES will be found under the respective letters Consommes. Drinks. Egg Cookery. German Cookery. Greek Cookery. Ices. Italian Cookery. Jewish Cookery. Mexican Cookery. Oriental Cookery. Potages. Sauces. Soups. Spanish Cookery. Scottish Cookery, Etc., Etc ......................................... Pages 219 to 464. SERVIETTES AND HOW TO FOLD THEM, fully illustrated, Appendix, ............................. . .................. : ............. Pages i to 29. THE STEWARD'S HANDBOOK HOTEL STEWARDING SHOWING THE INTERNAL WORKINGS OF THE AMERICAN SYSTEM OF HOTEL KEEPING. THE STEWARD'S DUTIES IN DETAIL AND IN RELATION TO OTHER HEADS OF DEPARTMENTS. Steward's Storekeeping, Steward's Bookkeeping, AND MANAGEMENT OF HELP. ALSO, COMPOSITION OF BILLS OF FARE, THE REASONS WHY, AND NUMEROUS ILLUSTRATIVE MENUS OF MEALS ON. THE AMERICAN PLAN BY JESSUP WHITEHEAD. CHICAGO. 1903. Entered according- to Act of Congress in the Office of the Librarian, at Washington, by JESSUP WHITEHEAD, 1889. All rights reserved. THE HOTEL STEWARD AND HIS DUTIES. The steward is out of fashion just at present, although there are indications that the time is coming around again when he will take his proper place in the hotel economy, a place second in import- ance only to that of the proprietor. He has been dropping out of fashion more and more every year for a long period, while the chef gained the ascendancy, till now the steward and his position are al- most forgotten. It used to be sufficient to say that Mr. So-and-so was the proprietor and Mr. Somebody was his steward, and that included everything, for the steward had his headwaiter, his cook, Ms pastry cook. Some stewards of the few remaining write my cook, etc., yet, from the force of old habits, but really there are but few and they are but seldom heard of. There are plenty of indications to satisfy anyone that this is the case. There is no employe' of any importance about a hotel or restaurant so seldom mentioned in print now as the steward, and if one of them does appear in print through his own writing, he gets but a nod like any stranger, and at once disappears. / It is very rarely that any ad- vertisement appears of a steward wanted, and when occasionally a steward adver- tises for a situation it is half-heartedly, for most of such advertisements end with an offer to assist with something else, as if it was scarcely expected that any hotel keeper could possibly want a steward, or as if a steward's duties were not exacting enough to demand every minute of his time ; some, who so advertise, have been stewards, they say, twenty years or more; that is, they are of the old stock of stewards, remainders from the stewards era, and cannot help offering themselves. But the young men who advertise numerously wants to be assistant managers, managers of small houses, caterers, occasionally, or store- keepers and assistant clerks, anything but steward, and letters of inquiry come to the hotel newspaper offices innocently asking iwhat the steward's duties are, almost by implication asking what ^stewards are for. About a year ago some newspaper man interviewed the proprietor of a large hotel in Washington and asked him about the methods of internal management, and asked: "How do you know how much to cook?" "I confer with my chef" answered the proprietor and then we do thus and so, and the dialogue included many such questions. But where was the steward in that case? Another such indication comes to hand in a very late number of the Hotel World, after the foregoing had been written, and must be repeated for its worth and to help confirm the position taken, that the steward is out of fashion, and the chef is in the as- cendant: The chef 'of a large Saratoga hotel is re- ported as saying: "We receive word from the office every morning how many people there are in the house, and there are cer- tain well established rules for calculation. For instance, among a certain number of people so many will take roast beef, and we have found by experiment that 100 people require a side of beef weighing about forty pounds. Among the same 100 people forty or fifty chickens will be needed, according to the size of the chickens. We can calculate pretty closely, but we have to be liberal, so that if fifty or sixty people come in to dinner whom we did not expect, there will not be a scant supply. I make THE STEWARD'S HANDBOOK. out the bill of fare for each day's dinner on the afternoon of the previous day. I look over my stock, ask the steward what he expects to have in by the morning trains, and thus knowing the material I shall have to work with on the morrow, the bill of tare is made out." The above Is according to fact, but if everything in the hotel system were in its proper order it would have been the stew- ard who did the taking, conferred with the cook, instead of being questioned by the cook, and who would have suggested the bill of fare and revised it after the chef had written it A year or two. ago a young proprietor in sore trouble applied to the writer to assist him in finding a different variety of cooks from those he had met; he said he had tried all sorts, the high-priced association cooks among the rest, and he stigmatized Jhem all as a man will who is tormented. He wrote: "I want a cook who can com- pute the cost of his meals, who knows the difference between skillful work and com- mon extravagance, who will remain at his post until the meal is over, and be as will- ing to earn his wages as I am to pay them.'' This young proprietor has come into the business while stewards are out of fashion, and it never occurred to him that what he really did want was a steward. There are no cooks who will do all that he sees should be done, none that have learned to compute the cost of meals, except with the codpera- tion of the steward and store-keeper; where there is no steward something is neglected to be done. Although this ne- cessary officer may be absent, his duties are there to be performed in every hotel, and are divided amongbt several, and as these cannot do as well as a man trained to the special duties of the position, there must necessarily be irregularity, incompleteness and loss in the hotel system. A NEW CLASS OF STEWARDS. If there is to be a new beginning, if the steward is to catch up with his proper place In the line of hotel improvement, so that he will be found where he ought to be in every hotel, and if it is become so that ihe steward will be engaged first and the cooks at any time afterwards, instead of the pres- ent general practice, there must be a model for young men to build upon. It is impos- sible now to give a satisfactory answer to the inquiries that are received as to what constitute a steward's duties, for it is too indefinite a question. There are two dif- ferent sorts of stewards at present filling the positions where they are filled, and one of these types will endure and be tlie hotel steward of a few years later, and then his duties will be well defined. rOne of these is the New England steward, the other is the New York steward, which is the same as the ship steward and the Southern steamboat steward of years ago. Nothing invidiously sectional is meant by the adop- tion of these distinguishing terms. There are New England stewards in New York and stewards of the New England type; they are the men who go from the North every winter to take the same positions in the same Florida hotels year after year; not all of them are of New England birth, some are Canadians, or of more distant origin still ; when by chance they have to advertise for a position they describe them- selves as working stewards. And there are stewards of the nautical New York type in New England (for New York is but the rendezvous for steamship men and steamboat men), the bossing and buying stewards, who are officers and used to dis- cipline, yet absolute in authority in their own department, and fine men in their own sphere ; yet, somehow, they do not assimil- ate with the hotel system ; neither do they who learn from them. Proprietors, after a trial, prefer to carry on their business with- out them, and the steward drops out of sight. The kind of man that is coming to the front is a bossing aria buying and working steward, too. He knows what should be done, how it should be, and sees that it is so, and when there is any neces- sity whatever for him to do so he'can take hold and do it himself. THE STEWARD'S HANDBOOK. A more efficient set of men, who yet do not suit the hotel system, cannot be imag- ined than the stewards of the ocean steam- ships and old-time, long-trip river steam- boats. They have entire charge ; the pas- sengers must look to them for everything and not to the captain, who is but a court of appeal, a higher authority in reserve. When complaint is made to the captain he is very apt to say, "Sir or Madam, I have a steward who manages all those matters, he will arrange those things to your satisfac- tion, you had better speak to him." If a polite commander, and desirous of pleas- ing the passengers, perhaps he will promise to see the steward about it himself; beyond that he does not interfere, and for good reason, for he has other cares and duties, those connected with the cargo and with navigation. These stewards are everything to the passengers; the head waiter is sec- ond steward; his next best man is third steward, and it is no wonder .if all the wait- ers come to be called stewards in such a case, as they are on some steam vessels ; and this practice has had such effect that anywhere south and southwest from Washington and Baltimore the native ho- tel proprietors call their head waiter their steward, and when they engage a steward they expect he is going to take charge of the dining room and waiters, if not wait on table himself. But these efficient steam- ship and steamboat stewards are not suited to even the modern hotel, because the pro- prietor must have something to do, not having any cares of cargo and navigation on his mind, and if such a steward excer- cises his full .function he becomes the big man and the proprietor the little man of the house. There cannot be two kings over one small kingdom; one of them has to abdicate. The proprietor cannot and does not deny that the steward is right about his duties and prerogatives, but he does a quieter way, concludes that he does not need a steward; will perform part of the duties himself and puts the other part upon the chef. STEWARDS OF OTHER DAYS. Those old-time Mississippi steamboat stewards were fine models of executive ability ; they were remarkable men in their way, and are worth a passing description, for we shall never see their like again ; the same state of their business will never exist again, for they were without the telegraph, practically without mail or express, since their boat carried the mail and they could hardly send word ahead, and the express reached only the railroad points which were limited then to the northern cities. They were models for the summer resort stew- ard whose hotel is off the regular lines of travel, in a difficult country, destitute of local markets and with slow and uncertain means of communication. Indeed those stewards were generally resort men them- selves, for the boating season was in winter and spring, and the best of them had sum- mer engagements at the various fashionable " Springs " to pass away the time when the rivers were low and the crops were not ready to be moved, These stewards had entire charge and control of the victualling department and hiring of help and rate of wages to be paid. The captain held but one powerful restraint upon them ; he and the chief clerk, who was the cashier and pay- master, kept up a rigid comparison of the bills for each month and for the same months of former years, and, in a general way, the steward who could run the boat with the smallest monthly bills was the man they wanted for that position. While this fear of running up a monthly expense account that the captain wouldn't stand, was a great check upon the entire steward's department, the men who were smart enough to be stewards were fertile in ex- pedients for dodging a direct comparison, and often made their dearest months seem the very contrary, either by collusion with the merchants or by special excuses plaus- ibly presented. The captain did not know the waiters nor whence they came, nor did he know the cooks, unless by chance he had one of some repute, but if this steward required twenty waiters and seven cooks THE STEWARD'S HANDBOOK. and another could run the boat with fifteen waiters and five cooks, the cheaper man had the better chance of the position. These are the same checks and balances which hold good in the hotel of to-day, and everywhere, but there were other checks In the thorough first-class steward's favor, for the captains were desirous of a good reputation for their craft and had rivals in the business, and the dearer man often had his day to be on top regardless of expense. Where the special ability of this class of men was best shown was in the provision- ing of the boat in advance, and so manag- ing that every succeeding day's dinner would be better than the last, and the last dinner of the trip was complete with every luxury of the season, although it might be seven or eight days since they left the city and the markets, and there was always a degree of uncertainty as to how many pas- sengers might come on board at the various towns and landings of a ten or twelve or fifteen hundred mile trip. The boat's crew of deck hands and firemen, amounting to anywhere from twenty to sixty or seventy men, were also provided for by the stew- ard, and calculations for them had to be made as well as for the cabin, just as the hotel steward has to provide separately for a large portion of "the help." Going down stream they left orders at certain landings for the boat storemen to have so much milk, chickens, eggs, or such things, ready by a certain day on their re- turn; for the rest the trusted to their well- managed ice-chests and store-room. The steward hired the stewardesses, who is the same as the hotel housekeeper, and she generally hired two girls to help her. The steward, likewise, hired the porter and bar- ber, but had nothing to do with the bar- keeper, nor engineers, or mate's crew. There was a pantryman, who did not wait at table ; the fifteen or twenty waiters were divided into berth-makers (instead of cham- ber-maids), lamp-trimmers, knife-cleaners (for plated knives had not yet come into use), napkin-folders, and the usual side work, and they filled in all their time be- sides in scrubbing paint, except the short interval in the afternoon. These waiters had to carry al! the stores on board from the wharf, whether at the city starting point or at way landings, so that the steward and those he hired and controlled carried on the entire hotel de- partment of the boat without aid or inter- ference from anybody. Steamboats are still running under much the same rules. This is spoken of in the past tense, because it refers to a time when the passenger trade was so good that the steamboat table was as good as money and skill could make it, and the time on each trip was long enough to make the steamboat more like a hotel in some out-of-the-way place than the light- ning-express boats of to-day can possibly be ; and, besides the best of their time was from ten to twenty years B. W., which means before the war. So, presumably, those old-time stewards are all dead and cannot object to the statements contained in the next chapter. "THE EVIL WHICH MEN DO LIVES AFTER THEM." These men, these old-time river stewards, are largely to blame for the fact that there are so few stewards now in the hotels. Their standard of morals was generally very low; they were sharps, they were universally "on the make." When the passenger trade was taken away from them by the building of railroads they naturally went into the hotels, where they were not adapted to remain, the hotels being gen- erally not large enough to hold them and not wealthy enough to stand the " bleed- ing" which the river steward could not live without resorting to. About five years ago a party of four or five old survivors met together talk- ing, and a number of young hotel boys sat around learning steward wisdom as it fell from their lips. Said one : " What! Don't you know how it was we river fellows never could make a go of it in a hotel?" " No; what was the reason?" Landladies!". THE STEWARD'S HANDBOOK. And then he brought his lips together, bulged out his cheeks, and looked around as if that one immense word was all that need be uttered. Soon he resumed : 41 You know there's no landladies on the boats and oh, well," with a shrug, " in the hotel pastry room and kitchen you don't see the difference, for they don't go there much, but we are all about the house and so are they, and when we go to run it right we step on their toes every once in a while." "Well," said another, "I got a pretty good sit ' in there at the St James, and never quite knew how I got out of it, but tomebody must have been meddling. You know I was on the N No. 2 and on No. 3; they both burned up, and then I went and brought out the new No. 4, but there was no water that season and she couldn't run ; so Captain C took me over to the St. James and gave me an introduce, and I went as steward of the house, and 1 made up my mind that was better than a boat and I could keep my family cheaper. There was my buggy ready for me at five every morning to go the rounds of the markets, and I would go to the butcher's and pick out what I wanted for the day, and I would pick out a roast for myself and order that sent around to my house when they sent the wagon with meat to the hotel ; then down to the fish market and vegetable mar- ket and do the same. Then I drove back to the house and when the stuff came in I weighed it, footed up what I had bought, took the bills to the office and they handed me the money to go and pay them with, for they paid cash on the nail every day, and after breakfast I went around again and paid for everything received that morn- ing. Every week or two I would say to the butcher, ' Well, what do I owe you for what you have sent to my family?' 'Oh, nothing,' says he, 'that's all right,' and not one of the others ever charged me a cent, either, and I was getting along as good as you could expect of a hotel ; but somebody must have been meddling, for I had a little unpleasantness in the office and I quit." Then another took up the conversation : " We hadn't such a bad time with those boats when the seasons were right, with plenty of water in the rivers. A fellow had to be in with the boat store-men and then he was all right, for they could get him a berth if he got out, and would pull him through a hard time. Yes, they were a clever lot of fellows. I used to stay around with old Tom Curtice and son at Vicks- burg, and I've seen the time when it was pretty hard to pull through from one season to another, I tell you, but whenever I went to Curtice he would say, 'Well, Frank, how is it now ?' By jing,' says I, it's pretty tough when a boat's so long coming out' ' Well, Frank,' says old Tom, 'what do you want, what can we do for you; all you've got to do is to say it?' ' Well, Mr. Curtice,' says I, ' about twenty-five dollars to pay house rent is the size of it.' Then without another word he would turn to his son and say, " Richard, open the drawer and hand Frank twenty-five dollars no, give him thirty, he can use it,' and that's all there would be about it. It might be months afterward, but sometime I would say, ' Mr. Curtice, how about that thirty dollars I owe you?' 'Oh, don't name it,' says he, 'you don't owe us a cent; but how many tierces of ham, bacon, shoulders and lard shall we send aboard this morning?' Well, it was to their interest to be clever to us and they knew it The captain was stuck on having all the stores purchased in New Orleans, but in the first place it was not his business where I got my stores, as long as the price was right, and then it was the easiest thing in the world for me to forget, or have if come from the New Orleans house late enough to miss the boat, and have to take on stores at Vicksburg, any- way." Such are the favorite topics the old-tim- ers love to converse upon and the hotel boys think they are learning from them how to be stewards. One year ago one of these same young men, who listened for hours to the talk of the party above named, was met by the THE STEWARD'S HANDBOOK. writer in the South. In the interval he had been steward, or part steward, In a hotel in a town on the Hudson, and what he told of his experience showed that the lessons in stewarding, he had listened to, were not thrown away upon him. When met he was the roast cook in a large hotel at forty dollars per month, and in answer to the question how he was getting along, he replied: "Oh, I made the worst sort of a break for myself when I came down here. I had a good little house up in York State ; I was cfief, but the house did not keep a steward and I did the buying for them, and was doing very well, but I kicked because they would only pay sixty dollars. But if I had looked at it right that house was worth a hundred dollars a month to me, every cent of it, and it was a small house and I didn't have to work hard." "But how was it worth a hundred a month to you?" "Well, for one thing, I was sure of a five dollar bill from the butcher every Monday morning, and all the others I traded with chipped in a little. Then I made the waiters whack up to me; they got money and .they had to divide or would not get anything. Then at Christmas time I got a new suit of clothes, a pair of fine boots and a fine hat and they never cost me a cent; but I kicked on the sixty dollars and they got somebody else and I quit and came down here." And so the young would-be stewards are cut down like the green grass and the race is in danger of becoming totally extinct THE PERNICIOUS COMMISSION SYSTEM. The very fact that these old-school stew- ards and the young fledglings who think they are learning the steward's duties from them, relate these money-making exper- iences with so much gusto, and, indeed, make them their favorite subject of con- versation, shows that they do not consider bribe-taking dishonest It may be their moral sense I* very dull, but if they need to justify themselves they can find abund- ant excuse in the prevailing system of per cents and commissions. There is not a thing that must be purchased from a mer- chant but bears two different prices: the list price, or asking price, and the net price. From the material to build the hotel, the furniture, ranges and crockery, to the type to print the bill of fare, everything comes priced at so much, but with five, ten, fifteen or twenty-five per cent, off to the actual purchaser, and If the old-school steward is allowed to be the purchaser there is no possibility of convincing him that he is not entitled to that commission, and, further- more, according to his reasoning, if the distant merchant do so unsolicited the home merchants must be made to do the same. And the home merchant who wants his trade agrees with him, and, more than that, says to him, "You may as well take the commission; if you don't somebody else will, and if not the house will not get the benefit; the price will be the same and we shall keep the commission ourselves, as well as our regular profit." The writer knew a youthful cook in a large hotel, only a few months ago, who went to the office and asked the proprietor to send for a list of knives and tools for him and take the amount out of his current months wages. The proprietor did so. The bill of goods was in the neighborhood of twenty dollars; there was the usual dis- count allowed 'and it amounted to about three dollars and a half. The proprietor, who was a mercantile man himself, charged the cook the full list price and put the pur- chaser's commission in his own pocket This made the youthful cook and probable future steward so "mad" that he would have discharged the proprietor if he could, but as he could not he tendered his own resignation instead. Yet this is what the old-school stewards think is the right thing to do. Human nature is the same in proprietor as in cook, and when the stew- ard pockets the commissions which he ought to obtain for the house and not him- self, the proprietor may not split logic over THE STEWARD'S HANDBOOK. it, but he is liable to come to the conclusion that he can get along better without a steward, and if the butcher Is making so much profit that he can afford to give five- dollar bills to his customers, the proprietor will go and receive his share himself. The coming steward will refuse to take these bribes for reasons apart from the question of morality and the correctness of prevail- ing commercial customs, but from another motive, to be dwelt upon further on. SOMETHING LESS MANLY. While these old-time stewards took such extreme pleasure in talking over the de- lights of commissions and per cents, there was another source of profit worked by some of them that was never spoken of. They were generally a rugged and manly set of men, used to controlling others, and perhaps were conscious that there was nothing to be proud of in this sort of brokerage. It was the selling of the situ- ations under them. None can know whether the practice was general or to what extent it prevailed, but it was well known that the situations on some boats could only be obtained by purchase. The stewards kept up communications and knew where every available porter, second steward, stewardess, cook and baker could be found, and if the old hands were not coming back some such trades as this took place. The boat paid a certain price for each employe', the rate being fixed by the stewards themselves, and no man or woman was wanted, or could ever after- wards obtain a situation, who would offer to come and take less. The stewardess (housekeeper) was required to be a respect- able, matronly sort of a woman, one whom the lady passengers could feel at home with; the wages for such was usually forty dollars per month, but she did not secure it all, having to pay part of it to the stew- ard, [n the case of a cook the trade would be about like this : Steward "This boat pays eighty dollars ; what will you give me for the job will vou pay me twenty dollars a month for it?" Cook "No, I will pay you ten dollars a month." Steward "You can't have It. But you want to work?" Cook "Yes, I want to work." Steward "And my friend up the river writes me that you are a good cook ; now, I like my cook to be a good one if he does not cost me too much I'll split the differ- ence; you shall pay me fifteen dollars a month for the job, pay every trip before you go ashore." Cook "All right, I'll do that." Steward "Well, pull off your coat and go to work; I'll go and enter your name on the cashier's book." But the cook generally had the privilege of hiring and discharging his kitchen help, and could partly recoup himself by selling the second cook's job in the same way. It must be said in their favor, however, that the majority of river stewards thought this a despiceable practice. "Why," cried one of them with intense scorn, "a man aint fit; to be a steward that can't beat his hand out of all their money at cards. That's the way I always do, and it is more honorable than grinding them down ; what is the use of making small dickers !" A SPECIMEN LETTER. The mixedness of the ideas of a stew- ard's duties contained in the following let- ter is easily accounted for when the fact is taken into consideration that there are two different types of stewards now doing busi- ness in the hotels of this country ; one set does and the other does not do as the writer says. After discussing the matter from their different standpoints we will endeavor to draw some definite conclusions and out- line the duties of the coming steward. This letter is from New Hampshire; it is written on paper bearing the imprint "Kearsarge" hotel; it is one of the best specimens of a letter of inquiry of this sort ever received, for the writer has ideas of his own and starts the subject, and the italics, which are his own, intimate very 10 THE STEWARD'S HANDBOOK. clearly just what points were in dispute. It runs: "Having some dispute with friends in regard to the duties of a steward in a first- class house I told them I would leave the matter to you to decide as I knew * * * * I told them that the steward engages all the help for the kitchen, the clief included, also head waiter (the waiters under the headwaiter may be hired by the head- waiter subject to the steward's approval), and that all the above help are under and subject to the steward's control; that the steward does all the buying of supplies for the table and all kitchen utensils; that the pastry cook or confectioner makes all ices and creams; that the steward does no carv- ing, as that is done by the cook or his as- sistants; that the steward gets up all bills of fare ; that it is not his duty, or his assist- ants', to carry from the carving room and care for the meats, etc., that may be left after the dinner is over, that duty belong- ing to the cook ; that the steward does no manual labor, but is the head and director of all matters pertaining to kitchen and dining room; that the steward's assistant prepares all meats for cooking, but not the steward personally. I have been interested in small hotels, not large enough to employ a steward, and so may be wrong in my statement, and if so will you please give me the correct du- ties of a steward, and oblige, etc." THE STEWARD THE SUPERIOR OFFICER. The first proposition is only partly right, the steward hires the chef or head cook but not the kitchen help under him; the steward hires the headsvaiter but not the waiters under him; the steward hires the baker, pastry cook and confectioner but not their helpers not by right, but he frequently does in fact as a matter of ac- commodation because he knows where to find them when the cooks themselves do not, and the steward always has the power to discharge any hand for disobedience or misconduct, or to suspend or fine him. The steward Is the superior officer over the head cook, over the headwaiter, over the pastry cook and the rest He is next to the proprietor. He is responsible for the good or bad table that the house sets, and for the quality of the service. If he does not have the power to hire or discharge the cooks they will work against him and there will be no harmony ; they will look to the higher authority, blame the steward for the poor quality, real or alleged, of the supplies furnished to them, and make of him little more than a market man and messenger, and the headwaiter will take but little notice of the complaints the stew- ard may hear and report to him concern- ing his waiters' conduct, if he knows that the steward has no power except to talk. THE STEWARD DEALS ONLY WITH THE HEAD MEN. But the head cook has his own favorite second who goes with him year after year, and frequently his roast cook and broiler and several others whom the steward never exercises his authority over, except when they wilfully transgress his rules, and rarely ever speaks to, for whatever they do wrong or right the head cook is responsible for, and all orders for them to do anything are given to the head cook; the steward will say, "have your man there do this, or "your vegetable cook is not giving good satisfaction, will you look into that mat ter." There may be a hand in the kitchen or bake house whom the steward thinks is exceptionally good, yet, some day the head cook or head baker may dis- charge him or her by writing on a piece of paper, "Steward, please pay off bearer for good cause. John Smith, chef. Sept. i, 1887." And the steward will not inter- fere, but lets the hand go without a word unless he is ready to dispense with the ser- vices of the chef. The same with the headwaiter. There is not probably a rec- ognized headwaiter in the land, one who is known and capable, who would take charge of a dining room where the side waiters were to be hired by the steward or THE STEWARD'S HANDBOOK. 11 any one else. He could not exact perfect obedience from his waiters without having the power to dismiss them without appeal. Nevertheless the steward can compel the discharge of a waiter who is direlict in his duty or disobedient. THE STEWARD AS BUYER. The next proposition does not admit of a straightforward answer. It Is: "The steward does all the buying of supplies for the table and all kitchen utensils." Undoubt- edly the coming steward will ; he is wanted for that very purpose, but as a matter of present fact, as the correspondent puts it, he does not, except in a few cases. And the hotels are the worse off because of the de- ficiency of stewards, the buying for a hotel being a trade in itself, not to be picked up or assumed by anybody on short notice, but requiring long practice and varied ex- perienced to become proficient in. The steward's functions in this respect are often assumed now by the proprietor. We read that one or other of the proprietors of the largest of New York hotels goes regularly to market at five in the morning and makes the purchases for the day, numbers of prominent hotel keepers, besides, have been noted as following the same practice. If it be a lack of confidence in stewards in general which has led to their being shorn of their proper authority, it is likely the stewards of past years have themselves to blame. There is very little that is pleasant in a steward's life, he has to be a sort of a policeman, austere, apparently unsym- pathetic, and he cannot permit familiarity, nor afford to be sociable, but most men in the position find a pleasant relaxation in marketing and driving good bargains, and when, in addition to the pleasure of smart trading, the idea of making a little private gain in a seemingly harmless way is entertained, the steward is very liable to give that part of his duties nearly his whole attention, and leave the disciplinary portion inside the house to neglect ;then the proprie- tor volunteers to do some part of that duty that his steward may have more time to "stay in and look after the help." Yet no volunteer or occasional buyer can leave the office desk, or pantry, or store room and go and buy at once cheaply and intelligently. The experienced steward does not have to memorize a lot of rules to know whether game, fish, poultry or meats are fresh and wholesome or not, he knows at a glance ; he has no chemist's tests about him for determining whether a sample ot butter is genuine or imitation, he knows at once, he is practiced at it The volunteer buyer, landlord or clerk rushes out and buys what he thinks are bargains because below the retail price, while the practiced steward comes in with the same thing twice as good and bought at half the price. The practiced steward does not buy small po- tatoes, nor small apples, nor stale eggs because they are under price, as the volun- teer buyer does, for he knows they will all waste away in use and cost double in the long run, nor does he buy fruit that will not keep till next day, nor buy anything on a falling market. He knows where small supplies of a scaice article may still be found in the bye-ways of the market and keeps them in view, but does not buy till absolutely compelled, thinking that new offerings and cheaper may arrive at any hour. The volunteer buyer cannot be so systematic, nor can he watch the fluctua- tions of the market in staple groceries and provisions to take advantage of them as the regular steward does. The coming steward will get all these things down finer yet, including fuel and furnishing in his purchases, and he will not sell his inde- pendence and freedom to roam the markets over to any merchant for "a commission." THE STEWARD PUTS IN HIS FANCY WORK. Next, our correspondent evidently does not say what he means, his question is in- direct, he says: "The pastry cook or con- fectioner makes all ices and creams," he probably means it is not the steward's duty to make them ; right, but probably the com- ing steward will one day make a cream or 12 THE STEWARD'S HANDBOOK. an ice and another day an entree or a soup, whatever else he c; n beat the world at, just because he can, and for the credit of his table. Even now there are hotels employ- Ing bakers, who are bread bakers only, who cannot make a biscuit, or a common custard or pudding, and pastry cooks who consider creams and ices so exclusively confectioners' work that they never try to make them, and if they are good hands otherwise, the working steward steps in and supplies the deficiencies out of his own superior knowledge. The writer knows of one summer resort, where the number of guests often reaches three hundred, where the creams, ices and fancy sweets of all sorts, except cakes and pies, are made by the proprietor's sister, with plenty of laboring help to assist, the baker having plenty else to do, and it is often said that these "little desserts" are the best things the house has to serve, which illustrates the point that the pastry cook does not al- ways make them, although it certainly is his business. ALL STEWARDS CARVE. The next proposition: "The steward does no carving, as that is done by the cook or his assistants," is quite wrong. The only point that all sorts of stewards are agreed upon is that'it is the steward's duty to carve. The ability to carve is one of the accomplishments of a gentleman. The necessity of the steward's carving is obvious, else how can he know how the meat turns out which he is buying? how can he know how much is taken and how much is left over? how can he know, whether the fault found with the meat in the front of the house is attributable to the cook'e negligence or to the meat itself? how can he know what meat goes to the officers' dining room, what to the nurses and children, and what to the help? And if the head cook is to carve who is to dish up the entrees he has made which nobody knows how to dish up right but himself? and who is to watch the run that is made upon this or that dish, or the soup, or fish, or salad, or vegetables, and provide more before the last order is gone, if his atten- tion is engrossed at the carving table? The old steamboat stewards always carved the meat, sometimes the captain assisted. The New York City hotel stewards carve, onlv, when the hotel is large, there are two stewards, and the inside steward is the carver, the outside steward has no time for it. The New England stewards, who go South every winter, all carve. A steward of the writer's acquaintance, who grew up in the Niagara Falls hotels and was troubled with obesity, begged off from carving be- cause he suffered from the heat, but he never hinted even that carving was not his proper duty. A certain California steward, who, however, has been every where,where- ever he goes, always as- mes the carving as his right, and his skill in dismembering a fowl almost instantaneously is really mar- vellous. A true New York City steward in a large southern hotel used to make his carving time very short and got the head cook totake hold for him, but never denied that it was his business to carve. One of our model New England stewards is now a proprietor of two resort hotels in their re- spective seasons, but still acts as his own steward, and his chef told the writer, in answer to questions on these very points, that he did his own carving until the house became so full it was scarcely possible for him to do so, and then the chef found him a carver and he accepted him and released himself. ASSISTANT CARVERS. The steward, being the chief carver, does not necessarily do all ; in a large hotel there is a row of carvers, from three to six, or more, all at work at once, and there can be no rule about these assistants. They may be both inside and outside stewards, some- times the second cook, for he is often set at liberty while the chef dishes up the en- trees. Sometimes the roast cook or broiler, or the meat cutter. In some hotels one of the clerks is an expert carver and assists, in others it may be a porter who regularly THE STEWARD'S HANDBOOK. 18 comes In. A very good combination is coffee maker and carver. The coffee man has plenty of employment at breakfast and supper making and serving the coffee, tea, chocolate and hot milk and slicing cold meats, but at dinner these things are un- important and the coffee man finds em- ployment at the carving table instead. THE STEWARD AND THE BILL OF FARE. Then, says our correspondent: "The steward gets up all the bills of fare." The coming steward will, but he will be a true maitre d' hotel, he will be a scholar, a man of taste and grammar, he will know more than the cook, pastry cook, baker and confectioner, all combined, about dishes and the modes of preparing them and about literary composition. There are a very few such stewards now, they make the bills of fare, therefore they rule the kitchen and make, or break, the culinary reputation of the hotel. Here is a recent paragraph from the gastronomic items of an eastern paper, that reads right : "Young turkey, split and broiled, is more delicious than spring chicken. It is a dish that is very nicely cooked and served under the supervision of Mr. R. C. Amos, the experienced and judicious steward of the Revere House, whose cuisine is getting to be much talked about and tested." That gives us the impression that it is the steward that knows what is good and the cooks are but the hands, while he is the head, that he plans and they execute, all of which is in the natural order of things and as it should be. But a person who sets up to be a steward without training and without study, and who is beholden to the cooks for his culinary information and his terms for the bill of fare, becomes little more than a tool in their hands. If he does not know more than they, he will not have their respect, and he will have no real authority. Cooks generally are not so dis- interested as to work hard v hen they are just as free to work easy. The chef can make his bill of fare so that it will take the very best endeavor* of all his assistants to get the dinner ready in time, or he can make it so that there will not be enough work to fill up the hours, for he knows which dishes are tedious and difficult to prepare and which dishes are mere child's play for their easiness, and if left alone is prone to make the easy and commonplace dinners every day; he may use canned goods almost exclusively, because they are ready prepared and makes the inexperi- enced steward his errand boy to go out con- tinually to buy him some more ready-made goods. If a new cook is brought into the kitchen he is likely to find a different set of utensils to work with, from those he was used to in the last place, and if he finds the steward inexperienced and weak he will get him to buy a new outfit for his especial benefit. The eook in such a case may be right, but it is necessary for the steward to know absolutely the merits and faults and the use of all the different utensils that he may be the judge of the needs in the par- ticular department, and discern the differ- ence between a real need and the whim of a cook. The steward who does not know this cannot take the bill-of-fare writing out of the chef's hands without being met with hundreds of objections to his own bill, on the grounds of there being no suitable pot for this, or pan for that, no time to make one dish and no material for another. THE STEWARD WHO DOES NOT KNOW. On the other hand the cooks would have good cause for complaint against any steward, inexperienced in culinary affairs, who should try to get up the bill of fare. There is a character in Shakespeare's Win- ters Tale very much like some of these un- finished stewards says he: "Three pounds of sugar; five pounds of rice; rice? What will this sister of mine do with rice? But my father hath made her the mistress of the feast and she lays it on ! I must have saffron to color the warden pies, (pear pies), mace, dates ; nutmegs seven, a race or two of ginger, (but that I may beg) ; four pounds of prunes, and as many raisins of the sun." The cooks are driven wild at time* by 14 THE STEWARD'S HANDBOOK. the immature steward's sublime uncon- ciousness that all these trifles which they ask for are of any sort of consequence, his vague idea that any time In the course of a month will do. "Turnips and carrots? what are turnips and carrots? common and cheap I don't ever eat them, who cares for turnips and carrots?" But the chef can do next to nothing without them. "Chives, shalots, leeks, thyme, what good are they ? Aniseed? What does the baker need ani- seed for, and cream of tartar, and paper and hops and potatoes? I'll try to remem- ber them sometime when I go down town." But if the chef cannot get a pound of pork or bacon at the proper time, he will have no larded fillet, nor rice-birds wrapped in bacon, and without hops for yeast the baker will have no bread. It would be use- less for an alleged steward of this sort to try to make bills of fare for the cooks to work up to. But the genuine steward knows what these workers want, even better than they do, things that they forget and forget purposely to avoid work. The old palace steamboat stewards made up their own bills of fare without consult- ing the cooks, for they knew what they had in their ice chests when the cooks did not, and they knew what they were going to have for dinner seven days ahead, and the bills of fare they sent to the kitchens to be executed drove many a cook to strong drink. A few hotel stewards are now evidently making up their bills of fare un- aided and according to ther own notions, for their menus are original in their leading features. The ordinary practice now is for the chef and pastry cook each to make out nis own part of the bill of fare and either steward or proprietor looks it over, perhaps rewrites it, possibly suggests changes, then sends it to the printer, but still that bill is the cook's and not the steward's. So, to come back to the original question : "Does the steward get up all bills of fare?" the answer is yes, when he is a better man than any of the cooks, and the coming teward will be that and higher priced. THE STEWARD IS THE OVERSEER FIRST AND LAST. The next proposition of our correspond- ent does not admit of a straight yes or no, either. It is: "It is not th{ steward's duty or his assistants', to carry from the carving room and care for the meats, etc., that may be left after the dinner is over, that duty belonging to the cook." It is the duty of the steward to see that nothing is wasted, however he may secure that end, and there is no part of a steward's duty more important to the proper conduct of a hotel than his duty to stay in the carving room or kitchen until the meal is over. Where a head cook is doing his full duty he is unable to stay there till the end ; his labor is of a sort that taxes his powers of endurance,, he begins his work early and finds no time for a recess until dinner is over, his own meals in the early part of the day are swallowed in a hasty manner, his mind being on other matters, and he is in no condition to stand at the carving table two hours and then stay till the last watch- ing what may be left over. It is the cook's trade to cook and serve the meals to the waiters, the taking care of the surplus de- volves upon somebody else. The actual carrying and putting away may be done by the second cook or the carver, but the steward is the director of the matter. In a paragraph reprinted in a former ar- ticle on this subject relating to a Saratoga hotel it is truly stated that there has to be an exercise of liberality in apportioning the quantities to be cooked, so that if fifty or sixty people extra should arrive there will still be plenty of dinner for them all. But if, on the contrary, the fifty or sixty do not arrive it is palpable that provisions suffi- cient for that many more are left over. There may be no great harm in that if the steward's watchful eye is over all to see that the house is not the loser, fo~ such things as chickens and green peas and un- cut roasts of beef are as good as new whether hot or cold for the next meal. But suppose it is the ordinary style of ho- tel where the crowd of waiters come to the THE STEWARD'S HANDBOOK. 15 carving room for the remainders for their own dinner (instead of being fed before the meal begins) they will "go for" the chicken and green peas and the uncut roast of beef, and the other remainders when they are done will be remainders still. This will be the case if the steward is not present, be- cause the carver and cooks, even the head cook, lack the power to compel the dis- charge of or to fine or suspend a waiter, they have the power only to quarrel and threaten, be at war with the headwaiter who defends his own men, and disgrace the house. The way trftse rules actually are com- promised and worked out is this; The steward who is carving and the head cook who is dit-hing up entrees and watching the demand upon his various dishes are both busy enough during the first hour of the meal. About that time the business slacks up, the orders come in slowly ; the steward says to the cook, "We are not going to need that whole ham I shall be able to pull through without cutting an- other roast that leg of mutton will not be wanted." Then the cook himself, perhaps, or the carver who will slice the cold meats for the next meal will carry them off to the refrigerator. Later, when the steward learns from the headwaiter that the last of the always-late people are in the dining room and have been served he takes a new survey. "This whole boiled fish is good for a chowder, a fish soup, a dish of scalloped fish, a dish a la Bechamel, a fish salad, fish cakes or something else, take it away and save it. That baked fish is thin, dry, will be worthless when cold, you need not keep it." If the head cook be still in sight as most likely he will be, although not carv- ing and no longer serving entrees, the steward calls him and asks him if he wants to save anything and he generally does want to save the consomme and if he has any stews or ragouts of his entrees to give away as he generally has and these things being all understood, the carver and vegetable cook may be left to serve out all that remains on the carving stand, and the second pastry cook to give away the re- mainders of pudding and perishable sweets. THE STEWARD AS A WORKER. Next: "The steward does no manual labor, but is the head and director of all matters pertaining to kitchen and dining room." In reality the hotel steward who does his full duty is the most hard-working man in the house, if not with his hands then with bis head and feet. But our correspondent was thinking about a steward's personal dignity and his keeping a dressed-up ap- pearance, and supposes that a steward never puts on an apron, nor has lo do any- thing that will soil his hands. This is all wrong; the steward never does any menial duties, yet he puts on an apron very often. Even as a buyer in bad weather the active, energetic steward, clad in a rubber coat, slouch hat and heavy mud-defying boots, does not much resemble the parlor dude which country hotel boys picture the great bossing steward to be. But that fearlesness of work does not detract from his personal dignity, but rather adds to it. The source of personal dignity is not in the hands, but in the eye; wealth alone cannot buy it, a fool cannot inspire respect; some rich chuckleheads are called "Old Billy" or Old Tommy" on all sides all their lives in spite of their unsoiled clothing. A fifty- dollar steward once objected to the writer against putting on an apron and doing some necessary thing, on the grounds that if he worked his help would not respect him any more and he could not then secure their obedience. He was not a bad man, but there was no mental or moral force in him, he had no personal dignity to spare and had to be very stingy in the use of what little he had ; and this poor man came to a very humiliating end, after all, for he was knocked down by the swill-man and carried out by the police. There was an- other steward of a different make who also took fifty dollars because it was all the situation was worth and the house could not afford to pay more, who filled in hi* 16 THE STEWARD'S HANDBOOK. time voluntarily as house carpenter, fur- niture repairer, locksmith, anything that might happen to want doing, In fact, bought for the house and cut the meats, and after all put on his good clothes and took a four hours watch as clerk in the office to relieve the proprietor, who was struggling to pay for his house, and the point of it is that whatever else might be forgot or neglected that working steward, when he came to do his carving, never failed to find his snowy apron laid ready, his towel hanging on its peg, his carving knife fresh ground and whetted, and his chair placed for him to rest, while waiting. He had his help in subjection, and had their respect, because he was a man of force of character, no matter what he might choose to do. An- other of these working stewards, another one of our New England models, though this one bears a foreign name, was for- merly a steward in the Boston Brunswick, but the writer found him in a much smaller establishment where he was at once the buyer, the store-keeper or receiver, to take In, weigh and book what he had bought, the pantryman, preparing and serving the fresh fruits in good style, the issuer of stores, the writer of the bill of fare, the preparer of the meats for cooking, then the carver and finally the keeper of the keys when all doors where closed. His was not a time of kid-gloved ease and he was well aware of the fact, but then it was only of tem- porary duration. Two different owners of large and fine hotels, hearing where he was, went personally to se him and if possible secure his services, and he went to one of those houses, as soon as he was at liberty, where he again took his position at the head of a full force of hands. Men of this sort wield a power over their subor- dinates greater than the non-workers ever can, because the hands know the steward can always get along without them ; he can take hold and help himself in a pinch. THE STEWARD MANAGES THE MEATS. Perhaps the remaining proposition dis- closes what our correspondent was really driving at in asking the manual labor question, he says: "The steward's assistant prepares all meats for cooking, but not the steward personally." This is one of the dividing points be- tween the New England type of steward and the nautical New York type. The former buys the meat, cuts it up (with assistance if necessary) hands it over to the cooks, carves it after cooking, does every- thing except the cooking of it; the other does not cut meats, but counts that the cook's duty and has what he calls a butcher cook for that work. The coming steward wilfccut meats, not all actually, but he will supervise the assistants who do, he will put the cut meats away, carry the keys of the refrig- erators, and hand the meats out to be cooked. The modern, improved, system- atized hotel organization is based upon the assumption that every man is honest when it is to his interest to be so, and temptations and opportunities to be otherwise are re- moved from the employe's as far as possible. One employe" is made to be a check and restraint upon another as far as practicable. The steward buys, the store-keeper receives and gives receipts, he issues and charges. If the cook sends an order for meat, re- ceives it, cuts and trims, cooks, carves and serves it, there is no check upon him ex- cept the uncertain one of the size of his daily bill at the store-room, nobody knows what he has done with the meat. But if the steward, carrying the keys of the re- frigerator himself, cuts up the loins of beef and sends them ready cut to the kitchen, when the tray is sent back for more while the meal is going on, the steward may say: "How have you used the meat I sent you? I sent you fifty porterhouse steaks, fifty tenderloin steaks along with one hundred common steaks, now you send for more choice steaks so early. What have you done with the others? Has your broiler spoiled them in cooking? Have you allowed them to be served to persons not entitled to them? Have you laid them away In reserve to sell to some private favorites? THE STEWARD'S HANDBOOK. 17 Have you chopped them up for your con- somme" instead of waiting and sending for a piece of coarser meat?" Such questions are never actually put in words, but the cook feels that the steward may ask them and the consciousness of restraint makes him watch the broiler and be more atten- tive to the orders as they come. As for the dinner meats, the steward will remember that he issued fifty pounds of roast yesterday, and twenty pounds was left over, therefore he issues less to-day, and holds the carver or cook responsible for that which they took charge of after yesterday's dinner. In this way the stew- ard holds the reins of government and hotel work goes on with the same precision as if it were a large factory. The hand labor of cutting up meat for hundreds of people in a large hotel is no small matter, for in some houses it keeps two active hands busy from morning till night. In such cases the steward only directs which meats to use first, and receives and locks up the product of the cutting. Steaks and chops have to be prepared in the greatest amounts. It is merely mechanical work, however, and easily learned. When a young man under the steward's instruction has learned to cut one loin of beef right he has learned how to cut all, if anything un- usual is to be done in the way of boning or trussing the took will do it himself. Con- sequently, when the hotel has not business enough to require the employment of a meat cutter exclusively, any apt hand about the house may be trained easily into doing the mechanical part of such work, the head work and managing not to lose any meat devolving upon the steward. STEWARDS NEEDED EVERYWHERE. These replies cover all the points raised by our correspondent except the statement that there are some hotels too small to employ a steward. Strictly speaking there are no such hotels. In every hotel the steward's duties are done after a fashion by somebody, it would be better if they were performed by a working steward who would fill up his time as some do by com- bining these with other duties. The proper combination is steward and head cook where there is not work enough to fully employ a steward. A very common com- bination is steward and headwaiter being oftenest the case where girl waiters are employed, perhaps from the fact that where male waiters find -such an arrangement in force -the smartest one soon sets himself up as headwaiter, and the steward being late or otherwise employed allows it. THE STEWARD AND THE LANDLADY. The recipe for getting along amicably with the proprietor's wife has hitherto been kept a profound secret; it is now divulged and is alone worth the price of this book. It is this: Make yourself thoroughly master of your business before venturing where the landlady is one of the ruling spirits, after that go in confidently and be patient. Proprietor's wives are always prejudiced in advance against the steward before he comes. They fear that their husband's importance is about to be lessened by some- body usurping his authority; the house- keeping instinct in them makes them ap- prehensive that their own prerogatives also are to be interfered with. They believe in advance that the steward is but a fraud and a pretender, and if they can prove him so he must either leave or lead a dog's life, and not a pet dog's either. But women generally worship efficiency. Let the new steward show skill and knowledge superior to her own, let him stand between the tricky traders and herself and husband, and buy better and cheaper, bring the help into a state of discipline, have the meals on time and served promptly, and secure for their house more praise for less outlay than before, and the recalcitrant landlady is soon subjugated and becomes of the opinion that a steward is the most indispensable adjunct to the hotel business and she couldn't keep house without one. THE STEWARD AND THE HOUSEKEEPER. The modern hotel is so far different from the ship and steamer that the steward 18 THE STEWARD'S HANDBOOK. docs not hire or discharge the housekeeper here as he does the stewardess there. There are a few exceptions among the largest hotels, the few that are conducted as purely mercantile establishments where the proprietor's family does not reside in the hotel, and one of the two or thre stew- ards employed purchasing steward, Inside steward or wine-room steward has ab- solute control over all the employe's outside of the office, but such is not and cannot be the general practice. The hotel house- keeper has a domain of her own. The housekeeper, the lady guests and proprie- tor's wife, who are accustomed to look to her for attentions, and the linen and laundry department are naturally affiliated together, and the steward has no business tc Intrude. He would need more than a sheriffs posse behind him who would go up stairs to discharge a housekeeper whom the landlady and lady guests liked, only to put another in her place more suitable to himself. In other words, the steward could never exercise his authority over the house- keeper if he were invested with it, without coming in direct conflict with the proprie- tress of the house. THE STEWARD AND THE HEADWAITER. "Well, thank Godl that's over," ex- claimed a headwaiter as he closed the din- ing-room doors after breakfast, "oh, but they scorched me, they burnt me up I There is no steward out there. I can't get anything out of that kitchen. My waiters go there, but never come back. The head cook does not know whether he is on his head or his feet, his men are all rattled, and the people tear me to pieces. I would not go through another such season if they would give me the house." Thus far we have considered only the principal meal of the day, the dinner, in relation to the steward's duties, but his presence during the progress of the other meals is no less important Perhaps there it no time when his supervision is felt by all to be so necessary as during breakfast the urgency of this need i* what impels proprietors themselves to assume part of the out-door duties that the steward may remain in the house; this need is what first uggests the employment of an inside stew- ard when the proprietor cannot assist. A good steward, a man of force, can get about twice as much work out of a set of waiters as they will do spontaneously if they are left alone. Although the waiters, as a class, are higher in the scale of respect- ability, there is such a similarity of method aetween the mate of a steamer and his crowd of deck hands filing past on the jang plank carrying goods on board, and the inside steward urging the waiters along during the rush of the meal, that the com- parision is irresistible. The headwaiter has no business in the kitchen or carving room except to look for his waiters when they get lost, he cannot stay there to see whether they are fooling the time away, or where the fault lies. When they pass beyond the dining room doors they are out of his power and he can only wait till the powers behind the scenes send them in to him again. And some waiters will "soldier." One of them \\ ill see with a side glance some party com- ing in whom he does not want to wait upon and he picks up a dish from a table and darts off as if he had been sent for some- thing, knowing that another waiter will have been detailed to attend that party be- fore he returns, and some old dogs at the business will manage it so that they never have more than one or two orders at a time when they ought to take six or eight. The hotel might hire fifty or a hundred waiters of this sort and still never have enough. It is the business of the steward to see through and frustrate all such tricks, and also to help the waiters along by seeing that they are not kept waiting for supplies at the pantry or fruit room, or bread or toast tables, or by the hot milk being allowed to run out, or by waiting for new supplies of meat from below that ought to be brought up in time, and a hundred other trifles which require forethought, but nobody thinks of but the head man. Then there are serious knots and snarls taking place THE STEWARD'S HANDBOOK. 19 In the kitchen. Twenty waiters are wait- Ing for their multifarious orders at once, they grow vociferous, the more energetic thrust themselves forward and secure their orders far in advance of their turn, while the quieter waiter looses his turn over and over again, and his family of people in the dining room have the mortification of seing people at the next table, who came in later, receive their breakfast promptly, eat it and depart before their own waiter even makes his second appearance. The simple re- straint of the steward's presence at such a time is often sufficient to quell the noise and correct these irregularities, if not, he insists on the taking of regular turns, and assists the cooks to know who comes next. Under such a supervision the meals are served in the least possible time, without it the results are low quarrels and confusion worse confounded, or, at the best, when the business slackens up the kitchen and neighboring departments become a play house. THE STEWARD AND HIS ADVERSARIES. The headwaiter in some hotels is a ver- itable Warwick the king-maker, he can oust the steward frequently, and cause a change of chef every month. This is oft- enest the case in what are called family hotels. It is necessary to have the head- waiter under the steward's control, to have him hired or discharged by the steward to insure thorough discipline and harmony throughout the house and for the interest of the proprietors themselves, for the ob- vious reason that when the headwaiter knows that the steward, in leaving his situation, will most likely unseat the head- waiter, too, and the new incoming steward will bring his own man, he is likely, from motives of self-interest, to help his steward to satisfy the people instead of pulling him down. The steward in any case has his pleasures of wielding authority fully bal- lanced by the pains of bearing the blame for every untoward happening or defi- ciency in the hotel. The headwaiter, who may not be under the direct control of the steward, can make things appear better or worse to the guests, as he chooses, and it is human nature to detract from another's good name rather than build it up, and in depreciating the character of the steward in the guests' estimation, he necessarily injures their estimation of the hotel and its proprietors. The peculiarity of his position in this re- gard is this: He is always a man of respect- able appearance, sometimes quite a superior man in this respect, and must be fairly well dressed. His manner is polite and his speech soft; it is his business to be attentive and appear solicitous for the comfort of the guests, and if he chooses he can become on very familiar terms with some of them, particularly with those fond of gossipping about the hotel which they are making their home, and there is no more fruitful subject for gossip than that of the table and the illiberality of those responsible for its furnishing. Encouragement from the head- waiter, such as may be conveyed by a shrug, a significant smile, a little remark that he is "sure the house pays enough to have the best" and he "can't imagine the reason that what comes in is really so unfit to set before first class people," soon leads to the current talk of the house being that the way that hotel is conducted is a dis- grace to the nineteenth century civilization, and the proprietors becoming frightened discharge the steward and chef. Then the harmless-looking headwaiter chuckles in his sleeve and softly says: "Next!" This is not a fanciful supposition. Names and instances could be given. But suppose tne headwaiter is desirous of building up instead of pulling down, how he can smooth over the temporary difficulties, softly excuse this thing being out or that expected delicacy not having arrived in time, call attention to the excellency of this dish, or the novelty of that, and promise something to come next day I THE STEWARD AND THE STOREKEEPER. Under the modern hotel system the steward does not hire or discharge the THE STEWARD'S HANDBOOK. storekeeper. The storekeeper is a clerk, he represents the proprietor in the store- room, he is employed or dismissed from service by the same authority that engages the other clerks. If not ostensibly, he is practically a check upon the steward in the proprietor's interest, and is under the con- trol of the proprietor direct He receives all goods purchased for the establishment, whether provisions or crockery, or other furnishings, or fuel or ice. He demands an invoice with every purchase from the smallest to the largest. He counts, weighs or measures everything that comes in, compares his tally with the invoice or bill, notes the quality and condition of goods as they come in, marks the discrepancies, if any, then enters the actual weight or number received in his book, lying always ready for the purpose, carries out the amount according to the price per invoice to his cash column and files the invoice or bill away for future use. At the end of each day he foots up the total amount. The hotel has a stated pay day for staple merchandise, usually twice a month, and the dealers on that day send in their bills. The storekeeper takes each bill and com- pares it with his book, and if the amounts in each are the same he attaches his signa- ture and "O. K.," and the dealer then takes it to the cashier in the front office who pays it and files away the receipt. If the amount of the bill presented is not the same as that carried out in the storekeeper's book he turns to the invoice or former bill on file and finds what he wrote upon it when the goods were received, as so many pounds short weight, so many tubs of butter be- low the grade invoiced, fifty per cent, of eggs worthless, so many pieces spoiled, so many pieces broken, etc., and explains that much to the dealer. The storekeeper only records the facts and allows payment for what he actually receives. Any difficulties that arise in consequence are between the dealer and the steward, who must settle them. When the dealer is satisfied his bill as corrected is allowed and he takes it to the cashier to be paid. When transient marketing is bought by the steward, the amounts are weighed by the storekeeper, who makes a bill of each lot, signs it, and the farmer or huckster takes it to the cash- ier's desk and receives payment at once. THE STEWARD AND HIS STOREROOM. The steward is proud of his well-stocked storeroom and spends whatever leisure time he may have in it In one sort of storeroom, now found in modern- built hotels, the steward spends most of his time while on duty, for from it he can oversee all that is going on. The storekeeper is to all intents and purposes the steward's own clerk, even his private secretary, who saves him a vast amount of care and book-keep- ing. Their relations are precisely that of employer and employ 6 and they are on the most friendly terms, the trifling fact of the storekeeper being an appointee of the front office and in a measure independent of the steward is perhaps seldom thought of by either. There are two different patterns of store- room in use and two different methods of issuing stores, just as there are two differ- ent classes of steward. The New England style of storeroom is in the kitchen itself, either built so that a part of it like a shop front opens into the kitchen while the back opens upon the street where the goods are taken in, or the room originally built as a kitchen is partitioned off that part may serve as a storeroom, and here the store- keeper remains all day, serving out goods to the different departments as they are applied for, starch and soap to the laundry, toothpicks, matches and stationary to the office, fruit, cheese, milk and bottled goods to the pantry, lemons and sugar to the bar, and all the various articles except meats needed by the cooks and bakers. He enters all the items in his book and charges them to the various departments, and the rest of his time is taken up in receiving stores, auditing accounts and taking account of stock needed to be ordered and once a month or oftener of the amount of stock on hand. In this storeroom the steward THE STEWARD'S HANDBOOK. remains during breakfast and lunch or supper, and such times as he is not carv- ing, for here he can hear every order that Is given and all that goes on in the kitchen, being ready to step out if any difficulty arises or any special rush of business, and while there he writes his letters to mer- chants and supply men, looks over his ac- counts, posts up his books, notes down the orders for supplies suggested by the store- keeper, and keeps count of the changes among the help, filling out a blank for each and handing it in to the cashier. One of our model stewards passes the most of his time that way, there being no local marketing to do in his locality, and nearly all orders for goods having to be sent by mail or telegraph He has a little box of an office in the corner of the storeroom that is less than four feet from the kitchen table, and all that is ordered at the store- room counter he hears, and sees, if he cares to, where it goes. This may not be per- fectly admirable. Perhaps neither the reader of this nor the writer would like to work under such close surveillance, yet it shows to what a point systematic hotel- keeping has been brought In this Instance, fortunately, the ever present steward is an amiable man, and if he sees his workers in their easy moments he also is with them when the crowd is in and he knows how well they earn their money. The defect In this style of storeroom is in its requiring the storekeeper to be always present, and the hotel has to be of a large size to afford one hand for that one duty. The intention under that system is that the cooks shall never have in posession more material than they need immediately, and it is easy for them, for the storekeeper becomes in effect a waiter to hand trifling amounts to them continually. On the other hand the cook can complain that he has no check upon the storekeeper when the order system is dispensed with, for he may draw fifty pounds and the storekeeper hating him may enter in his book seventy-five pounds, and so injure the cook by the apparant extravagance of his bills. By the other system the cook sends a written order to the storeroom for material and keeps a duplicate of the order himself, so that In case of an accusation of extravagance, which may loose him his situation and his character, he can appeal to his duplicate orders to see whether he has been mis- represented. The method of ordering and Issuing supplies from the other style of storeroom, distant from the kitchen, h fully detailed in another place. The de- fect of that system consists in the propens- ity of the cooks to order too much at once ; having a day's supply on hand and such apparent plenty, they use the material more lavishly than If it is counted to them pound by pound. A competent steward knows how to remedy the defects in either case, and there is not much preference to be given to one style over the other. It will be understood that the written order system can be operated as well in the open storeroom adjoining the kitchen, but, as It is so much easier and quicker to do with- out an order, It rarely or never is. THE STEWARD AND THE CARE OF MEATS. Take care of the meat, all the rest will take care of Itself. It seems most shocking to people in general to waste bread because such has been the teaching of their child- hood, but where abundance of other things besides bread is in hand, as in our hotels, the expense of meat makes that of most other items seem Insignificant by com- parison. In order to realize how like the wasting away of meat Is to that of a block of ice in the sun It has to be considered that only prime cuts of the carcass are selected in the first place. These, under the latest im- proved system, are subjected to a preserv- ing process, being dipped in a solution of which the composition is at present a secret, and, whether so treated or not, are dried, chilled and sometimes even frozen In a cold-blast refrigerator, then wrapped in several coverings of paper, packed in hogs- heads and shipped by rail or steamer to all parts of the country, usually reaching the THE STEWARD'S HANDBOOK. destination, which may be a thousand miles away, still in a semi-frozen condition. Still, this meat, when it reaches the hotel meat-cutter's block, is only raw material. There is the bone to be taken out, that is from one-fourth to one-third of its weight gone ; there is the outside to be pared off ; there is the inevitable loss of weight in cooking; there is the risk of loss through the negligence of cooks; then the cooking of too great a quantity and having it left over with the chances doubled that what is so left over will not be useful any more, and will be entirely lost. That is all under the most favorable circumstances. But the times that try a steward's effi- ciency are the unfavorable times when the meat arrives in bad condition, when the weather suddenly turns warm while the hotel meat house is full of meat, or the number of peopfe to be fed suddenly di- minishes before the stock on hand can be worked off; and other unfavorable times are those in a resort hotel where the weather is most trying and the supplies are irregular, there being at one time two or three carcasses, and barrels of poultry to be taken care of at once, and then nothing fresh for several days. The thorough steward is, however, equal to the task of meeting all these difficulties and makes of them no difficulties at all, when the un- trained and inexperienced man stands help- less, blames the weather and has the whole hotel, the kitchen, carving room and dining room for days in succession full of the sickening odor of tainted meat Here is an instance of the employment of steward's common sense which may prove serviceable. A hotel man finding, himself out of employment at the end of a summer season, bought the dining car privilege on a train carrying a very large excursion party out to an interesting part of the country on the newly built railroad. It was the last week in September, oysters in season, but still dear. The man loaded up with oysters, raw, soldered tight in cans, which came by express packed in ice. There was every prospect that the oysters would prove the favorite dish with the excursionists and he would soon sell out his stock, and such might have been the case had the weather remained cool, but it changed to summer heat again and oysters were not in demand, and, next, the train ran into a lot of game, which interested the passengers and kept them feasting until their return home. The hotel man's cases of oysters remained on hand, still in ice, but highly perishable stock. A man less accustomed to the care of provisions might have sold a few of them to the restaurants at a greatly reduced price and have lost the rest, but our steward packed the cans in an ice chest in a layer of broken ice and salt, more ice and salt on top, more cans on that and more of the freezing mixture on top of them, and the oysters were half frozen in the cans and could have been kept for weeks, but as the spell of warm weather had prevented the dealers from ordering any for a few days, the steward's frozen stock was all there was in town and he retailed them out at a good profit. An- other example: A new steward went to a city hotel in the trying time of midsummer and found that tainted meat served at table was the rule rather than the exception, and the waste of meat which became totally unfit for use with amazing rapidity was enormous. He took the meat out of the refrigerator, where they were keeping it, altogether. He had a long discarded ice chest cleaned out and a draining rack of cross pieces laid in the bottom. He placed his loins and wasts of beef and quarters of mutton on that. He bought sheets of light canvas and laid one clean washed on top of the meat, and on the canvas he spread plenty of ice. On the ice again he placed his smaller meats, lambs, poultry, tongues, sweatbreads, covering them with a sheet of canvas, and that again with ice and closed it down. Every second day he unloaded the ice chest, placed the newly killed meats at the bottom, to remain there and season and become tender, and the old stock on top to be used next, and refilled the box with ice and.occasionally had the canvas THE STEWARD'S HANDBOOK. 23 sheets washed and bleached. This going back to the old fashioned ice chest looked like retrogression, for the upright refrig- erator, where meat may hang up and keep dry in a cold atmosphere, is the later im- provement, but the requirements of differ- ent places are different and it all defends ufon hew the refrigerator is used, whether it is the best preserver of meat or not. In this case there was no more loss from spoiled meat; there was scarcely another pound thrown away that summer. Meat kept in ice is wet and in danger of becom- ing soaked and divested of some of its juices and fine flavor, but when the other alternative is a hot weather taint and the greenness of incipient decomposition, the ice box method is infinitely preferable. One more instance of very recent oc- currence may prove Instructive: A large new hotel was finished up and furnished with great liberality, as regarded the ex- pense, the desire on the part of the owners being to have everything right, the cost of it being only a secondary consideration. The refrigerator meat house was therefore built of large capacity. The upper part would hold a car load of ice at once, the lower or meat room was a good sized butcher's shop, large enough both for stor- age of a good lot of meat, and for barrels and boxes besides, and still had room left for men to work in. Yet, when the trying time of blazing hot days and sultry nights came the refrigerator utterly failed of its purpose and the meats spoiled in it with frightful rapidity, the choicest and costliest imported roasts and loins having to be thrown away by the hundreds of pounds at a time. This was largely owing to the incapacity of the cook, but the immediate cause was the too frequent opening of the refrigerator both at top and bottom, the general arrangements being insufficient for the needs of the house, and the one large receptacle being made a place of half-hourly traffic. Hot air was admitted every time the door was opened and the ice sometimes was diminished to a small quantity, hence the meat spoiled quicker than if it had never been chilled at all. The remedy applied in this case was the removal of everything but the fresh meats and, there being no other ice house, the providing of a pile of blocks of ice buried in sawdust outside, to be drawn from for every other purpose, and the refrigirator was then kept strictly closed spite of all excuses and reasons to the contrary, and then it proved effective for its purpose. The steward who has meats to manage that are not select and not shipped in to him ready trimmed avoids loss by attend- ing to the selection at once as soon as it arrives. He has the shanks, flanks, necks and breasts cut off and consigned while fresh and untainted to the soup boiler, to the salt beef barrel, to stews and meat pies, holding back live poultry and things that will keep till these perishable goods are used up, and packs away the choice cuts in refrigeratort or ice boxes in which there is plenty of room and of ice through the roughness having been first disposed of. The other possible sources of loss of meat, which the steward has to watch, are the great stock boiler, the cook's roaring fire, the gaping swill barrel and the surrep- titious back door basket. Of these the stock boiler is the most ravenous and con- sumes the house's substance with the most harmless and innocent expression of coun- tenance and the most plausible excuses and the promise to give it all back, which it seldom does. The roaring fire may be satisfied to take tainted or dirty meat, the swill barrel will be content with cold cooked joints, but the hungry stock boiler will consume a hundred pounds of the freshest meat and relieve the cook of all trouble of working it up, and then return nothing but a consomm6 which nobody cares for, and which will be rejected even in the officers' dining room where it is that or none. THE STEWARD AND HIS MANAGEMENT OF HELP. A new steward cannot get along with old help. Such is the rule. The old hand 24 THE STEWARD'S HANDBOOK. all think they know more than he possibly can know, they do not want to do new ways, they feel disposed to tell him, he be- ing a stranger, how they do and how he ought to do, instead of looking to him for direction. When the old hands are good and worth keeping the proper way to do is to call them up, one at a time, offer to pay them off and turn them over to the new steward, for him to hire them over again if he wants them and if they want to re- main. It may be productive of temporary inconvenience to have any of them leave, but It is far better in the long run, for it is a formal investment of the new officer with his proper authority, without which he can not run the back part of the house accord- ing to his best ability. When a head cook leaves his second expects to leave, too, or be discharged; only a few exceptional men in that position ever remain without the formality, at least, of being paid off and be- ginning anew under the new head cook. So in the case of a new steward ; the head cook and headwaiter expect that their situ- ations will be wanted for new men of the steward's own, and if they are expected to remain it is best to go through the same formality with them and let them all begin anew. In most cases where a new steward comes in it is to be inferred that either there was no steward employed there be- fore, or else there has been laxity of ad- ministration or corruption or misdoing which has led to the change being made. Then it is most desirable all around that "a clean sweep" should be made. Let the really good hands come back alter a time and be hired over again. This rule is good and even necessary, as has been observed already in the case of the headwaiter, for if each hand's place depends upon the dur- ation in office of the steward, each one will be more likely to uphold him and his rules than tb oppose him. As a measure of defense when he is but one against BO many, the steward keeps other hands in view continually. Perhaps he finds it convenient to keep in communi- cation* with an employment agency, more especially for the finding of the commoner sort of help, who are alway changing their situations. He does not seek to be popular with his help. It is not good business policy for the steward, or head cook either, to let the help praise them too much. The head cook is a little less bound, he may let his men have a half day off by turns, considering that ' hey have no Sunday, but the steward can not afford to make any such concessions of his own accord. The least familiarity leads the help to ask favors in food or holi- days, or drawing pay out of pay times, and if the steward yields in any case his power is broken. He decides according to the kind and style of hotel whether the waiters shall have their meals in their special dining room before the guests' meal time arrives, or whether they shall eat after the meals are over, he also fixes the time for meals for all the other hands, then posts up the rules and the notice with them that they will loose their meals if they do not come within half an hour of the time specified. The steward, after consulting the cook, fills out a printed blank bill of fare each day for the officers' dining room, which takes in at its several tables the clerks, housekeeper, linen keeper, engineers, car- penter, barkeepers and various others. If there are two soups, this bill of fare has one allotted to it, fish, perhaps, and one or two kinds of meat, and in all about half the variety which goes to the guests, and all expensive extras are omitted. A similar selected bill of fare is allotted to the nurses and children's ordinary. As regards the discharge of the hands under the head cook and headwaiter, the steward who sees they are idle, inefficient, or not longer needed requests the head cook or headwaiter re- spectively to dismiss them, and it is ex- pected that they will at once comply with the request since it is but a matter of cour- tesy to them. But for all flagrant offences such as drunkenness, using profane and obscene language, gambling within the house, insulting females, insolence to THE STEWARD'S HANDBOOK. guests and patrons of the house and the like, the steward instantly discharges any hand without ceremony. Fines are im- posed in some cases for minor delinquen- cies and under some circumstances the direlict hands are suspended from employ- ment and thrown upon their own expenses temporarily. It is the steward's duty to ask of every strange face that appears is his depart- ments why it is there, to watch that no idlers are admitted and to be sure that every hand hired is at once entered in his book ; name, for what purpose employed, wages, date. A copy of this memorandum he transfers to a printed blank and hands it in to the cashier. When a hand is to be paid off, he fills out another printed blank, with date, name, time due that is, not days, but such a part of a month at so much per month occupation, or what class of service the money is paid for, signs it as steward and sends the hand with it to the cashier's desk to be paid. THE STEWARD AND THE HANDS' PAY DAY. All rules are off where there is no re- gular pay day. The hotel that is in debt to the help is in a bad way; they break away from the restraints of dicipline, work but to suit themselves and always have it in mind to say : "If I don't suit you pay me off!" and in such a house the steward has no business. The good hotel rule is to have a set day each month when the wages due is handed to each and every employd of the house in a sealed envelope, superscribed with the Individual's name and the amount of the contents. Most hotels pay on the tenth of the month, paying up to the first and holding back ten days' pay until the hand leaves finally and then the ten days reserve is paid. Some proprietors choose the fifth for pay day, keeping back only five days' pay; a few choose the fifteenth, keeping back half a month. Some of the largest hotels, however, have two pay days each month, as the third and seventeenth, or fifth and twentieth. For several reasons the tenth of the month is the best day, and the ten days' pay always retained till the hand leaves is sufficient restraint. Were the employe's paid up in full they would fre- quently leave the hotel without a word of notice. If paid on the fifth they frequently sacrifice the five days pay due them in order to get away without giving notice, or find- ing a substitute to take their place. When finally paid off by the steward the ten days' reserved pay very frequently is all they have saved to live upon until they find new employment, and its retention until such a time is a real benefit to them. On the morning of the pay day, or on the day before in a large hotel, the steward looks over his time book, notes time lost by absence, by sickness, fines, money drawn (which can only be drawn through another blank filled out by the steward), and any other remark; sets down the amount due against each name, with particulars, and hands the list to the cashier, who compares and corrects his own books accordingly, and at a convenient time the help are ordered to go to the cashier's, window all at once and are paid, the steward standing by to identify each one if necessary. In the smaller hotels, however, the steward or a clerk goes around and hands the en. velopes to the owners without their having to leave their work. THE STEWARD AND THE CLERKS. The steward, having to count the cost of meals, cannot make up his estimates, nor complete his accounts, without a daily house count from the office made up as is fully detailed in this book in another place. He therefore applies to the clerks for such house count, not as a favor, but as his right and their duty. Usually the night clerk makes the count before breakfast, if he fails the steward applies to the chief clerk to have the remissness corrected. It is the duty of the chief clerk or the proprietor, as the case may be, to notify the steward of the expected arrival of any unusual num- ber of people to be entertained that he may provide accordingly, and in like manner to 26 THE STEWARD'S HANDBOOK. warn him of the departures that he may reduce hih kitchen estimates in proportion. THE STEWARD AND THE PROPRIETOR. "And what shall / be doing all this time!' 1 some proprietor will ask, who has read thus far. Well, there was once a very handsome and popular hotel proprietor, whom the writer knew, sitting on the piazza among his guests and one of them asked him about something in the back of the house and why he had it so. "Well, sir," said the proprietor, "I have a steward, an excellent man, and very capable to attend to all those matters, and I think I build up my business better and make more money by remaining in front and looking nfter the comfort and pleasures of my guests, than I could by hiding myself away in the interior and leaving you all to the small share of attention you would get from the over-worked clerks. Whatever is worth doing is worth doing well. I give my steward entire charge of the inside of the house and do not interfere with him, and I take entire charge of the front my- self." There was nothing very striking in this reply, but it outlines the chief duty of the proprietor to himself as he understood it. Very few men are adapted by nature to be at once a genial host in the front and an austere disciplinarian inside the house. At present, it is true, a great number of proprietors are performing the more re- sponsible part of the steward's duties, be- cause they have no steward, and the head cook is trying to do the rest. The effect will be when every hotel has its real stew- ard in his proper place that there will be fewer managers, assisstant managers, clerks and men of mixed duties, there will be more cooks and fewer chefs. The relation of the hotel steward to the landlord is the same now as the land stew- ard of scriptural days w as to the land owner ; he gives an account of his stewardship. Under the modern hotel system the steward comes to the proprietor's private office with his books or transcripts of them In hand and shows what it is costmg per meal and per da\ to rut the house in- pn -em st\ 1> His accounts, properij K. j- show at a g.ance: How many people were in the house to-day. How many meals where served. How much value of material the meat cook used. How much the pastry cook used. How much the pantry man or wom.n used. How much the head laundress used. How much the office force used. How much the barkeeper used. How much these amounts are above or below the average. How much per meal it cost for all hands. How much it cost for the guests. Cash value ol stock in store room this night THE INSIDE STEWARD'S SPECIAL DUTIES. Where there is too much work for one steward two are employed. The purchas- ing steward not having time to remain in the kitchen and carving room Juring the two or three hours of each meal the inside steward steps in. The duties are not differ- ent from what has been already detailed, but they are divided between two and the inside is the second, if one must rank the other, the purchasing steward having charge of the accounts and the cost per meal and per day of running the house, while the inside steward has immediate control of the kitchen and dining room. The special need of an inside steward is most apparent when a hotel has a number of private dinners, suppers and banquets to get up as a part of the regular business. Then the inside steward is the one to be con- sulted upon the subject of the menu for each occasion. He is required to be acquainted with all dishes, wines and the etiquette of the table. He decides the choice of viands, knowing which are in season and which are most suitable for the time, due regard being had to the amount of money the purchaser wishes to spend. The inside steward is more than a headwaiter and supersedes him in many cases, for the in- side steward enters the dining room and THE STEWARD'S HANDBOOK. 27 has the private dinners served under his own supervision and management. THE WINE-ROOM STEWARD'S SPECIAL DUTIES. Wine stewards are employed in hotels where a large bar and banquet business is done. It is the duty of this steward to have his store-room open, very much like the kitchen store-room, during meal times and be ready to hand out the bottled wines, liquors, ales, mineral waters, etc., to the waiters, according to the orders written on the cards and signed by the headwaiter, which they bring to him. He buys wines, etc., for the house by the barrel and bottles them ; perhaps rectifies, mixes, compounds, bottles and labels various spirits and cor- dials. He issues supplies to the bar and books the amounts the same as the store- keeper issues material to the kitchen, and he issues to the store-room supplies of liquors to be used in cooking, and wines and beer allowed to the cooks for their meals, where such is the rule, and charges the same to kitchen store-room like any outside merchant. He also has charge of the cigars and tobacco for the bar. He mixes and sends up from his cellars ready for use the champagne cups, claret cups, punches and the like required for the priv- ate parties taking place in the house, and sends the bill of the amount at once to the cashier to be charged in the guests' bills. THE STEWARD AND THE DAIRY. The steward having in charge the fur- nishing of the table is responsible for the quality of the milk and for the furnishing of cream for the coffee, oatmeal and berries, etc., holding somebody else responsible to him. It is good for the hotel, its table and reputation when it has a regular dairy de- partment in connection with the proper conveniences and a dairy woman to attend to it Where such is not the pleasant state of affairs the steward establishes rules of management of the daily supply of milk furnished to the hotel to such effect that the cream from it will be secured for the coffee, making the purchase of cream so much the lighter expense, and allowing only the skimmed milk to be used for culi- nary purposes. Generally some hand can be found among those already employed who has a special aptitude for taking care of the milkr Sometimes it is the pantry girl, sometimes the coffee maker or the storekeeper. THE STEWARD AND THE DISH-ROOM. The steward is directly responsible (hold- ing somebody else responsible to himself) for the appearance of the crockery and glassware as it goes to table. The dishes, cups and saucers and all the rest must be bright and spotless, not showing marks of being smeared over with a wet and much used towel, but shining with the polish left by clear and very hot water, the glassware the same. The cream pitchers and water pitchers need special watching that the inside be well cleansed. The steward also watches the dishes as they pass him com- ing from the kitchen to see that there are no thumb marks and spalterings of gravy on the edges. He has to see that the dishes after wash- ing are covered up and effectively secured from flies and dust. He is responsible also for the dishes being kept warm, in a dish-heater or other- wise, and makes rules against the waiters and others destroying dishes by placing them to get hot upon the range. Accordingly he has shelves, closets, draining racks, warm closets, dry towels, mosquito net coverings, and all such ap- pliances made in the manner best adapted to the particular circumstances of his house. The dishwashers, pantry woman, scrub- bers, ice man and yard man are directly under the steward's control, to hire and dis- charge them without reference to any heads of departments whatever. The better the hands he can secure in these menial situations the lighter will be his cares. THE STEWARD AND HIS WORKSHOPS. The basement story of some large hotels resembles a small factory where each trades- man is doing his part towards the comple- 28 THE STEWARD'S HANDBOOK. tion of some immense work, and a great number of trades it takes to keep up and supply the needs of a large hotel. In one of these rooms is a soap maker and assist- ants, and the necessary tanks, boilers, presses and drying room, all furnished with steam heat. The soap maker not only makes the common sorts for the laundry and for the floor scrubbers to use, but makes fancy toilet soap for the guests' rooms, the name of the hotel stamped on each cake. In 'another room the hotel con- fectioner superintends the making of the jellies and preserves for the house, there being one or two assistants employed in these operations, and at other times in the same room the pickles, catsups, chow-chow and sweet pickles are made, and there is an occasional canning and bottling of fruit^ and vegetables from the hotel farm, when the ripening season is on. Further on the furniture repairer is at work with cabinet makers' tools and glue, and a turning lathe and scroll saw are in motion close by ; then there is the blacksmith's shop adjoining the engine room, then the great engine that, perhaps, operates the elevator, keeps the laundry machinery In motion and whirls the ice-cream freezers, and another engine for the electric light The meat-cutting room is very likely to be found in this base- ment story, and the oven where the loaf bread is baked, the pastry oven having to be upstairs and near the dining room as the kitchen is, for convenience of service. All of these are under the control of the pur- chasing steward except the engineers, and he must purchase fuel also for them. The fruit and sugar for the confectioner, the materials for the cabinet maker and for the soap maker, and whatever other trades may be there are all, in these largest estab- lishments, purchased by the steward, and the hands are accountable to him for their time and quality of workmanship, the same as in the eating and drinking departments above. Thus It is seen the steward, whether he be trie man-of-all-work in the smallest ho- tels, or whether multiplied into three or four of one name in the largest, is the real operative hotel keeper. And yet some hotels have no steward I WHEN THE STEWARD'S GOOD TIME COMES. Compare the actual duties of the thor- ough hotel steward, as they have been de- tailed, with the ideas of those who think they will, as stewards only have to go to market, buy something and make their own little "per cent.", walk around the house a time or two and then sit down in a shady corner and doze the happy hours away, and the discrepancy between fact and fancy will be found so great as almost to take away the hope that truly efficient stewards ever can be made out of such poor material as usually offers. Nor does there seem to be much encouragement for more capable men to undertake duties so arduous, unless they will look further into it and behold the perfected hotel and its system of working departments running with the smoothness and certainty of a great factory, wheel within wheel, and he himself the directing head of all. A man cannot be steward of a hotel and give it a divided attention it takes up all his thoughts. He cannot be steward and take an interest in politics, nor write a book, nor a play, nor carry on a business of his own down town. Stewarding is of all things a thoughtful occupation. Every individual that meets the steward in the hotel wants something something to be purchased, to be re- membered, to be tried for and not secured, and tried for in another quarter. Every individual the steward meets has to be an object of his mental inquiry, has to be thought over in regard to duties and con- duct. Every hour of the day has its special claim upon the thoughts of the steward, from market hours to meal hours, train times, mail times and appointments. Every individual in the house blames the steward for something, either openly or covertly, from the scullions, who complain that the steward's soap will not cleanse anything, that his matches will not light and his stove wood is wet and will not make a fire, THE STEWARD'S HANDBOOK. through all the departments of fault-finders to the dyspectic guest in the distant room, who blames him for the butter or syrup or meat or bread not being to her liking, or for the failure to find a special something in market that was not there to find. Yet, spite of all this, a man who can govern himself and therefore can govern others, may have a moderately easy time as steward of a good hotel. He may be like that one of our model stewards men- tioned, as sitting in his office in the corner of the store-room within four feet of the kitchen table. He has telephone connec- tions in his office and speaking tubes to the different departments. His storekeeper is an able second to him and needs no watch- ing. His head cook is thoroughly efficient and reliable, can govern his kitchen and needs no watching, his pastry cook the same. The head waiter is one of the best, is on the most friendly terms with the steward and cooks, and hib well-trained waiters are assiduous in their efforts to please the guests and are free from all the faults which some waiters need watching for. The house is prosperous, the business is steady, each one employed does his or her part; there is no noise, no quarelling, no friction anywhere. This is the easy condition reached through the firm enforcement of rules and the steady weeding out of poor help and replacement with better, and the encourage- ment of well-doing by trifling promotions and judiciously bestowed words of praise. Then the steward takes his hour or two of recreation in the evening without the fear of a strike among the waiters, or of a desertion of cooks, or unmade fires and late meals to wear him out in the morning, and his thoughts run out to the pleasanter prospect of securing- the first strawberries of the season or a new variety of fish for his next menu, and occasionally he finds time to bestow a pitying thought upon any man, who has not yet found out that the hotel he stewards for and his table are the best in the world. WHO SHALL BE STEWARDS? Every hotel being in want of a real steward, and only a small number being at present supplied with such, it is evident that, when the stewards do come to their own again, they will crowd out some- body that is now standing in their shoes. They will crowd out the "assistant man- ager."- There is no such a thing as an assistant manager, the man so called is occupying the steward's place without do- ing the steward's hardest work. They will crowd down the present crop of chefs and make head cooks of them. There is no such word as chef in the English lan- guage, nor in American-English. When a head cook becomes such an object of re- spect that he must be named in italic print and made conspicuous in that way all over a newspaper page, it shows that he is more than head cook, he is a grade above, and that grade in English is steward ; in French also, it is steward, the French cAefis equiv- alent to American steward. The French cook is le cuisinier. The French chef -de- cuisine is the chief of kitchen, he is more than cuisinier, he is the managing, meat- cutting, carving, bill-of-fare writing, wine serving, kitchen-governing man, known to the American hotel system as steward. The French chef of to-day is the same as the maitre 'd* hotel of a century ago. Maitre d' hotel is literally master of the house; every French nobleman's house used to be called hotel, his steward was his maitre d' hotel. We are accustomed to reading in English of Ude, Vatel, Marin, Bechamel, and others being cook to such a king or prince, but the French reading is not cook, but maitre d' hotel, steward something higher than cuisinier the same thing, in fact, as our working and govern- ing stewards, who can invent dishes and show others how, if need be. The old term maitre d' hotel seems to have dropped out of use, the French now have only chefs chiefs of the kitchen, with all that it im- plies. Jules Gouffe" was called, and called himself, chef to the Paris jockey club, but THE STEWARDS HANDBOOK. he was far more than a cuisinier he was wine steward and an authority on wines; he was an authority on confectionery, canning and preserving, and on meat cook- ing as well. That is the sort of man he understood a chef\o be the same as a mo?t accomplished working steward is with us. Are the head cooks of ihe generality of hotels that sort of men? If not, why call them chefs in italic conspicuousness? If there are some such why not apply the English word and call them stewards? CAefis generally thought to mean cook. Steward is a title of higher rank, and those who deserve it ought to wear it. PROMOTE THE GOOD COOKS. There is no school wherein a young man can learn thoroughly the masterful duties of the hotel steward but the live hotel itself. There are three departments in which the business may be learned. From waiter to headwaiter and then steward may do very well. From storekeeper to steward is better. From head cook to steward is best, and is in the natural course of promotion. A superior class of young men have come into the hotel cooks' ranks of late years. They are no longer the corner loafers and drunken castaways, the ignor- ant, profane and obscene outcasts, who secure the good places in the hotels. Many of the cooks, who write to hotel papers, now write good business hands and can indite a good letter, they give evidence of having received a good common school education in most cases, in some instances they ex- hibit much more than that. These are adapted to become stewards. They have been attracted to the hotel cook's occupa- tion by the liberal scale of wages offered for efficient men in that line, and they find, on trial, that the hotel cook is not a servant, but a master mechanic who has a chance of next becoming a superintendent or stew- ard. Some among these are total abstainers from strong drink, or else have control over themselves to resist excess. They are readers, and quick to detect ridiculous blunders in a bill of fare. Some of them cherish that principle of free citizenship which makes them scorn to sell their vote for a bribe, and the same principle will prevent their selling their independence to any trader for a bribe. They know the best article in market when they "see it, and they want it wherever it can be found, and they wear nobody's collar and buy no- body's stale merchandise. These are the coming stewards. There is no other train- ing so good to make stewards as the cook's training. A man who can govern the kitchen can govern all the rest of the interior, and the man who as head cook has had experience of all kinds of provi- sions and has practiced writing the bill of fare, is a steward almost already. Such men should be promoted to the position of the sort of steward that has been described in the foregoing pages; not promoted to the lower rate of compensation which stewards now generally are receiving, but promoted to still higher salaries than the chefs are getting, with all the honor, auiiiority and responsibility of stewardship superadded. HOW STORES ARE ISSUED AND CHARGED. The proprietor of a hotel of small or medium capacity generally has no patience with the "red tape" methods of making requisitions, booking and checking and counter-checking, which he may hear are practiced in metropolitan establishments; he says: "if I didn't think my man was honest I would not have him in my house; if he is determined to steal from me he will steal anyhow, and blank forms to fill out would have no effect; my way is to hire none but those whose honesty I have confidence in, and then I trust them im- plicitly and let them know that I trust them." Those are the pleasant sort of men to deal with, and theirs are the houses where employer and employe's are like one family. The strict rules are not for them. But take the big city hotel where some 200 hands are employed and some among them leave every week and strange faces take their places, and the united family feature disappears and, instead, a system as hard and unsentimental prevails as any THE STEWARD'S HANDBOOK. 31 that governs a company of miners or mill operatives. No sympathy exists between the lowest grade of workers in the various hotel departments and employers, who each apper to be seeking to take advantage of the other whenever an opportunity occurs. In such houses all the doors are guarded. One bears the notice "No admittance to see the help under any circumstances." Another says, "You are not allowed to re- main in the store-room." Another, "You will be discharged if you come in here without permission." There the coffee- maker must count the number of cups he serves out and on no account give out a cup to any employe" without express per- mission, the fruit room and pantry goods are all guarded with the same strictness and a watch is kept upon the hands em- ployed in them, the sarr.e as upon the coffee- maker. Even where a more cordial feeling exists the great number of employe's makes a personal acquaintance impracticable, much less individual trust, and a strict and formal accounting in every department is adopted as a measure of the sternest necessity. The genial hotel keeper who objects most strongly to those "red tape" measures and is slowest to buy the necessary blanks and books, after once becoming accustomed very seldom abandons them. As to how much of them should be adopted in any given size of house, must of course depend upon the disposition of the proprietor and the degree of personal attention he gives the business. The two different styles of hotel store room have been already de- scribed. Apart from the question of which is the better, many of the largest and best conducted houses have no ro >m for a store room in connection with the kitchen, it musl be in the basement because the plan of building did not allow for it upstairs. In such places the chief cook, the pastry cook, the head waiter, the housekeeper, the chief clerk and, perhaps, the barkeeper and other heads of departments write a requisi- Beef Loin, 18 Ibs. " Roast 18 " " Butts 21 " Mutton 6 " Veal 16 " Pork.. 18 " Fish 10 " Butter, table " kitchen Coffee. __ __ _ 3^ " 2 " i, l A " Tea _ 4 OZ. S^rup i quart. Milk 4e p alis Lard 2 Ibs. Oatmeal \y~ Grits 4 " Sugar cut loaf " powder " help's Mackerel 4 " 4 " 2^ " 10 " EiJS 6 doz tion for the day's or half-day's supplies in a printed blank like this: HOTEL BELVIDERE, Nov. 24, 188. Storekeeper deliver to bearer: JOHN SMITH, Chef. The blank book from which this is torn has a duplicate form, which the chief cook, or other requisitionist, fills out with the prices and total, as follows, and keeps it: HOTEL BELVIDERE, Nov. 24, 188. Storekeeper delivered to bearer: Beef Loin 18 \bs.@igc. " Roast. _. 1 8 8c. " Butts 21 ' pc. Mutton 6 ' 9c.- 3 i i i i i i i i 42 4 89 54 04 17 80 05 40 05 15 15 20 22 6 12 36 36 IS 30 20 Veal 16 6%c. Pork 18 ' by 2 c. Fish 10 8c Butter, table.. 3J ' 3oc. " kitchen 2 ' 2oc. Coffee _. 3^ ' 3oc. Tea - ._ 4 oz. @ 6oc. Syrup i qt. @ 6oc. Milk . ._ 4gal@3oc. Lard 2 Ibs @iic Oatmeal __ \% " 40. Grits 4 " 3c. Sugar cut loaf. 4 " gc. " powder - 4 " pc. " help's 2% " 6c. Mackerel 10 " 30. Eggs 6doz@2oc. $16 87 JOHN SMITH, Chef. 82 THE STEWARD'S HANDBOOK. It may be asked : "What does the chief cook want with the duplicate, when the goods have been entered in the storekeep- er's books before he receives them?" The answer is, it Is a part of the unsentimental system of making one employe* act as a restraint and a check upon another. The \v; te r s on watch cannot close up and leave the dining-room until the missing knife or Spoon has been found or charged up to eome delinquent; the chambermaid cannot get a clean towel from the linen-room un- til she brings the dirty one to be exchanged for it. It has been shown how the steward becomes a check upon the cook and the storekeeper upon the steward, and now the cook, and indeed each other one who makes requisitions, becomes a check upon the storekeeper. The supposition acted upon Is that the bar- keeper might send for five pounds of sugar and the storekeeper might enter it in his book ten pounds; or the cook might draw twenty pounds of meat and the storekeeper might enter it thirty and might then thiow five pounds of sugar and ten pounds of meat out of the window, without coming out short at the monthly stock-taking. Without looking as far as that, the cook keeps the duplicate accounts for self-pro- tection, because the steward will come to him at night and say, "Your bill to-day was twenty dollars more than yesterday; the proprietor will expect an explanation, do you know what made the difference?" and the cook will want to know whether he has been subjected to an overcharge in the store-room and will look over his own account for that and the preceding day to see how it was, for it is to be observed that an unaccountable increase in the store-room bills fastens upon the cook the accusation of extravagance which he does not wish to incur. The pastry cook, baker, confec- tioner, pantryman and every other one who draws supplies is In the same position as regards their daily accounts, though none have such large amounts to answer for as the chief cook. THE STOREKEEPER MUST RISE EARLY. One of the most serious of the minor difficulties is connected with the issuing of supplies early in the morning. If the bakers and cooks get a late start, not only will the breafast be ill-cooked and short of some of the dishes which the bill of fare promises, but they scarcely will catch up with their work during the whole day. The bakers want material to use at four o'clock in the morning, the subordinate cooks need nu- merous things such as oatmeal, lard, pota- toes, cracker-dust, onions and potatoes to get their respective shares of the work of preparation done before the head cook comes. The requisitions for the several de- partments have been written out the night before, and when the storekeeper throws open the doors, there is a rush of work upon him, and while he is weighing, measuring and booking the supplies issued, a valuable half-hour qr more is lost, per- haps, by each of a dozen hands, and if he is late himself the trouble is so much the more serious. It is contrary to good hotel rules and to good policy to issue the stores over night, the store-room is the place provided to keep such property locked up in. But to facilitate the morning issues the good rule is to have the requisitions from kitchen and bakery sent down over night, together with the pans and pails to hold the goods, the storekeeper fills the orders and books the amounts before closing up, and when the doors are opened next morn- ing the stores can be handed out without delay. STORE-ROOM HOURS. In every well r*egulated hotel there are four times in the day, periods of one hour each, when stores are issued, after that the store-room doors are locked, and it must be something very urgent to make them open again before the next regular time. This rule is necessary to prevent the store- keeper's time being consumed by a con- stant doling out of trifles, it makes the cooks and others think what they are going to want and make one order of It. For the THE STEWARD'S HANDBOOK. 83 storekeeper has much else to do besides Issue provisions as has been already shown, and must close his doors in order to do his book-keeping, receiving, auditing accounts and stock-taking. The times of issue aie early in the morning and then just alter each meal, or, rather, while each mea5 is in progress he issues for the next meal, be- cause it is absolutely necessary that he shall be in the store-room during meals, to be ready to issue special goods which may be unexpectedly needed for some par- ticular orders. , THE STORE-ROOM ISSUE BOOK. The following pages show three differ- ent ways of keeping the issue book. The first is for a written book, an ordinary blank journal will answer, and the storekeeper will draw a line or two on each page as he uses it. The requisitions which come from the different departments repeat themselves every day in the great majority of items, only varying in the amounts called for, thus, the cook always call for the staple meats, fish, poultry, butter, lard, potatoes, etc., and the pastry cook or baker always repeats flour, meal, sugar, butter, lard, eggs and the other staple needs. Therefore the storekeeper when he uses a written book, takes advantage of leisure opportunities and goes several pages ahead and writes in their proper lines the names of such daily staples as is seen in the first specimen page, but leaves vacant lines to write in such articles as are only called for occasion- ally, then when the issues are made he only has to write the number of pounds of the staples instead of the whole line. The specimen pages here following show the rest. It will be observed that a comparison of the totals of the bills run up by any de- partment, can be had instantly by turning over the pages of the account book. The storekeeper of the medium size hotel from whose written pages the two follow- ing are copied, has not added the prices o( articles as he went along, as the frequent repetition of the same items, and his thor- ough acquaintance with everything through his other duty of booking the purchases and examining bills and prices made such itemization unnecessary. He knew that the cost of kitchen butter was fourteen cents per pound, and set down the five-and- a-half pounds at seventy-eight cents, avoid- ing superfluous writing. The four separate entries of butter in the same line show that a requisition for that commodity was sent from the kitchen each time that the store- room was opened. As various forms are used in different hotels the specimens on pages 36 and 37 are subjoined for the purpose, principally, of showing how numerous the articles are which are required to stock the storeroom of a large hotel. These pages are copies, reduced in size, of the ready-printed requisi- tion lists of one of the largest hotels, a house capable of accommodating one thou- sand guests at once. It is not, however, a pattern to copy after as regards its interio organization. These printed lists are in- tended to serve the double purpose of saving the time of the chief cook and the baker, by giving them the least possible writing to do and to take away the excuse of forgetfulness and frequent sending to the storeroom by enumerating almost every possible thing that can be wanted. When these requisitions have been filled and the stores issued, the items and amounts are copied from them into a book as in the other case, at the storekeeper's first oppor- tunity. Any party who may be concerned in the opening of a new hotel may find it profitable to go over these lists attentively before deciding that their storeroom it completely stocked and ready. 34 THE STEWARD'S HANDBOOK. Friday, December 77, 1^88. KITCHEN. Loins _ ___ i 2 I I I I I 5 00 28 71 26 oo 78 oo 30 64 54 20 5o 54 24 20 18 10 13 40 oo 60 06 06 00 20 18 28 25 oo 78 15 23 75 10 05 Bro't forward __ __ $22 3 I 69 oo 20 20 15 2 4 45 28 10 24 25 35 12 8 4 IO 2O 13 50 25 02 Chocolate __ Roast 16 Chickens, 20 16 - _ Butts, 15 14 Apples ._ Lamb, 8 10 Wine, Yi Veal C. Fish, 4 Ib. Pork, 12 Oysters " Salt Potash, 4 Liver, 4. Salt, Brine, 15 Sausage, 8 Kraut, 3 _ Hams, 14 - Turnips, ^ Tongues, i L. Peas, ? .. Bacon, 5 Barley, i^ Fish, 10 12 Turkeys, 4. _ Mackerel, 8 Macaroni, ^ Onions, i ._ F. Peas __ Cabbage, 10 Oil, i Parsley, i C. Berries, i Irish Potatoes % i Mushrooms, i Sweet " i Candle, Hall, i .. Corn $3i 3i Tomatoes i i Grits, A._ Oat Meal, i^_ _ .. Corn " Coffee, VA -iV, Tea, 2 4 Rice, 4 VV. Sugar, i 2 i Brown Sugar . Butter, i \y z 2 i Lard, 2 Milk i Eersrs, 10 <; 10 Soap, i i Soda, i $22 69 THE STEWARD'S HANDBOOK. 35 BAKERY. Friday, December n, 1888. D. ROOM. C. Meal, 8. 12 Nuts,3 4S Milk, 4 QO Raisins, 3 . 4C Eggfs, 6 \ 2 O7 Oransres, c "\ Q6 Butter, 4 60 Apples 20 Lard, 3 21 W. Sugar oo W Sugar 6 4.2 C L " 4 4 4 Pow'd " 6 5 B. " 2 1/ 2>/ 20 Brown" 4 26 P. ' oo C.Loaf " oo S Milk 4.3/ 4. c 08^ Brandy, ^ __ 1C B " 125^ Molasses, ^ IO Butter. 114 V4 114 2 62 Apples, 5 2C Syrup i i 2r> Pumpkin, i __ ' }S Cheese i fy( 2O Currants, 3 24 Preserves, 3 _-. 77 Salt, 12 08 Crackers 2 12 ck o ling es n hand, mor- Issues TURKISH BATH >ck on hand, night Total Issues 47 76 Total ] ward Receip 1 Total Is Issues 1 Stock o ning Receipts for- 2318 56 185 20 2503 1629 76 _72_ 04 .s to-day fotal___ sues forward to-day 1581 96 47 7 6 rotal.. n hand, mor- 736 60 i37 44 8 74 Add Stock on hand, eve- ning Mornin Averag Actual Actual g Count e Cost. ._ 37 127 34-8 Meal Count- Average Cost A blank book of unusually large size is required for the elaborate method of keeping the store room accounts shown on preceding pages, in fact it is intended for both storekeeper and steward or manager to make entries; the former carries out his own part showing the amount of the daily issues etc., and the steward using l nk of another color (to show which were his own entries, in case of dispute) fills in the number of meals served and the cost per head. As in such a case the storekeeper is almost sure to use a commoi memorandum book to make his entries in first, at the time of issue, and copy it into the big book after- wards the objection of " double trouble " will be made everywhere but in the larg- est hotels and another method is here offered, sufficiently simple for use in a written book yet more comprehensive than the first example. The " recapitula- tion " which is for the proprietor to see at a glance is here unnecessary, the totals appearing in a separate column plain to see, and these columns added separately, prove each other and reduce the chances of making mistakes. 42 THE STEWARD'S HANDBOOK. CHANGING COOKS IN A LARGE HOTEL. This is the most serio-comical occurence that ever takes place in grand establish- ments. Some hotels make changes so often that all concerned get used to it, they get the mode of procedure down to a fine point; still the operation is always a critical one, attended with serious dangers, which can only be safely laughed at after the crisis is past For everything in a hotel, even the very continuance of the business, depends upon the cooks, the lapse of even a single meal would shake up the house and bring consternation upon the people equal to a small earthquake ; it is the diffi- culty of making the connections so close that the one intervening meal will not be dropped that makes the experience excit- ing. The determination to make a change is not often reached suddenly, but the com- plaints and dissatisfactions grow and in- crease through several weeks, perhaps months. There is no particular reason why a chief cook, who does not give satisfaction, should be retained except the fear of under- taking the delicate task of making a change of administration. There are always plenty of fine cooks ready to take employment in the hotels which will pay high enough salaries. So the complaints go on and grow for a while. There are bickerings and fencings, defiance and sharp words betwixt the chief cook and those in author- ity over him so constantly that a state of sullen enmity becomes the ordinary rule of their relations. All at once a change of temper takes place. The steward or man- ager or proprietor, as the case may be, be- gins to act very pleasantly toward the chef, they treat him to smiles sarcastic smiles, but perhaps he does not detect the sarcasm. He has his own way undisputed and grows good-natured, too. It is wonderful then what peace and harmony pervades all the culinary departments; it seems impossible for anybody to do wrong, for no more faults are found and there is no more driv- ing. The fact is the steward and proprietor have been telegraphing and writing and have secured their new man, and try to practice such extreme secrecy about their movements, lest the chef should suspect the truth too soon, they nearly overdo it, and it is only the latters egotism that pre- vents him from seeing that something is going to happen, for all those around him are conscious that things are not what the^ seem, and while they whisper about among themselves, not really knowing anything, they have nothing openly to say. Next, there are two or three strangers seen tak- ing back seats in the office or waiting room ; they came on the morning train. Strangers of all sorts are arriving com tantly, that is nothing, but, somehow, these do not seem to be of the usual sorts. One of them, at least, is well diessed, but they do not act like commercial travelers nor like men of leisure, the very hall boys observe that, and when it is seen that the steward is more concerned with them than the clerks are, a light begins to break and the whisperings about the house increase. Then the stew- ard takes the strangers, or at least the best dressed one of them, and shows him inside the dining room, then the breakfast room and ladies' ordinary, then to the pantry, if that happens not to be in plain sight of the kitchen, then takes him back to the office, where they have a long talk. By that time the headwaiter knows all about it, although not a word has been said to him, for he knows that if it had been any other strang- er viewing the house out of curiosity, it would have been the proprietor or a clerk showing him around instead of the steward. But why so much secrecy? Because the chef above all things hates to have it said that he was discharged, or that he was "rolled," i. e. t pushed out of his place by another chef. He may not care for the loss of the situation, may even be glad of a rest, but he wants the first word and to say that he quit; and If he knows for certain that a new chef has come to the house, he will pull off his jacket instantly and make his second and third cooks do the same, will gather up his knives and all will go to the office and demand to be paid off. The THE STEWARD'S HANDBOOK. 43 steward wants the first word, too, but he thinks more about the ensuing meals and desires to let the new chef in at night when his opportunities for getting acquainted with his new surroundings will be better than between meals. Therefore he con- tinues the secrecy to the latest moment, waits until all the cooks have left the kit- chen in the afternoon, then shows the new chef the interior and takes him to see the ice chest, and as soon as supper or evening dinner is well ready, he informs the present head of the kitchen that his money is ready for him in the office and he "will not be re- quired to prepare breakfast. Some men at such a juncture are kinder and better nat- ured than others and yield gracefully, that is, they act like gentlemen and throw no obstacles in the way of their successor. Common men, however, immediately go around and undo whatever they can that has been done in preparation for the next day. They throw out their soup stock, their salad dressings, their espagnole and other sauces, their aspics, their croquette preparations, their codfish balls, which were ready for breakfast; they stop the vegetable parers from their work, forbid the replenishment of coal and kindling boxes, in short do whatever they can think of in half an hour to make it hard for the fellow that comes after them. The pastry cook under the same circumstances throws away his yeast and neglects to set the sponge for the morning bread, hides away the baking powder, puts soda in the cream of tartar package, hoping to cause mistakes, puts salt into his wine jellies and custard mixtures, hoping the' new man will use them, breaks the oven damper and stuffs rags into the flue. And yet the breakfast appears on the table the next morning the same as usual, and if any dif- ference is observed by the guests, it is very likely to be in the way of improvement, for the new hands are anxious and doubly attentive. The obstacles thrown in the way of the new chef do not set him back because the trfcks are all so old, he knows them all himself. He takes no notice of what his predecessor has done, or what he has left behind him, but begins everything Anew, even if he has to bribe some of the help to work late that night; and, if the former chef has left a can of his favorite sauce or a salad, just to give the new man some- thing to pattern after, the new man puts on a scornful smile and pitches it into the swill-barrel. The new pastry cook knows in advance all about the yeast trick, and has brought some fresh yeast in his pocket ready for the fray; he tastes and tests everything, walks straight to the chimney and pulls out the stuffing of rags, throws out the former pastry ccok's treacherous compounds, which he knows are only snares to entrap him, and then goes iO work, and the day succeeding sees every- thing going on as usual; the crisis is past. HOW THE NEW CHEF BEGINS HIS DUTIES. Sometimes the change of cooks is made by common consent when the one wants to get away for reasons of his own, and there is then no secresy and no surprise, which must be regarded fortunate for the new man, for no matter how well experi- enced he may be, he finds the first day in a new situation a hard one, even when every- thing is left running on in its proper order, and so much the worse when the late in- cumbent has done all he can to make it hot for him. It is hard at first to find any article that he wants, he must find the thing by searching in various places instead of being able to lay his hand upon it from habit with- out thinking, and then his kitchen hands are strange to him. However, he has his own second cook, perhaps one or two more whom he knows. Beginning at night, he first makes sure of his fireman, finding out if he can be relied upon to have the fires made early enough, and he sees to it with his own eyes that the fuel is good and easily reached. He divides the breakfast work in his own mind into three divisions, the meats, the fries and the vegetables. The meats Include everything that is to be broiled, also the eggs, and he sees whether 44 THE STEWARD'S HANDBOOK. the small meats are ready cut and in the refrigarator, if the whole list which appears upon the breakfast bill of fare is there, or whether only part is ready ; then he pro- ceeds to cut or have cut and prepared the missing articles, which may be chickens, fish to broil, or ham. The fries include fish, oysters in all ways, fried potatoes, chip potatoes, fried mush, codfish balls, breaded cutlets, liver and tripe. The vegetables are not really vegetables, but are miscel- laneous dishes grouped together that way, because prepared in part by the vegetable cook; they are oatmeal, cornmeal mush, grits, stewed potatoes, hash, fried onions, stewed tripe. Some of these things the vegetable cook carries out complete, others, such as the stews, that cook only prepares oy cutting up ready and the second cook finishes. The meat division belongs to the second cook, though he probably will have the meat cutter, or some other, to do the broiling, he having to dish up orders and do the most of the egg cooking; his first part of getting ready for breakfast is the making of the stews and assisting with the frying of cutlets and breaded fish, the third cook being busy getting enough Saratoga chips and French fried potatoes along with other fries to keep ahead of the orders. The head cook's duty is to "make" his eggs, as the kitchen phrase is, that is to cook them as ordered, but this he only does dur- ing a rush of orders, and after seeing that everything is running on right and nothing has been forgotten, he leaves the front of the range and puts in every minute he possibly can in preparing his soups and entrees for lunch and dinner. His ability to run the kitchen is according to his abil- ity to remember everything that must be done and every item- of material that will be required to work with; he makes out his requisition over-night, and it will be well for him, if he does not forget some- thing of small value seemingly, yet quite indispensable, and it is ho less important for him to know which one of his half dozen assistants will do each particular thing, and to give them their orders accord- ingly. After the fir*t newness is over, each of these hands will know the part he or she has to perform, and will do the same every day, but at first all the strain is upon the head cook. The first breakfast is, however, only half his cares ; at the same time of survey of the breakfast meats over night, he also sees what there v/ill be for dinner, plans the bill of fare, if the steward has not planned it for him, and looks about for the where- withal to make his first dinner in the house a credit to himself, and then he must see that whatever.will require the most time is begun first, and must plan the work of each one of his helpers. His second leaves the breakfast work next morning like him- self, and begins the work on lunch and dinner, and side by side they both do the c ame work, boning veal or fowls, stuffing, larding, barding, cutting meat small, cook- ing, pressing, cooling and re-cooking sweet- breads, mincing mushrooms, onions, parsley, cutting truffles in dice, boning, pressing and afterwards cutting up the cooked calfs head for soup, making cro- quettes, filleting fish, cutting croutons of bread, preparing salads, making auc<~, finishing the soups; and the second cook as his special duty makes the sweet entrees, while the third or roast cook roasts and boils the plain meats, the vegetable cook prepares all the vegetables, except such things as breaded and fried egg-plant, and another cooks meat for the hands. When the sixty or eighty different oper- ations have been merged into the thirty or forty dishes, which constitute the me.at cook's part of the great hotel dinner and the meal is about ready, he takes a bill of fare which has just come from the printers, calls the half dozen principal helpers to him and reads off each item, every accom- paniment, every sauce, every form of veg- etables, and asks if that is ready. If any- thing has been forgot, they make haste to get it ready yet before the doors open. When the dinner is about over, and the quantities have proved to be just right, and no person has been denied anything he THE STEWARD'S HANDBOOK. 45 called for, the headwaiter steps into the carving room and passes some pleasant remark to the steward ; the steward strolls over to where the new chef stands, makes some pleasant remark to him and they shake hands. Soon after the chef finds most of his assistants near him, and- sud denly he says: "Well, boys, how was that for a dinner?" "Went off first rate," says one cautiously. "A pretty good dinner," says another, with slowness and great emphasis on each syllable. "Well I should say it was !" exclaims the chef, with more emphasis still, "consider- ing it was the first day, too! Boys, there's a bottle of beer apeice-for you in the basket under my desk there's a bottle or two of Rhine wine there, besides, if any of you would rather have it, help yourselves." And the chef goes to his room. THE DRINKING HABITS OF COOKS. While there are and can be only a very few hotels of the largest size and highest style, what few there are have great in- fluence in setting the fashions in interior management, and many among the vast number of smaller hotel proprietors, as well as their employe's, have had unpleasant experiences of the slighting manner, the real contempt with which the cooks from those larger hotels speak of the smaller and less pretentious houses, because of their denial of certain privileges and their greater regard to expenses. But one of the cus- toms of the largest hotels, is a decidedly pernicious one and brings back punishment upon the employer by increasing the habit of intemperance among their employe's, that is the custom of serving out regular rations of liquor and an almost unrestricted issue of wines and liquors on demand, ostensibly for cooking purposes. It looks generous in the hotel-keeper, but it is not really so, but the cooks secure the conces- sion through their united demands. When a cook is wanted, telegraphed for, written for, as shown in a preceding page, he first inquires about the amount of salary offered and next stipulates how much liquors and wines per day shall be allowed to the kit- chen. When he gets to work, first thing among the morning issues from the store- room comes a quart of whiskey, which he divides among the hands, taking two shares for himself. At the rooks' nine o'clock breakfast, instead of coffee they each drink a pint of cheap California wine, or, if they do not like that, they are allowed a pint bottle of beer, and at least once or twice more during the day wine or beer is served out again, while the chef, as well as head pastry cook, has a supply of various liquors always at hand. They would be more than human, if they could avoid excess under such circumstances. But cooks must drink something, theirs is a thirsty occu- pation. They do not need the whiskey early in the morning, and that is the most harmful of all their allowances, but let the hotel keeper or steward act as their friend, give them the needed bottle of weak wine or cool and harmless beer in the heat of the day when the work is hard, and never allow bottles of rum or other liquors to be issued at all. He should pour the wine in the soup and brandy or rum in ths sauce himself. HOW TO WRITE THE BILL OF FARE. With a great many persons occupied daily in the preparation of the hotel din- ners, the composition of the bill of fare is the one literary effort of their life, it is their first timid step upon the threshold of the temple of belles lettres, where they be- gin to use the strange words of a strange language and watch for the effect to see whether they are understood and whether they hare said them aright. The words and the language and the whole operation of forming the bill of fare, are strange for the reason that our people generally are not "gastronomically educated," as the latest phrase has it ; neither the great mass of the people, who come to the hotels, nor many of those whose business it is to cater to their wants, have ever studied the sub- ject of the composition of various dishes and then- proper names, or thought much about the correct order of serving them, while still It is felt that a code of gastrono- mical proprieties must have been form- ulated somewhere in the upper regions of culture, and every sort of writer of the bill of fare tries to show his acquaintance with it according to his light. In looking over a promiscous collection, especially of hotel dinner bills, it is not difficult to pick out the bad examples which show how "fools rush in where angels fear to tread," and also the specimens which have emanated from a student of the subject who feels a proper pride in his performance, because he understands the motives which lie at the bottom ; the great majority are, how- ever, of the sort that are written as a task which must be performed daily by some- body and bear no marks of the pleasure which that task possibly may bring, when the reasons for every line and every sort of arrangement are thoroughly compre- hended. THE AMERICAN HOTEL DINNER BILL THE STANDARD. Premising, for the information of the learner, that there are other forms of the bill of fare suitable for private parties, formal banquets and for club dinners, it may confidently be asserted that the pre- sent general form of bill in use at the hotels of the United States and Canada is the best for the purpose of the regular dinner or table d' hole system, and the -most perfect which could be devised, both for the display of culinary proficiency and for the allow- ance of the freest choice to the dinner. This statement is made for the benefit of those who may chance to pick up speci- mens of old-country bills divided into "First Service Second Service," or "Pre- miere Service Deuxieme Service Troi- sieme Service" and the several different forms adopted by various clubs for the sake of singularity, as well as the specimens of dinners served in courses, all of them forms not suited to the requirements of the hotel dinner and therefore not to be adopted unawares in the effort for improve- ment. The present form has, so to speak, formed itself in accordance with the tastes and re- quirements of the people for whom hotels exist, the arrangement of dishes is accord- ing to their home-formed habits ; by which is meant that our people take meats and savories but once in the meal and do not take meats again in the "second service," but only sweets and fruit. THE HOTEL PRESS AND RECENT IM PROVEMENTS. The good taste- and good sense which characterizes the hotel bill of fare in general is largely attributable to the course of teach- ing and criticism of the hotel newspapers for, up to a few years ago, a vast proportion THE STEWARD'S HANDBOOK. 47 of the bills were very ridiculous affairs and the greatest mostrosities among them were those which they that wrote them thought were the best. It is only about a dozen years since hotel papers came into exist- ence. Before that time there were no sources of information on such subjects but a few antiquated cook-books which taught by-gone styles, and the mixed bills of the cooks of various nationalities em- ployed In the larger hotels. These showed lists of dishes enough and good ones, of course, but without the translations of their names into plain English and the statement of the reason for their appearing in any particular order of succession, such exam- ples did more harm than good. The sub- sequent intelligent discussion of the questions led to such favorable results that there is no diffculty now in the learner finding a riliable pattern since the bill of almost any good hotel may be taken as a model, -while the main arguments on the various points may be found in the hotel books now in existence and need not be gone over again in this place. Some minor questions still arise, however, which will be briefly stated in order to a full under- standing, it being noted in advance that a perfect uniformity In the bills of all the hotels would be very undesirable; we can usually select our favorite newspapers from a pile of papers through some individuality of appearance, their type, their make up, their color, their headings or absence of them, and we should value this stamp of individuality just as much in hotel bills of fare as in newspapers. BILL OF FARE OR MENU. Strictly speaking these words are not of quite the same significance. The menu is the fare, the bill of fare is to tell what the fare consists of; the menu is the "lay out," the bill of fare is the itemized description of the " lay-out," as if one should say, "this is my library; this is the catalogue of my library." People meet and discuss or enjoy the menu or fare, but they do not discuss the bill of fare. Nevertheless, by the elasticity of language, menu is used in the same sense as bill of fare, and either word may be chosen with propriety; menu is thought to be the more stylish of the two and is oftenest preferred now to head the dinner list. In this connection it may not be out of place to remark that cuisine also has a double sense, meaning both kitchen and cooking ; la cuisine is the kitchen, but when it is said that any hotel is noted for its excellence of its cuisine it implies the other meaning of the word cooking. Many hotels reject the use of both menu and bill of fare, and head their bills with the word "Dinner." Others, again, follow the mothod of the annexed example and make the announcement of table a" hote (which is equivalent to our plain American "regular dinner") do duty instead of either term. In regard to the examples of bills of fare here to be found, it must be explained that they are taken up by chance from a very large collection and are neither selected as models or otherwise, but are only the first that came to hand which happen to illu- strate the particular point under consider- ation. Metropolitan Hotel Kestaurant, Thursday, February 4, i88b. TABLE D' HOTE 8 TO 7 O'CLOCK INCLUDING WINE, $1.00. Oysters on half shell Consomme^ vermicelli Mock turtle & la Francaise Boiled halibut, lobster sauce Potatoes Hollandaise Smoked tongue with green kale Fricassee of chicken wings with oysters Sauerkraut a la Francfort au jus Fresh beef tongue brais^e, sauce piquante Spaghetti Ii6 a la Napolitaine Ribs of beef Turkey, cranberry sauce Salad ' Stewed tomatoes Boiled rice Mashed potatoes Peas Bread pudding, wine sauce Assorted cakes Strawberry ice cieara Assorted fruit M^doc French coffee English cheece The very choicest selection of Cigars to ce found In the City, for sale in Cafe. JOHN M. OTTER, MANAGER. 48 THE STEWARD'S HANDBOOK. HEADINGS OK NO HEADINGS? The above very excellent bill is strictly In accord with the opinions and teachings of the hotel press, unless an exception be taken to the cigar line at the bottom, and particularly so in regard to the small num- ber of dishes, the absence of "relishes," and the absence of headings. Here is an example from a hotel in the extreme South, but under New York management and running at four dollars a day, which uses headings and includes "relishes," and there are good reasons on this side of the ques- tion, too. FROM 6 TO 8. MONO AT, MARCH 16, rS$. St. Germaine. SOUP. Consomml Printanier Royal. FISH. Boiled Sea Bass, Sauce Hoilandaise. Potatoes Parisienne. RELEVE. Corned Beef and Cabbage. ENTREES. Becassines en Salmi a 1'Ancienne. Fricandeau of Veal, Bourgeoise. spaghetti au Gratin, Piemontaise. Chocolate Fritters, Vanilla Sauce. ROAST. Ribs of Beef. Ham, Champagne Sauce. Young Turkey, Stuffed. CAME. Brant with Jelly. VEGETABLES. Boiled Potatoes. Mashed Turnips. Green Peas. Baked Sweet Potatoes. RELISHES* Horse Radish. Gherkins. Chow -Chow. Lettuc'e. White Onions. Olives. PASTRY AND DESSERT. Steamed Kaisin Pudding, Brandy Sauce. Apple Pie. Pound Cake. Chocolate Slices. Jelly Drops. Lemon Sherbet. Apples. Oranges. Asorted Nuts. Raisins. Roquefort, Edam and Orange Co. Cheese. Crackers. COFFEE. TEA. Waiters art furnished with Wine Cards. All Dishes not on the Bill of Fare, and all Fruit or Lunch taken from Table will be charged extra. Guests having friends to meals will please register at office. BREAKFAST FROM 7 to 10; SUNDAY FROM S to n. The writer of these lines prefers to use headings, always writes his bills that way, considering that the hotel is an inn, a car- avansary where people come as strangers, and the ways of the house should be made as plain as possible for them. Very few of these transients are "gastronomically edu- cated," few of them, comparatively, have ever ordered from a bill of fare, and with a waiter standing by waiting for them to speak, they have trouble enough to order their meal intelligently even with the help of plain headings ; the bill without headings must seem like a mass of dishes thrown together without order and without a pur- pose. Witness the following bill without headings, divisions or spaces, as it is found in a New York hotel paper. Possibly the original was better looking. VICTORIA HOTEL. Blue Point Oysters Creme a la Windsor Consomme Napolitaine Fondu of Cheese on Toast French Sardines Saucisson D' Aries Celery Queen Olives Boiled Redsnapper, Sauce Flamande Potatoes Naturel Sautees au Beurre Turkey Boiled, Celery Sauce Smoked Jowl with Sauerkraut Loin of veal stuffed, Sauce Ancialouse Sirloin of Beef larded a la Lithuanienne Lamb Chops Farandale Rice Croquettes with Apricots Sherbet au Citron Ribs of Beef Capon, Giblet Sauce Saddle of Mutton Spare Rihs of Deerfoot farm pork, Apple Sauce Red head Duck with Orange Marmalade Salads Chicken Mayonnaise Lobster Potato Lettuce Pate de Foie Grass Truffe Boned Chicken with Jelly Plain Lobster Tongue Etc Boiled Potatoes Mashed Potatoes Boiled Onions Rice Peas Beets Spinach Baked Sweet Potatoes Squash Fried Oyster Plant Spaghetti Italienne Rice Pudding, Port Wine S-iuce Cocoanut Pie, Green Gag-e Pie, Almond Slices, Gateaux Boston Cream Cakes Wine Jelly Vanilla Ice Cream. Nuts Raisins Figs Fruits American, Rouquefort, Brie and Neufchatel Cheese Cafe The reason given for omitting headings from the bill of fare is that it is more "tony" to do without them Their absence implies a compliment to the guests by the supposition that they are "gastronomically educated," that they do know the proper order of dishes and the locality in which to look for them without any guiding signs. It will be seen, then, that the bill without headings is proper for select family hotels, but not best for commercial hotels, railroad depot hotels, nor for the generality of re- THE STEWARD'S HANDBOOK, 49 sort houses. And if the bill without head- ings is desired in such establishments, the dishes should be few as in our first sample menu, so that they may be comprehended at once and the dinner selected with ease even by a stranger to hotel customs. WHAT SHOULD THE HEADINGS BE? The ordinary headings are soup, fish, boiled, roasts, entrees, vegetables, cold dishes, pastry, dessert. That is for com- mon life without any pretentions to style, and the order of arrangement is as the people generally want it, in that order they take their dinner. And here it may as well be explained that pastry is not prop- erly called dessert, although it is the gen- eral custom to apply the term dessert to all the sweets which constitute the second service of the dinner. "Pastry and dessert" is the most convenient foim as it admits everything, but "dessert" alone means fruit, confectionery, very light sweets and ices. But where something above the or- dinary is desired, when the meals and the menu are intended for something above the run of common life, more divisions appear and more headings. The first example menu and the second are alike in one particular, they make the "Boiled" appear before the "Entrees" and the "Roast" after them, and the second uses the word "Releve" instead of "Boiled," as would be the case in the first example were headings used in it at all. This arrange- ment is Immaterial and merely a matter of literary taste, as the people for whom the dinner is prepared nearly always take all their meats, whether boiled, roasted, entrees or game, at one and the same time, and the vegetables of their choice with them. If the third example menu were properly strung out and the headings inserted, it would show cold hors d'ceuvres, soup, hot hors d'ceuvres, fish, releves, entrees, sorbet, roasts, game, salad, and cold dishes, veg- etables, pastry, dessert, thirteen headings besides cheese and coffee, which usually go as distinct items without headings, but which nevertheless make up the thirteen courses into which such a dinner can be divided. The Victoria menu is faulty in respect to mixing the hot. and cold kors d'oeuvres or side dishes. Ojsters raw, al- though some what of an American specialty, are but one of the cold hors d 'ceuvres, or appetizers, preliminary to the meal and no more entitled to stand alone than the others, "French Sardines Saucisson d'Arles Celery and Queen Olives," which all strictly belong in the same place as the oysters. The hot hors d'ceuvres belong where the one in that bill appears ; it is the "Fondu of Cheese on Toast," or Welsh rarebit. All of this style is, however, felt to be very cumbersome; it is difficult to handle all these formalities in strict pro- priety and the sensible thing is to drop the superfluities there is no use for the hot hors d'&uvre, except in a formal course dinner, and that being omitted, such side dishes as sliced tomatoes, olives and celery are placed after the soup instead of it. COMPLIMENTARY banquet given by Mr. Alder- man Whitehead to Major and Sheriff Davies and a large number of the inhabitants of Cheapward, at the Guildhall Tavern, London, on the 26 of October. The catering was up to Messrs. Ritter & Clifford'! best form, and the menu as follows: Haute Sauterne. Turtle Punch. Vino de Paste. RudesheimerBerg-. Irroy, iSSo. Veuve Clicquot, 1880. Piper's Tres Sec., 1880. Perinet et Fils, 1880. Pommery et Greno, 1880. Claret Chateau la Rose. Sandeman's Old Port. HORS D'CEUVRES. Sardines. Prawns. Caviare. Foie Gras. Olives. Clear Turtle. Thick Turtle. Soles a la Normande. Stewed Eels en Matelotte. Turbot, Hollandaise and Tartar Sauces. Fried Smelts. Lobster Cutlet*. Sweetbreads with Truffles. Salmi of Widgeon. Roast Turkey Poults. Ox Tongue. Boiled Capons and Cumberland Hams. Saddle Mutton, French Salads. Braized Calves Head. Wild Ducks. Partridges. Mushrooms. German Puddings. Curacao Jelly. Maraschino Jelly. Chartreuse of Grapes. Swiss Pastry. DESSERT. ICES. Lemon Water. Raspberry Cream. 60 THE STEWARD'S HANDBOOK. If headings are used and hors cToeuvres appear under their proper head, they are not designated as hot or cold, however, for their place In the bill shows of which de- scription they are, as the bill of fare on the preceding page illustrates. Had this been in the United States the first section would have been "Blue Point Oysters," and there might have been a total omission of all the other cold hors d'ceuvres, just as in this bill there is a total omission of the vegetables, which of course they had, as not worth mentioning. To be fair, however, here is an example where both classes of hors d'ceuvre are printed after the soup, the "Bouche'es Viennoises" being Vienna patties, a hot hors d'oeuvre, as most of those small trifles are, which in our American bills are classed as entrees. Menu of a dinner served at the Continental, Paris, being a banquet given to Hon. Geo. Walker by the Stanley Club. The dinner was of thirty covers, and this is what they had: MENU. Consomml aux pointes et quenelles bisque. Hors d'ceuvre vane's. Bouchers Viennoises. Turbot, sauce crevettes et Hollandaise. Poulardes a la ChevalieYe aux truffes. Langouste a la Parisienne. Sorbet Jamaique. Faisans et perdreaux sur croustades. Salade. Pate's de foie_ gr,as de Strasbourg. Petits pois a la financiere. Bomb Glace vanille et abricots. Gateau Havanais. Corbeilles de fruis. Bonbons. Petits fours. Xeres. Chateau Durcc. Chateau Cleniens. Pommard. Bacherolles. Medoc en carafes. Champagne. Heidsieck. Monopole. Caf6 et Liqueurs. As, perhaps, not one in ten thousand in this country understand French, as applied to dishes in a menu, and as these articles are intended to be informatory, the above may be translated thus : SOUPS clear soup with Asparagus points and the thick soup which we call cream a la duchesse. HORS D'CEUVRES various (rwfds), us, for example, in the London bill preceding. HORS D'CEUVRE (hot) Vienna patties or bouch&es au salpiqon. FISH turbot, with choice of two sauces, shrimp and hollandaise. ENTREES chicken fried, truffle sauce, sea crayfish or small lobster in Parisian style. SORBET with Jamaica rum, perhaps a new name for Roman or rum punch. GAME pheasants and par- tridges on ornamental fried toast. SALADS not specified what kind. Raised pies of foie-gras (Strasbourg fat goose liver), green peas in sauce, moulded vanilla and apricot ice creams, Havana cake, baskets of fruit, candies, small cakes, wines, coffee and liqueurs. FIFTH AVENUE HOTEL, New York. Oysters on half shell SOUPS. Paysanne Clam FISH. Boiled Haddock, shrimp sauce Baked Sole, Genoise Small Potatoes RKLEVKS. Leg of Mutton, caper sauce Corned Beef and Cabbage Chicken and Pork Calf's Head brain sauce Beef Tongue Ham COLD DISHES. Beef Tongue Roast Beef Ham Boned Turkey Lobster plain Chicken Salad Lobster Salad Lamb Head Cheese ENTREES. Sirloin of Beef a la Bordelaise Snipe bardie sur croustade Epigramme of Lamb aux petits pois Bouche'es of Oysters a la Reine Chicken a la Chasseur Cream Fritters, vanilla flavor ROASTS. Chicken Ham champagne sauce Mongrel Duck Beef Saddle of Mutton Turkey Curacoa Sherbet GAME. Antelope VEGETABLES. Boiled Potatoes Onions Stewed Tomatoes. Mashed Potatoes Beets Sweet Potatoes Hominy Fried Parsnips Turnips Spinach String Beans PASTRY AND DESSERT. Suet Pudding, -vine sauce Rice Pudding Sliced Apple Pie Cocoanut Pie Fancy Macaroons Holland Cake Charlotte Russe Ladies' Cake Almonds Oranges Raisins Pecan Nuts Apples Grapes Pears Bananas Hickory Nuts Figs English Walnuts Vanilla Ice Cream Coffee. When, in the matter of these side dishes or of any other question of arrangement, there seems to be such diversity of practice even amongst the higher class of caterers, we come back to the fact that there is such a thing as an American hotel bill of fare that is a pattern to itself, and indeed is becoming a pattern to many on the other side of the Atlantic as numerous printed bills of their hotels show, and the old forms, which are THE STEWARD'S HAND BO STATt ' L more perplexing than useful to follow, are In our bills of fare ignored and left over for those to carry out whose duties compel them to conform to foreign usages. The hotel named on preceding page will be re- cognized as a representative one and one of the largest size, yet its bill of fare is very faulty in arrangement, if it is to be judged by foreign rules ; it is, curiously enough, the desperate effort to make an American hotel bill conform to a Parisian pattern, in reason and without reason, which makes it faulty, for it is neither the one nor the other; the curacoa sherbet, the antelope, the snipe and the salads are all out of their proper places ^ beyond dispute, while other dishes and even divisions stand upon disputed ground. But to finish the hors d'ceuvres question: One object of inserting the Fifth Avenue - Hotel bill on preceding page was to show f\ that even the best hotels do not always ^ enumerate such things as come under that designation, but if they do, the proper place for celery, olives, sliced tomatoes and sim- ilar cold trifles Is after the soup. It is necessary to state this definitely because serious contentions often arise between steward and proprietor on just such ques- tions, and there are some who maintain that such cold "appetizers" should be written in after the fish " to take away the ^L taste of fish," as they reason. In the " smaller hotels, where the cold trifles are j placed on the table in advance to facilitate quick service and save waiters' labor, the particular line occupied in the bill of fare Is of little consequence, but the best usage ^~? decides after the soup. For example: HORS D'GEuvRjc. Oysters on half shell. SOUPS. Clam Paysanne Celery Olives Sardines Prawns Caviar FISH. ^ Boiled Haddock, shrimp sauce Baked Sole Genoise Parisian Potatoes. SERVING POTATOES WITH FISH. A cursory examination of the hotel bills of fare from all parts of the country will show that the custom of serving potatoes in some fancy form with fish has become very general, so much so that a bill does not seem to be complete nor as stylish as it might be if that feature happens to have been omitted. It is a recent custom which originated in the famous restaurants of Paris, notably at Brebant's, for whom one of the forms of potatoes is named, that we designate a la Brabant. It comes quite as natural to eat vegetables with fish as with meat, yet foreign custom, and particularly English custom, has confined us hereto- fore to bread generally brown bread with that course. The ornamental addi- tion of potatoes to the sauce is the more satisfactory, because the individual style of service of the present day shuts out most of the ornamental styles of dishes that used to be served whole. Potato croquettes and croquette balls, leaf, heart and star shapes of duchesse potatoes carefully egged over and baked, and, indeed, all the varia- tions that are in use are great helps to the appearance of a plate of fish, ALWAYS SERVE FISH ON SMALL PLATES. New waiters generally have to be in- structed on this point, as they are most apt to take a meat dish for fish. But if they serve it so, the person at table will slip it from the dish to his plate, and the dinner plate will then have to be changed for the meat course. Apart from that considera- tion, the fish looks better on a dessert plate, and it cannot be transferred to another without "mussing" it up with its sauce. The diner eats it from its own small plate, garnished as the cook sends it in. WHICH FIRST, JOINTS OR ENTREES? It will be observed that In all the ex- ample bills of fare thus far shown the roast meats appear after the entrees ; in the first one the entrees come next after the fish, In the others the "fence is straddled" and the boiled meats precede entrees and roast meats follow them in another place. Here is a Scottish bill that looks a good deal like American style except that It has no rege THE STEWARD'S HANDBOOK. tables or other minor mention, and in this, loo, the entrees follow the fish. The cor- respondent writes: "A presentation dinner was given by the Queen's O*vn Yeomanry Cavalry to their major on the occasion of his leaving for India. I got hold of the bill of fare a good, healthy volunteer menu which I now present: Hare Soup. Oyster Soup. Clear Oxtail. Turbot, Lobster Sauce. Dressed Cod, Oyster Sauce. Filleted Sole. Mutton Cutlets, Sauce Piquante. Sweetbreads with Mushrooms. Curried Rabbit. Supreme of Chicken aux Truffes. Sirloin of Beef. Haunch of Venison. Braised Turkeys, Celery Sauce. Roast CLickens. Yorkshire Ham. Ox Tong-ues. Victoria Pudding. Lemon Pudding 1 . Berlin Tarts. Swiss Souffles. Stewed Fruits. Blancmange. Noyeau Jellies. Dessert. ' Now, all of these try to follow the French custom of serving the entrees first, only because it is the French way, and those who split the difference and place boiled on top, entrees in the middle and roasts next, get the roast beef and such solid joints so far down, because the French roasts are placed there in French bills, without taking notice that such French bills never contain any plain boiled meats, nor plain roast beef, nor mutton. Their roasts (rots) are some choice kinds of small game, something that is considered better in some way than the made dishes or en- trees. The French idea is that plain roasted or boiled meats are not gocd enough for a fine menu. (Look at the representative menu of the dinner given in Paris by the Stanley Ciub, a little way back no boils or roasts are there.) Instead of crowd- ing the English favorite boiled leg of Southdown mutton 'nto that Parisian bill jus* under the turbot, and the American favorite rare roast beef into the place occu- pied by pheasants and partridges sur crou- stades, we do better to make our own style of bill of fare according to the preferences of our own people, who, generally speak- ing, regard the joints as the principal part of a dinner and all the rest as little nic- nacks, very nice in their place, but of no great consequence. Practically it does not make much dif- ference whether the entrees or the boils and roasts are placed first in order, for ex- perience shows that people choosing from a bill of fare nearly always select whatever meats they intend to partake of all at one time, boiled joints, roasted joints, entrees or game, and their favorite vegetables with them, without regard to the order in which they are ranged in the printed list; still it is most proper to place the substantial meats before the entrees, in conformity to the principles laid down by the French gastronomers themselves. Here is the ideal menu embodied in a recent sketch by a feuilletonist of the day, "Max O'Rell." He depicts a little party of three or four "gastronomically educated" individuals, Paris gourmets, in fact, seri- ously engaged in the absorbing question what to order for dinner at the fashionable restaurant, where they are seated, and the subjoined shows the outcome of their de- liberations: "Consomm aux pois. Oysters and a sole Xormande. Pheasant a la Sainte-Allianc*. Chateaubriand. Tenderest of asparagus a 1'Amazone. SuprCmes de mauviettes. Ortolans a la Provencale. Meringues it la vanille. Ice, cheece, dessert." But it is easy to see that " Max O'Rell " has been studying Brillat Savarin and the Physiology du Gout for his purpose; the dishes are Savarin's favorites, the "pheas- ant a la Sainte-Allianc^ was his own in- vention, the menu is necessarily good and, which is most to the point, its arrangement of dishes in place is according to one of the axioms laid down by that much admired THE STEWARD'S HANDBOOK. 68 teacher that the order of dishes should be from the plain and substantial to the more light and delicate, the motive being to pro- long the pleasure of eating by leading on from dish to dish, from good to better and best. In this the ideal menu of this literary man is precisely the same as the best spe- cimens of the American hotel bill of fare. After the soup and fish comes the roast pheasant, equivalent to our every-day roast chicken or turkey stuffed; the Chateau- briand, which comes next, is the fillet of beef, with natural beef juice for Its sauce; it is to all intents the same as our roast beef and the nearest thing to plain roast beef that a proper Parisian menu ever shows. More delicate and more piquantly seasoned than those are the larks and then the ortolans, the fattest of small birds, and called the choic- est morsel that is known to epicures. Ac- cording to that rule, our entrees, seasoned, flavored and spiced, decorated to tempt the appetite that is already satisfied with plain food, should be placed after the subs tantial boiled and roasted meats, instead of before. And yet we would not have every bill look alike. THREE ROYAL EXAMPLES. Not to depend upon the Idealism for high sanction, however, the following menu of an actual affair shows a pretty good pattern of the American style; that is of the essential part, for these menus never mention the vegetables unless they are made into a good dish such as we call a vegetable entree and they call entremets, just as our bills never mention bread un- less it is made up into some form like crou- stades, sippets or toast: "Gala dinner served at Prince Ftirsten- berg's palace, at Kremsier, to the Emperors of Austria and Russia and seventy-six guests. The table was laid with the costly service of gold plate from the Imperial Palace of SchOnbrunn. The following menu was placed before the illustriou diners : Tortue Claire. Bouch6es a 1'Empereur. Filets de Saumon a la Cardinal. Piece de Bceuf et Selle de Veau. Suprfime de Poularde a la Financiere. Chaudfroid de Cailles. Sorbet Selle de Chevreuil, Salade et Groseilles de Bar. Fonds d'Artichauts a la Demidoff. Pouding a la Creme de Vanille. Gelee au Muscat Lunel. Fromages. Glaces aux Noisettes. Dessert.** There is a clear turtle soup ; a hot hors cfceuvre; fillets of salmon with a sauce made red with lobster coral ; a piece of beef and saddle of veal, roasted of course; a rich fricassee of chicken, white, and a rich fricassee of quails, brown, for the entrees ; then punch. Next, the game, saddle of venison with currant jelly and a salad, and artichoke bottoms for the vegetable to eat with it. Then a vanilla cream pudding, muscat wine jelly, cheese, ices, nuts and fruit. The piece of beef and saddle of veal above the entrees is the feature that makes it like an American bill of fare and differ- ent from French bills, and it has a familiar appearance all through. "The following is the bill of fare of a nice little dinner given by the Archduke Joseph of Austria to a select party of guests at his charming country seat on Marguerite Island, on the Danube, near Buda-Pesth. Count Zichy presided, the Archduke being prevented from appearing at the table owing to his being in court mourning: MENU. Potage a la Colbert. Piece d'esturgeon, sauce remouladd Filet de boeuf a 1'Anglaise. Bouch6es a la Reine. Perdreaux rotis. Salade Francaise. Turas- Haluska. Glace panachSe. Caf6. Liqueur Zichy. Creme. Partaken of to the melodious accompani- ment of a band of Tziganes (Anglic^, Hungarian band), and washed down with various bottles of Hungarian wines, amongst which reigned supreme a regi- ment of Imperial Tokay, 1834." 54 THE STEWARD'S HANDBOOK. There is a soup to be found in American bills any day ; piece of sturgeon with a va- riation of tartar sauce, or mayonaise w Ith minced pickles in it; fillet of beef in En- glish style, which is plain roasted with mushrooms; only one entree, which is a patty that might do equally well as a hors d^eeuvre; then roast partridge and a French salad. Turas-Haluska is a Hungarian pudding; then comes tri-colored or Neapol- itan ice cream and dessert. "Menu of a September lunch served at Mar Lodge upon the occasion of the Prince of Wales' visit to the Earl of Fife : Consomm< de volatile. Turbot creme au gratin. Salmis de grousses a la Mar Lodge. Poulets a la Viennoise. Filet de bceuf Bordelaise. Quartier d'agneau roti, sauce menthe. Perdreaux rOtis. Petits pois Francais. Souffle B6arnaise chaud. Mousse au caf." In that there is a quarter of lamb, roasted, with mint sauce, and a fillet of beef. The arrangement of dishes is slightly different from others, due to the preferences of the French cAefv/ho prepared the menu. The last dish named is a coffee- flavored whipped cream, a froth. These selections are more than mere in- teresting reading; they may serve as ex- amples for occasions which are continually wising in our hotels when traveling dig- nitaries and celebrities are to be enter- tained, and they show that it is not the proper thing then to make the bill of fare twice as long as it usually is made for common use. But to return to the ordi- nary hotel bill: THE PLACE FOR THE COLD MEATS. Those who wish to find good authority for placing the small side dishes of cucum- bers, celery, etc., after the fish instead of before, with the idea of "something to take away the taste of fish," have excellent pat- terns to follow in the three hotel bills of fare here following. A person having to decide what form to adopt could hardly do better than take either the first, which is from the Bates House, Indianapolis, or the third, which has the name of the hotel at- tached. The latter shows another way of putting in those little dishes, "small onions" and "olives" appearing in smaller type after the entrees, while "celery" follows the fish. OYSTERS. New York Counts SOUP. Mulligatawny Consommd FISH. Striped Bass, Madeira Wine Sauce Boiled California Salmon, French Pea Potato Croquettes Spanish Olives Sliced Tomatoes Olives BOILED. Fowl, Oyster Sauce Leg of Lamb, Caper Sauce ROAST. Sirloin of Beef Young Turkey with Dressing Cranberry Sauce ENTREES. Tenderloin of Beef, Larded, Tomato Sauce Sweet Breads, Braised, Mushrooms Banana Fritters, Rum Flavor GAME. Roast Pheasant, Bread Sauce Mallard Duck, Plum Jelly CHAMPAGNE ICE, COLD. Celery Salad Mayonnaise of Chicken Lamb Smoked Beef Tongue Roast Beef Crab Salad VEGETABLES. Mashed Potatoes Boiled Potatoes Steamed Rice Cauliflower Stewed Tomatoes Red Slaw Jersey Sweet Potatoes Baked PASTKY, ETC. Oriental Pudding, Steamed, Brandy Sauce Lemon Meringue Pie Mince Pie Charlotte Russe Almond Macaroons Fancy Assorted Cake VANILLA ICK CREAM. Raisins Mixtd Nuts Figs Fruit in Season Edam and New York Cream Cheese Crackeri Coffee. THE STEWARD'S HANDBOOK. These trifling variations show how bills may differ without being wrong in ar- rangement The middle one of these three bills of fare is from the Sherwood, a fash- ionable hotel in New York; it shows cu- cumbers after the fish, not because that is the place chosen for the cold hors d'teuvres, as some of them appear lower down under the head of "mayonnaise," but for the rea- son that it is proper, according to French ways, to serve cucumbers with fish. But suppose one has an antipathy and cannot eat sliced cucumbers with the French, is it not equally proper to eat sliced tomatoes with the Americans? And if both cucumbers and tomatoes are proper why not celery, also, and olives? The inquiring reader is to remember that these momentous ques- tions can never be definitely settled never so long as the world stands, but there may come a moment sometime in the midst of a heated debate when he will thank us for giving him this argument and the Sher- wood bill of fare, which illustrates it Tuesday, March i, t8Sj. Blue Point Oysters on Half Shell SOUP. Chicken with okra Consomme FISH. Boiled Halibut, anchovy sauce Onenmben Potatoes BOILED. Corned Beef and Cabbage REMOVES. Rib* of Beef Chicken Leg of Mutton Cold Meats, Etc. MAYONNAISE. Chicken Fetticus Lobster Lettuce Tomato Cold Slaw ENTREES. Fillet of Beef, sauce Barnaise Calf's Feet a la Poulette VEGETABLES. Macaroni a la Milanaise Bermuda Potatoes Rice Tomatoes Oyster Plant, fried Mashed Turnips Cream Spinach DESSERT. Boiled Apple Dumpling-, brandy sauce Peach Pie Charlotte Russe Assorted Cakes Orange Water Ice Vanilla Ice Cream FRUITS NUTS CHEESE COFFEE 4a xtr charge will be made for diihet ordered not on the bill of fare. DIMMER FROM 6 TO 7.30. ZMHEIsTTT. SOUP. Green Sea Turtle, a 1'Anglaise Consomme Royal FISH. Baked Florida Trout, aux Fines Herbes Celery Potato Croquette* BOILED. Corned Beef and Cabbage Leg of Southdown Mutton, Caper Sauce ROAST. Ribs of New York Beef, with Yorkshire Pudding Sirloin of Beef, with Browned Potatoes Young Chicken, Stuffed, Giblet Sauce Sugar Cured Ham, Sherry Sauce ENTREES. Tenderloin of Beef, Saute, with Mushroom* Calf's Head, & la Toulouse Apple Fritters, Glace au Rum Olives Small Onloni COLD DISHES. Roast Beef Ham Corned Beef Shrimp Salad VEGETABLES. Boiled Potatoes Mashed Potatoes Carolina Rice Stewed Tomatoes Sweet Potatoes Extra Sifted Peas Vegetable Oyster Plant, Cream Sauce Asparagus. PASTRY AND DESSERT. Fruit Cake, Glace au Rum Lady Finger* Almond Macaroons Meringues, a la Parisienne Peach Pie vanilla Custard, au Meringue Steamed Cabinet Pudding, Claret Sauce Ice Cream, au Muscat FRUITS. Apples Oranges Dates Bananas Raisins Assorted Nuts Edam and Cream Cheese Wafers French Coffee Japan and Gunpowder Tea Sweet Milk Butter Milk KIMBAI.L HOUSE, Jan. 9, 1887. But the real object of introducing these examples is to show the best place to locate the cold meats, that is at' the end of all the other meats ; if entrees are the last let cold meats follow them, if game appears after the entrees let cold meat come after the game. The Fifth Avenue and the Sher- wood have them higher up, and they do not look so well up there dividing the hot meats. That is about all the argument there is in the case, for this division is the b&tc noir of the tasty bill of fare writer. The majority of hotel caterers try very hard indeed to twist their table d'hote bill into the shape of the French course dinner bill, with its sorbet or punch in the middle and its game after the punch and salad after the game ; and they manage that far very well, but when the cold meats di- vision has to come in they are at a loss ; 56 THE STEWARD'S HANDBOOK. the Parisian course dinner has no cold meats division so they have no guide. But the hotel customers don't care a fig about that, and want cold meats just the same. A caterer* to the tastes of hotel patrons we have but little concern with their mo- tives, but we know from experience that no matter what the hot meats may be some few out of a number always call for the cold cuts. It may be that at the mid-day dinner some people restrict themselves to selecting only a lunch, taking their hot meal at supper time, or, at evening dinner some people allow themselves only a light supper, letting all the rich and savory hot dishes severely alone at that time of day or night The "cold meats" division, therefore, has to be tolerated; the only thing to be done is to fill it with but few items, and one or more should be of the rich and or- namental sort aspics, mayonaises, boar's head, galantines, raised fatte. The inquir- ing reader should note in these examples the two different ways of placing the date: with and without the day of the week; at top and at lower left-hand corner; and the subsidiary lines, and also that all three have headings to the different divisions, and at the same time make no mention of "relishes." Attention is also directed to the example of two New York hotel bills the Sherwood here and Victoria in a previous article of this series in serving macaroni and spaghetti as a vegetable, or with the vegetables; that is not an over- sight, misfit or mistake, but all those dishes are properly classed as entremets by those who wish to have things that way ; so are puddings. CURRENT CRITICISMS. In one respect, at least, the writer of these lines has always been misunderstood by some readers. He has never denied that the French are the leaders of the fashions in dining as well as in other things, but has denied that French fashions are applicable to American hotel dinners. He has never denied that the French know more about cooking, taking them as a people, than any other people; but hat always contended, and contends yet, that to adopt strictly French cooking In an American hotel would drive most of the customers away. This is not supposition, but observation and experience. The French cooks themselves make the same observations and go back to France in dis- gust, complaining of a lack of appreciation, or else, if they stay here, they change their ways somewhat to suit our people. But yet, if some amongst our ho r -jl pat- rons will follow French fashions and dine upon fashionable dishes in fashionable for- mality we, as hotel caterers, are required to understand the subject with all the whys and wherefores, and for that reason these different samples of bills of fare are pre- sented, showing different forms; only pres- sing one line of opinion, viz: that while French cooking and French ways are the very best for the French, we need a little different system, because we are a different people and do^ not like the same things in the same ways as they do The real point of contention, and where the writer may possibly appear to be eccentric, if not or- iginal, is in this: that while most of the fine writers and would-be gastronomical educators say, "But you ought to do thus and so because the French do so," the argu- ment of these articles has always been: let the French go their ways; few of us like their oil, their garlic, their glaze, their espagnole, their nutmeg (in meats and potatoes), their herbs, their thin soups, their anchovies, their snails, their many things, and we cannot help these likes and dislikes in food. The French say we can not have good cooking unless we employ French cooks at their own prices, but we will say we will educate our own cooks and see what French, Italian, German and Spanish cooks know, that we want; and will adopt so much of their knowledge as is applicable to our own people, and leave the rest The above is partly in answer to criticisms. There are some partisans who are disappointed when there !e not a fight, and they look for a running- down and de- THE STEWARD'S HANDBOOK. 57 preciation of every French form only because it is French, and because they do not understand it That would be. extremely ridiculous. The object of these writings is to show the meaning and the merits of other people's fashions that we may hold fast that which is good and agreeable, and leave the remainder for them that like them, although we do not like them ourselves. If it were necessary to adopt some other country's fashion for a model the Italian bill of fare would come nearer to our predictions than the French. It is from the Italians we get our "sweet entrees ;" our favorite "fritter" is ihefritto of the Italian bill of fare, an indispensable course in every Italian dinner. The best known names among the noted cooks and caterers of New York are Italians; the fancy cake and confectionary business of London is largely in the hands of Italians it is almost given up to them ; and it does not follow that because they are excellent in some branches of the art we should make our bill of fare all of the Italian pat- tern, nor made up all of Italian dishes any more than French, although a steward, having to provide for the entertainment of a distinguished party of Italians, may be very glad to have the following example for a guide. The following Is the bill of fare of a dinner of a national character, prepared for Italians by an Italian, and it helps to ex- plain why some of our American hotel bills of fare are formed as they are; it is the mixture of Italian with French ways. The employment of fine Italian cooks in many hotels causes the bills of fare of such hotels to be really Italian in form, and therefore seem to be wrong when compared with French patterns, and hence some of the apparent confusion, and hence another argument in favor of adopt- ing a distinctly American bill of fare: A REPRESENTATIVE ITALIAN BILL OF FARE. Banquet to Signer Salvini, given by the Italian Colony in London, at the Panton Hotel (proprietor, Mr. R. Pratti). Covers laid for fifty. Dining room profusely de- corated with flowers and with Italian and English fags. MENU: Ostriche Native, ANTIPASTO. Caviale, Sardine, Salame, Tonno, Seller!, eta. ZUPPA. Ravioli al Brodo. Risotto con Tartuffi. FRITTO. Frittura Mista, PESCK. Salmone Bellito, Salsa alia Geneves* e Salsa Hollandese. ENTREES. Polio Saute alia Salrini. Aniinelle di Vitello alia Minuta con TartuflL PUNCH ALLA ROMANA. Asparagi alia Milanese. Aspic d'Aragosta alia Garibaldi. ROSTO. Agnello allo Spiedo. Tnsalata assortitia. SXLVAGIUMK. Quaglie rostite, DOLCE. Zabbaglione. Ananas all' Orientals Croccante di Amandole. Gelati alia Napolitana. Gateau alia Vanille. Petits Souffles all' Indiana. DESSERT ASSORTITO. Caffe e LiquorL TOO. Sauterne. Chianti. Barolo. The first dish above named is not ostrich, but oysters English "natives," raw, ol course, and it is very rarely that a French menu is formed that way, for the cold ftors d\aeuvres here follow the oysters under an- other heading; the Italians call them anti- pasto, and regard them as much a neces- sary part of a good dinner as the soup or fish. After them the soup, and after the soup the hot hors d' Corned Beef Hash FRIED. Hominy Mush Deerfoot Farm Sausages Oysters Scollops EGGS. Boiled Scrambled Poached Fried Shirred Omelet POTATOES. Baked Hashed with cream Fried Lyonnaise Sautees Breakfast, 7 to 11. Dinner, 6 to 7:30. Lunch, i te i Supper, 9 to 11:30. The fifth, a New York City hotel bill, with a list as rich and abundant as any, shows different ways of grouping the ar- ticles together and is suggestive of many suitable breakfast dishes. Nothing could show so well as this bill how much work must be done in a hotel before breakfast Undoubtedly there are too many dishes offered in all but one or two of these bills, still, as a good many of them are not cooked until ordered the destruction oi provisions is not quite as serious as it looks. Manifestly the proper rule in composing the breakfast bill is to place the dishes in the order that they are eaten by the gen- erality of people. It is the custom, and THE STEWARD'S HANDBOOK. 71 the fashion, too, to eat fruit as a beginning, and then oatmeal or hominy or cracked wheat with cream; only small portions are served. After that the fish, meats, eggs and potatoes and bread are selected from all at once, and it makes little difference except for the appearance of the bill what order they are printed in, but waffles, crum- pets, and all kinds of griddle cakes are eaten last and should appear last in the bill, as they do in most of the examples. The San Marco bill is the best model as regards the arrangement of different classes of dishes. ABOUT THE AMERICAN BREAKFAST. There is no French pattern for the American breakfast bill; the French do not know anything about any such break- fasts as our hotels set out. The English have some idea of It, for they believe in taking a tolerably substantial meal to begin the day upon, but their ideas of what some- thing substantial consists of do not reach up anywhere near the displays of actual meals in the five breakfast bills of the fore- going pages. The French custom is to take a light breakfast of coffee or chocolate and rolls or bread, and defer the eating of a hearty meal until the middle of the day ; the English expect for breakfast, besides the coffee or tea, a chop, or bacon and eggs, hot rolls from the bakers, and butter, or toast with some sort of appetizing addi- tion such as potted tongue, anchovies or marmalade, and that is thought to be a sufficiently plentiful meal to last until lunch at noon ; dinner taking place at two or three o'clock and a cold supper some time between candle-lighting and bed-time, according to the habits of the family, and the same form prevails in the hotels. Without leaving our proper domain and going into that of the doctor's it may at least be asserted that our people eat too much for good health and at the wrong times. Could anybody reasonably contend that such an immense number and variety of viands are necessary as appear on the third, fourth and fifth breakfast bills pre- ceeding? And yet a necessity of a certain kind does exist, it is the business necessity which obliges the hotel keepers to try to please people who, having eaten too much the day and night before, have no real healthy appetite for breakfast, but pick around, find fault, and imagine that if there was only something else which j not there they could eat; that oysters stewed and fried are perhaps very good, but as for them they can never eat them any way but broiled, and while the friend at their right must have fresh fish, yet criticises the shad for its bones for their part if all the fishes of the sea were there they can only pick a bit of smoked salmon. While such an unreason- able demand for quantity exists the de- mand will be supplied. "My dear Careme," once said the Prince Regent to his famous chef, "your dinner yesterday was superb; Everything you gave me was delicious, but you will make me die of indigestion." "Mon Prince," returned Careme, bowing low, "my duty is to flatter your appetite, not to control it." There is no doubt, however, that It is frequently the case in our hotels that the hotel man, the proprietor, manager or steward, as the case may be, has it quite within his own control to provide a small but excellent spread instead of such an overgrown catalogue as those shown. It is sometimes ill-naturedly charged that these bills of fare are not true representa- tions of the actual meals, that a large por- tion of the dishes are " crossed off " before the bill goes to table. In fact, there is nothing more distasteful to the hotel keeper or steward than to have a "scratched" bill go to the table, and great trouble is often taken and considerable expense to obtain some scarce article, not so much because it is really needed as because it is on the bill of fare. So where it is optional, or nearly so, with the hotel man whether he will make out a big list of dishes or a small one he should limit the number to a rea- sonable amount, and limit the styles o* cooking, too; for the more ways of cook- 72 THE STEWARD'S HANDBOOK. Ing allowed the more utensils, more hands (or more haste), the more previous prepara- tion and more waste. Whatever else may be said of the hotel breakfast, it is, unless under very good management, the most wasteful meal of all, chiefly through the propensity of the guests to order and leave things which they have not the appetite to eat, and in a great measure through the number of things offered necessitating the preparation of so many steaks, chops, pota- toes, breads, fruits, pieces of fish and the whole list according, which, if not used, are the more liable to be lost through being so prepared. A SMALL PATTERN, BUT SUFFICIENT. Rather than be compelled to include al- most everything in a stock bill of fare, and to cross off several dishes each morning because unattainable, it is better to name too few; have the bill printed with a blank line or two, and write in something special every morning. It may be chicken or oysters, perhaps, in some places, but if only one kind of hash (the New York breakfast bill has three) it will be better thought of for being special that day than many of the stock dishes already printed in. This example shows the form: BREAKFAST. FRUIT TKA HOMINT OATMEAL FRESH FISH CODFISH BALLS FISH. SALT FISH AND CREAM BROILED MACKEREL BROILED AND FRIED. SIRLOIN STEAK LAMB CHOPS BREAKFAST BACON BROILED HAM FRIED SALT PORK BROILED TRIPE EGGS. BROILED FRIED SCRAMBLED COLD. HAM TONGUE OMELETTES BAKED POTATOES. LYONNAISE FRENCH ROLLS HOT CORN BREAD DRY TOAST. MILK TOAST, BUTTERED TOAST. As a commentary upon the absurd pro- fuseness of the American hotel breakfast these bills of fare, from one of the Penin- sular and Oriental Royal Mail steamships, are appended. It is true they do not enu- merate the breads, -coffee and vegetables, but neither do they offer many varieties of meats or fish, or of porridge, or miscel- laneous ways of cooking. BILLS OF FARE. P. & O. ss. "Thames" (at sea between Gibraltar and Plymouth.) BREAKFAST. Porridge Fried Fish Mutton Chop* Minced Collops Grilled Bacon Scrambled Eggs Curry and Rice Cold Ham LUNCHEON Soused Herrings k la Sardin* Corned Brisket, Roast Mutton Bologna Sausages, Galantine of Veal Salad Mashed Potatoes, Cheese. Bnn DINNER. SOUP Green Pea FISH Salmon Cutlets a la Maitre d'Hotel JOINT Roast Beef and Horse-radish Sauce ENTREES Rissoles of Pheasant a. la Pompadour Macaroni fc. 1'Italienne POULTRY Roast Capon and Ham CURRY Mutton PASTRY Lemon Jelly Almond Custard Plum Pudding Therein may be found, likewise, good sanction for a class of "breakfast entrees," such as our sample bills show; there are minced collops, and curry and rice. , Also, an idea for making curry a standing dish with a permanent heading, the Wnd ol meat to be changed at will, tor dinner. THE STEWARD'S HANDBOOK. 73 A SPECIAL BILL WHICH IS LARGE ENOUGH FOR ALL TIMES. PEABODT HOTEL. BREAKFAST. SUNDAY, MAY 16, 1886. Strawberries with Cream Oat Meal Cracked Wheat Grits BROILED Spanish Mackerel, Maitre d'Hotel Sauce Ducbesse Potatoes Spring- Chicken, Water Crest French Fried Potatoes EGGS Fried Shirred Omelets Boiled Poached BREAD, ETC. French Rolls Graham Muffins Corn Muffins Brioches Wheat Cakes Corn Cakes Coffee Chocolate Tea THE AMERICAN SUPPER OR TEA. The same thing that has been done for the breakfast could not be done for the supper; that is, the presenting of a set bills that fit alike all hotels in any part of the country, for while there is great uni- formity of practice in one respect there is extreme diversity in the other. The American breakfast is always a substantia meal; the supper may be anything to suit the place, or may not appear at all. The general American habit is to partake o only three meals a day: a good breakfast a good dinner, a light supper. In many hotels, such as those in country towns anc at resorts, houses that are not too fashion able that is to say, not too city-like these healthful habits can be kept up ; the hote keeper provides a very plentiful dinner, al his assistants work hard for it, and afte: that all is quiet; the third meal of the day is easy. In the middle, southern and west ern states it is called supper; in the north ern section and in Canada it is called tea In a great many hotels which make Ugh f this meal the bill of fare is headed "Tea ^ard," and the guests are not encouraged o expect much from it. Before the rail- oads had spread all over the country it used to be a saying "the pastry cook makes he supper," which meant that hot-breads, cakes and toast and, perhaps, baked pota- :oes were all that would be especially cooked; cold meats, stewed fruit, coffee, tea and milk serving to complete the meal. Hotel proprietors used to be divided in two classes: those who gave hot beefsteak for upper and those who did not, and there was a subdivision of those who gave hot aeefsteak every night except Sunday and those who gave it every night in the year, Sunday making no difference. The only other hot dish allowed in the beefsteak houses was boiled salt mackerel. But there was great choice of breads, rolls, rusks, coffee cakes, coiled buns, corn-bread, muf- fins, ginger-bread, buttermilk, biscuits, beaten biscuits, waffles, batter cakes, toast and cold bread of several varieties. One reason why the hotel supper has changed from the old simple style is found in the arrival of railroad trains at supper time; the travelers coming to the hotel must have a good meal, and the supper bill is almost equal to the breakfast bill shown a little way back. The broiled steak and boiled mackerel are found there as of old, but in addition there are chops and cutlets, fried fresh fish, spare-ribs, eggs, oysters, chicken more things than we care to enumerate. Another cause is the desire of a few in almost every town to dine at supper time instead of mid-day, when the hotel keeper, not caring to change his hours to please a few, sets out a supper bounteous enough to allow them to call it dinner if they please. The annexed example is the very moderate bill of fare of a very large hotel which is In exactly the above described position, the regular dinner being served at from one to three and no dinner In the evening, unless spe- cial for a party. This is, as far as it goes, an excellent pattern, the better because It allows so few varieties of hot meats. 74 THE STEWARD'S HANDBOOK. SUPPER. Vienna Coffee Chocolate Japan and Gunpowder Tea Sweet Milk French Rolls Johnny Cake Saratoga Rolls Graham, Rye and Wheat Bread Broiled Sirloin Steak Fried Black Fish Eggs Boiled, Fried, Shirred, Scrambled Omelettes Plain, -with Parsley, Onions Tomatoes or Ham French Fried Potatoes Saratoga Chips Baked Irish Potatoes Pearl Grits Cold Roast Beef Cold Roast Mutton Cold Corned Beef Cold Smoked Tongue Cold Boiled Ham Beet and Cabbage Salad Potato SalaJ Assorted Small Cakes Frozen Tapioca Custard Articles taken or sent from the table, and dishes or- dered not on this Bill of Fare, will posi- tively be charged for extra. RISING EQUAL TO THE EMERGENCY. For a hotel In a large and growing city, where bankers and merchants who would like dinner to be In the evening if it were convenient, are numerous among the guests, and where the trains bring many passengers; also at those resorts where many people of fashion contend in favor of the late dinner, the happiest combination of a supper with some dinner dishes added is this in practice at the hotel named below. It i the conception of the accomplished steward of that house, Mr. George Fulwell, who Is a specialist in bills of fare, taking as much pleasure In the development of ideas In that particular line as some men do in producing a new variety of fruit and others do in carrying off the honors at the exhib- itions; but he has paid attention to this branch and knows how to put his practical knowledge of the steward's business to account in suiting the tastes and conveni- ence of all the patrons of the hotel alike. PBABODT HOTEL, MEMPHIS, TSNN. SUPPER. Cerealine Porridge ENTREES Broiled Veal Chops Stewed Turkey Giblets, with Peas Ragout of Mutton, with Tomatoes Blanquette of Rabbit, Milanaise Fried Codfish Balli COLD Roast Beef Roast Duck Venison Salad EGGS Shirred Boiled Scrambled Omelets, with fine herbs POTATOES Baked Saratoga Chips German Fried BREAD, ETC. French Cream Graham Plait Vienna Rolls Tea Biscuits Toast Rye Griddle Cakes SYRUPS Maple Whit* Rock New Orleans Molasses Coffee Tea Milk Preserved Cranberries and Assorted Caker HOURS FOR MEALS. Breakfast, J-n. Dinner, 1-4. Supper, 6-0. SUNDAY. Breakfast, 7.30-11. Dinner, 1.30-4. Supper, 6-0. CHILDREN AND NURSES. Breakfast, 7. Dinner, i. Supper, 6. Tuesday, January 3, i88S. SUPPER. Oat Meal Porridge OYSTERS Stewed Fried ENTREES Broiled Pig's Feet Fried Veal Cutlets, Robert Sauce Stewed Kidneys, Madeira Sauce Braised Beef, with Mushroomf COLD Venison Pork Mutton Salmon Salad POTATOES Baked Hollandaise Saratoga Chips BREAD, ETC. French Graham Cream Plain Finger Rolls Currant Coiled Buns Toast Flannel Griddle Cakes SYBILS- Maple White Rock New Orleans Molasses Coffee Tea Milk Canned California Cherries and Assorted Cake* Wednesday, January 4. 1888. THE STEWARD'S HANDBOOK. 76 Two of these bills of succeeding dates are printed to show where the changes come in. It will be observed that this is far in advance of the regular stock bill of fare, in being a fresh composition printed daily and changed in nearly every partic- ular, yet without depriving the guests of their accustomed favorite dishes ; the hotel does not abandon the mid-day dinner which the greater number of people like best, but changes the make-up of the sup- per without adding to the number of dishes so that they can dine at night who wish to do so. There Is no beefsteak, therefore fewer loins of beef to cut up ; and no soup to be re-christened from a mid-day lunch, but there are eggs one evening and oysters the next ; the potatoes, breads, cold meats and supper fruit are all changed about, just enough to give freshness and variety with- out depriving any person of the regular diet of rolls, baked potatoes or batter cakes. In those hotels where the dinner hour is changed to evening the greatest discontent is occasioned by the disappearance from the menu of h t rolls and biscuits, fried pota- oes and batter cakes, and, be the dinner never so plentiful, nothing that can be of- fered can quite make up the loss to those who have been in the habit of eating and enjoying those popular articles of diet for supper all their life. The new form of bill under consideration appears to be a compro- mise for all parties. A compromise used to be thought a good thing in the time of the great Henry Clay, and a compromise at one time was thought to be all that was needed to avert the war of secession; this com- promise bill of Mr. Fulwell's by a parity of reasoning ought certainly to be effective in keeping the peace between the early and late dinner factions, even in a growing com- mercial city like Memphis. "Back num- bers" of these bills (for the system has been in satisfactory operation for several months) show variations in the plan of this expert, whose efforts to rise above the common* place are worthy of re-cognition especially in this land where gastronomical education is at present at a low stage and teachers are few. One sample more is inserted here with very good will towards the author: SUPPER. Tuesday, September 6, 1887. Rolled Oats Porridge OYSTERS Fried Stewed BROILED Pig's Feet Liver, with Breakfast Bacon FRIED Croquettes of Veal, French Peas MISCELLAN EOUS-^ Braised Beef, with Vegetables Boiled Salt Mackerel Welsh Rare -Bit COLD Roast Beef Roast Veal Chipped Beef Roast Chicken Corned Beef Italian Salad Sardines in Mustard POTATOES Baked Saratoga Chips Provencale BREAD, ETC. French, Graham, Vienna, Cream and Plain Bread Vienna Saltz Kipf el Rolls Cream Scones Toast Flemish Gridle Cakes SYRUPS Maple White Rock New Orleans Molasses Coffee Chocalate Tea Milk French Prunes and Assorted Cakes PORRIDGE DISHES AVAILABLE FOR SUPPER AND BREAKFAST. Cornmeal Mush. Shredded Maize Porridge. Rolled Oat Porridge. Cracked Wheat Porridge. Rolled Avena Porridge. Cracked Wheat with Cream. Cerealine Porridge. Farina Mush and Milk. Home-made Hominy. Wheaten Grits. Pearl Grits. Stewed Wheat. Steamed Rice. Apple Tapioca and Cream. Cracked Wheat with Milk. Oatmeal with Milk. Oatmeal Porridge. Mush with Milk. Graham Mush. Oatmeal with Cream. Graham Farina Porridge. Hominy Grits and Cream. Rice Grits and Milk. Wheat Flakes with Cream. Large Hominy and Milk. English Furmety. Cream Sago. Manioca Porridge. [A condensed description of the composition of every dish in these lists, -which is not suffi- ciently apparent by itt name, will be found in the Dictionary of Dishes, toon to follow] 76 THE STEWARD'S HANDBOOK. FISH ENTREES AVAILABLE FOR SUPPER AND BREAKFAST. Broiled and Fried Fish of all Kinds. Cutlets of Black Bass, Genoise Sauce. Salmon Steak, Sicilian Sauce. Fillets of Whitefish, Remoulade Sauce. Fondue of Fish. Scalloped Fish. Panned Perch with Bacon. Canned Salmon. Smoked Bluefish, Boiled. Spanish Mackerel, a la Maitre d'HOtel. Codfish Bal^s. Codfish Cakes. Picked-up Fish in Cream. Mackerel in Tomato Sauce. Sardines in Mustard. Sardines, Truffes. Barbecued Recifish. Baltimore Roe Herring. Salt Codfish in Cream. Codfish Steak. Codfish Hash. Broiled Salt Mackerel. Redfish Courtbouillon. Oregon Salmon. Mullet Roes, Fried Smoked Salmon. Smoked Halibut. Smoked Haddock. Boiled Salt Mackerel. Smoked Herring. Trout Cuurtbouillon. Salmon with Parsley and Butter. Fillets of Soles, a la Maitre d'HOtel. Baked Mullet, Fine Herbs. Baked Whitefish. Broiled Florida Trout. Broiled Pompano. Codfish Tongues on Toast. Frtsh Shrimps. Potted Shrimps. Buttered Shrimps. Curried Shrimps. Curried Lobster. Anchovy Cakes. Shrimp Omelette. Potted Lobster on Toast. Sardines and Waterci ess. Scalloped Codfish. Smoked Finnan Haddock. Fried Slices of Cod. Anchovy Toast. Hot Boiled Crab. Sardines on Toast Shrimp Pie. Shrimp Patt es. Broiled English Bloaters. Curried Oysters. Fish Quenelles. Fish Croquettes. Lobster Cutlets. Fresh Fish in Cream. Fish Flakes, k la Bechamel. Boiled Codfish Palates. Curried Sardines. Bloaters in Batter. Shrimps and Boiled Rice. Scalloped Lobster. Fresh Herrings Stuff, d. Broiled Kippered Salmon. Salmon and Macaroni. Stewed Mackerel. Lobster Rissoles. Herring Roe and Mushroom*. Lobster Creams. Dressed Crab. Anchovy Toast with Egg. Sardines en Calsse. Lobster a la Crime. Canapes of Sardines. Scalloped Shrimps. Sardine Sandwiches. Shrimp Canapes. \Other fish dishes -with description of all can be found in the Dictionary of Dishes further on.] OYSTER ENTREES AVA1 : ABLE FOR SUPPER AND BREAKFAST. Fried Oysters. Stewed Oysters. Oysters with Macaroni Oysters in Small Loaves. Oyster Toast Steamed Oysters. Oyster Patties. Vol an Vents of Oyster*. Oysters in Croustades. Scalloped Oysters. Oysters k 1'Indienne. Oyster Kromeskies Ovsters a la Brochette. Oys;er Omelets. Oysters en Cabse. Broiled Oysters. Oyster Rissoles. Oyster, Fritters. Oysters in Wafer Shells. Oysters Broiled in Bacon. Oyster Chowder. Oysters Fried in Batter. Clams in same ways as oysters. Scallops in same ways as oysters. EGG ENTREES AVAILABLE FOK SUPPER AND BREAKFAST. Eggs in about one hundred ways are available, for which see the dictionary of dishes further on. It is unnecessary to follow further with such lists, as all the forms of meat entrees and ways of cooking potatoes are already familiar to those who prepare the dinner bills of fare. The foregoing lists are in- tended to help those who have to make new breakfast and supper bills daily, which is comparatively new business. THE STEWARD'S HANDBOOK. RESTAURANT STEWARDING COMPRISING A SURVEY OF VARIOUS STYLES OF RESTAURANTS AND THEIR METHODS. CLUB STEWARDING AND CATERING, HOW TO PREPARE AND HOW TO SERVE THEM; WITH NUMEROUS PATTERN BILLS OF FARE CARRIED OUT TO QUANTITIES, COST AND PRICE PER HEAD. CHICAGO. 1903, Entered accorctujg- to Act of Congress in the Office of the Librarian, at Washington, by JESSUP WHITEHEAD, 1889. All rights reserved. RESTAURANT STEWARDING. "The difference between hotel and res- taurant, did you ask? Oh, everbody knows that The difference is well, let's see the difference is, at a restaurant you can get your meals any time you want, and in a hotel you can't, because they close their doors. The restaurant man is glad to see you come in at any hour of the day or night, while in the hotels they look at a fellow like he had felonious intentions if he tries to get in to eat after their time is up." Good enough as far as it goes, but if we think it over a little we shall find greater differences than that. Hotel-keeping is good housekeeping on a magnificent scale; restaurant- keeping is merchandizing in meat and drink. The hotel Boniface keeps a good house; the restaurateur has command of the markets. The hotel-keepei takes care of people; the restaurateur attends upon people who try to take care of themselves. The hotel- keeper provides a home for a number sub- ject to rules; the restaurateur provides a refuge for those who know no rules or are ruled out. The hotel-keeper thinks the most of his customers in the aggregate and will not change his ways to suit different individuals; the restaurateur thinks most of the individuals and is not disturbed if their tastes differ to wide extremes. The hotel-keeper provides meals for numbers by wholesale methods, such as would cost the individual three or four times as much to provide singly for himself ; the restaura- teur provides by retail methods the separ- ate meals as ordered and charges for his services. The hotel-keeper thinks and manages for all; the restaurateur invites each one to think and manage for himself and adapts his establishment to meet every caprice. The model restaurant keeper stocks up like a merchant with everything that will ell; secures the latest novelties like a merchant ; displays his goods like a mer- chant; advertises like a merchant; maker his prices according to the demand ; make? his money out of the luxuries rather than the necessities of his customers. When the hotel steward goes to market and finds some desirable thing, the question with him is "Will it pay?" The restaurant steward asks himself, " Will it sell? " The first must limit his purchases within the bounds of the price per day charged by his house; the other must judge whether any among the known or probable patrons of his restaurant will buy the fresh delicacy at the price demanded. The hotel bill of fare shows how much can be done for a certain fixed price per head ; the restaurant carte shows what there is in market, and, consequently, in the restaurant larder, and what it will cost if ordered. The hotel steward hiring hands expects to have but one set for the day ; only one continuous watch. He hires them for long days, not comparable with the days of other classes of workers, if counted in hours, yet broken up and made easy by intervals between meals. He has times to close his doors and give most or all of the hands a recess. The restaurant steward hires them for so many hours continuous work without breaks or intervals; and when the clock strikes the watch on duty stops work and the next watch takes hold as promptly as in a factory; he strives, therefore, to apportion the workers to the duties to be performed in such a way that their time will be fully employed during all the hours he pays them for. He rarely closes his doors at all. The restaurant meals are never over, but always begin- ning. The most unseasonable hours are often the best for business. When the hotel is asleep and the theatre is over the restaurant is most awake, and the fresh hands newly come on watch then render their best work in cooking and service. 78 THE STEWARD'S HANDBOOK. The restaurant exists for odd times, unseasonable hours; to DC outside of com- mon rules and habits; to meet sudden emergencies, unusual demands, transitory fancies and pa-sing fashions. The success- ful restaurateur is like a courtier, making cash customer in turn think he is the only one that really knows how to order a din- ner, or has a true appreciation of what is good and en regie. The successful steward is one who can carry a stock so varied, even of perishables, that he can never be taken unawares by the most unexpected orders, and who yet loses the least through the spoiling of provisions. The best cooks, probably, are hotel cooks who have had a previous restaurant train- ing. Hotel cooks attain their greatest ex- cellence in that most valuable knowledge of cookery which the French common people are credited with possessing as a birthright, which Alexis Soyer gave such a brilliant example of when he showed the British soldiers in the Crimea how to take the rations which they were starving and dying upon and make them into palatable and nutritious soups and stews, such as their French neighbors and allies were concocting so well from the same poor supplies. Hotel cooks learn good manage- ment; they learn the economies; to make much of little; to suit the average greatest number; but the res'. aur ant cooks are the more ornamental in their work ; they must learn styles and fancy touches and take instructions from many critical or whim- sical customers. The individual style ser- vice of hotel dinners in small dishes has a certain prettiness of its own and a propri- etary exclusiveness about it which delights many, but the restaurant entire dishes for parties of four, six or eight give the cooks room and opportunities for styles of decor- ation which untraveled hotel cooks have no inkling of. A restaurant cook having to serve even so common an order as saus- age and mashed potatoes for two, price a few cents, will place four separate, smooth poonfuls of potato cross-fashion in the dish, a brown fried sausage pressed half- way in the top of each and gravy over all, and sends in an attractive dish with a shape to it, when in inexperienced hands it would be nothin > but potato in one dish, sausage in another, common and unnotice- able; alike in the commonest boarding house and the -best hotel. From such simples the restaurant cook's work rises to whole dishes of fish, fowl and game, with foreign names, styles and ornamental accessories. At the same time the restau- rant cook has an expensive liking for large portions, choice cuts, whole steaks, whole fishes, plentiful wines to stew in and the free use of imported rarities encouraged by a class of customers who pay a dollar or several dollars for a single dish, but which he must modify to some extent in the hotel according to its style and prices. The hotel head waiter having a party or a family whom he desires to have particu- larly well served, after locating them at the pleasantest table, looks around among his waiters for one who has experience in a restaurant. The restaurant waiter may seem slow and im fficient amongst a crowd, but he is the one they want when minute personal attentions are required; the one who never forgets ; is never in a hurry to get away ; neither hears nor sees anything at his table except his own duties. Res- taurant training makes that sort of waiter. But as everybody knows, they are not all restaurants that are called by that name. The real restaurants of the original Parisian sort are very few. Some, even of the most famous of modern French establishments have closed up within the last few years. Some writers account for the decrease by saying the rising genera- tion is becoming more mercenary and pre fers the table d'hote with its fixed price for dinner or supper to the gilt-edged restau- rant with its fancy prices and the latter falls into decline through the growth of economical tendencies. However, the or- iginal pattern of restaurant will still exist. THE STEWARD'S HANDBOOK. 79 few but remarkable, and there are modifi- cations of it growing everywhere in in- creasing numbers. THE RISE OF THE RESTAURANT. The rise of the restaurant is nearly al- ways alike semi-accidental. It might seem a curious line of argument to pursue, but it is more than likely it could be prove'n that of those who "open a restaurant" nineteen out of twenty fail. There seems to be a special adaptation to the business required, a love of it, and a kind of talent not often to be had for money. The first great Parisian restaurants, which attracted world-wide notice and imitators in all countries have been n entioned so often Beauvilliers' Very's Robert's that one is loth to touch again upon a subject so old, yet all the mention is of them in their prime, In their success; nobody knows how they began, nor by what accident of patronage their originators were started. Here Is a modern, a very recent instance, which is an illustration that will suit nearly every case and shows that restaurateurs are "born, not made." It is of one Joseph he has another name, but as Joseph only he is noted in the papeis who had a small restaurant somewhere in Paris, "Joseph's restaurant," and became the favorite of an appreciative few. He had some specialties, some special ways of pleasing his patrons which we may not know they were his special points of adaptation which made him successful and, perhaps, were generally of too small dimensions to be described, they were characteristics. But one point was of sufficient saliency to be taken hold of; something he did which became the talk of gastronomical Paris. What was it? What could one obscure man in a small restaurant do that made all the gilded and glittering establishments of old standing envious? He served as nobody else could, Canard Sauvage^ Sauce au Sang Wild Duck with Blood Sauce roast wild duck with its natural gravy. It is hard to avoid writing cynically about such a matter, but we will try. Some of these things which catch the passing fashion are so exceed- ing small, the admiration of them seems asinine; yet somebody must uphold and magnify them the restaurateur must. To tell how it was done is but a parody on another old story of how some wondrous cook electrified a court and charmed all Christendom by the genius shown in cook- ing two beefsteaks and squeezing the gravy out of one to pour over the other which was for the prince. M. Joseph roasted his ducks very rare, then cut the breasts in slices upon a chafing dish (a metal dish with an alcohol lamp under, to keep it at cooking heat), the gravy from the rare- cooked slices flowing freely. All the rest of the carcass he squeezed dry to obtain the juice for the slices of breast of duck, and he let all finish cooking in the dish, the gravy of course thickening itself, and served the meat so in its own juices. It may be he added flavorings and seasonings, the reporters do not say, and if so they were but incidental. Canard Sauvage^ Sauce au Sang was the dish. And let the host of carvers of "Roast Beef Rare" at the merchants' lunch houses, chop houses, restaurants, dining rooms, cafe's and hotels remember it when they see the "natural gravy" flow into the dish of the hot carv- ing table and cook and become thick there that is the sauce au sang^ the blood gravy which, when drawn from wild ducks, a large number of Parisian gourmets went into ecstacies over and made M. Joseph famous. Next, a wealthy American one of the very wealthiest was taken by a party of friends to M. Joseph's, not ne- cessarily to partake of canard sauvage^ but to patronize the pet restaurateur of the day, and they Commissioned him to prepare a dinner for them of his own choosing, which he did ; a thoroughly simple dinner of roast quail and a few other viands, with which they were so delighted because it was prepared by the only M. Joseph that they ordered the same for the next day and for several succeeding days. After they were gone their ways a great Parisian cau, secured the services of M. Joseph, just as 80 THE STEWARD'S HANDBOOK. an operatic manager secures a star per- former, and he officiated at a silver chafing dish with a silver duck-squeezer; and, later and latest, he was enticed away from the cafe" by the very wealthy citizen of the United States by the offer of a very large salary, and is now in this country in pri- vate service. Such is, in nearly every case, the history of the rise of the high-priced, fashionable restaurant there is a natural adaptation of a cook and an enthusiastic love of his profession ; then the patronage of wealthy admirers and it is an accomplished fact. But where is the restaurant in the case of M. Joseph? Most probably it is coming. We are not writing of the res- taurant of the last century. M. Joseph is of to-day; his restaurant may come to- morrow. Some morning the papers will ay: "Delmonico is likely to meet with a formidable competitor shortly, in a magni- ficent restaurant after the Parisian fashion, to be opened by the $10,000 M.Joseph, the famous ex-chef to Mr. Vanderbilt," etc.,, etc. They all aspire to it. Did not Presi- dent Arthur's chef open a restaurant? Did not Presidents Hayes' and Garfield's steward open a restaurant? What became of them afterwards does not belong to the story. When the hero and heroine of a novel get married the interest ceases and the story ends. Likewise, every man thinks to get to keeping a high-class restaurant is heaven until he has a chance to try it A TYPICAL AMERICAN RESTAURATEUR. As true a type as the French M. Joseph of the restaurateur, as distinguished from the hotel keeper by all the traits we have already enumerated is the American, Mr. Taft pictured below. He must indeed be an enthusiast, as the correspondents all agree in calling him, to carry his hobby of keeping everything that can be called for always on hand to such a successful extent as is described. Says one, recounting a visit to the place : "Taft's is a great Institution, and the person who visits Boston and does not go there has seen, or rather eaten, nothing. The fish dinners gotten up at that famous resort are not equalled, prdbably, anywhere in the world. Mr. Taft is an old gentle- man of over seventy, thin and tall as a rail, with snow-white hair. He is the greatest enthusiast we ever saw. It is a sight to see him bring in dish after dish, every one prepared under his personal superintend- ence, and carry it around the table for the inspection of every guest. His face is all aglow with pride and excitement and his features plainly say: 'What do you think of th t? Isn't it magnificent?' We asked him were he learned to cook. 'My mother chucked me under the kitchen table when I was three weeks old and there I stayed,' was his answer; and we believe him. Din- ners of twenty and more courses are com- mon occurrences here, and the charges are not exorbitant The old gentleman was asked why he brought the 'turbot,' which he claims is the finest fish, In the world, first on the table. 'Ah,' he replied, the best to be fully appreciated, must always be eaten when the appetite is keenest; then you relish It immensely.' Logic which certainly proved correct in our case, for we thought that turbot the finest thing we had ever tasted." Taft has a printed bill of fare or card of what can be had at his establishment, in which it is his pride to enumerate nearly all the edible birds and fishes, ending with humming birds served in nut shells. The list has been printed in the newspapers as a curiosity frequently. It would be Impos- sible to give a more graphic and interest- ing account of the man and the place, or particulars more readable to restaurateurs than this from the Philadelphia News. It is better than a lecture on restaurant-keep- ing. This writer remarks: " 'Taft does not serve general meals as does a restaurant' " but it does not imply that Taft's is not the truest kind of a res- taurant, it is one devoted to the specialties of fish and game, the very opposite of the table (Thole \ a place where ' you can easily run your bill up to forty or fifty dollars ' for dinner. THE STEWARD'S HANDBOOK. 81 " Boston has what I consider the greatest gastronomic prize in the world in Taft's. The name stands for both the man and the place. I can truthfully say of it that the bon vivant who confesses ignorance to his and its existence has no right to claim that he has lived. Taft? I hear you say. I don't suppose there are a hundred men in Philadelphia who ever heard the name before, and yet it is the only place in the wide world where you can obtain any edible fish that swims, perfectly cooked. Only one divinely inspired can cook a fish. A man of fair culinary education can ac- complish marvels with meats and vege- tables and sweetmeats, but how few of even our famous chefs can give a fish that delicate treatment without which it has no temptation for the educated palate. At Gloucester, in the planked shad, we have a dish that should stand second in the list of piscatorial delicacies. The first place should unquestionably be given to the tur- bot as cooked at Taft's. "Taft is a white-haired octogenarian who owns a roomy frame structure on the shore of the Atlantic Ocean at Point Shirley, seven miles from Boston. I took dinner there two weeks ago, but it lives in my memory as vividly as though it were yesterday. I can never forget it. Old Taft entertained us for some time when we entered the parlor with reminiscences of the famous men who have visited his house. When Charles Dickens was in this country he and Nathanial Hawthorne, Henry W. Longfellow, Charles Sumner and John W. Forney frequently sat to- gether in one of the little dining rooms. Taft takes great delight in exhibiting the treasures of his larder. Men who have visited his house send him trophies of the gun and rod from every quarter of the globe. I thought I would nonplus him when he proudly said : Gentlemen, I can furnish you with any edible fish or bird that you may name.' 1 said : ' Have you any reed birds?" He looked at me quiz- zically and said : ' You are from Philadel- phia? ' I said : ' What makes you think so? ' ' Because,' he replied, ' it is the only place in this country where you get reed birds except here,' and he held up a bunch of little bursting balls of golden fat the little cherubs that the Philadelphia epicure bows down before and worships. He showed me even plump little humming birds, each one snugly packed in the half of an English walnut shell. But his dis- play of fish! It makes my mouth water to simply think of the tempting sight. He had every finny delicacy I had ever heard of and many that were entirely new to me, even by name. Try again,' he said to me, laughingly. 'Perhaps you can name a fish I haven't got.' I naturally thought that the simplest of all, and yet one of the sweetest, would be forgotten in this wonderful array, and so I said : ' I want some Schuylkill catfish.' " Now I know you are from Philadel- phia,' he said, smilingly, as he reached far down in a big ice box and produced a string of our humble ' catties.' "Taft does not serve general meals as does a restaurant He will provide you with a strictly fish dinner or a strictly game dinner or a combination of both. For the fish dinner, which is really a cul- inary marvel, he charges two dollars with- out wines. For what he terms his ' regu- lar ' game dinner he charges three dollars and a half, but if you wish to select from his larder what you wish you can very easily run your bill up to forty or fifty dollars, even though there are but three or four in the party. The dinner I partook of was especially ordered, and was a com- bination of both fish and game. I want to say right here by way of apology for the tale I have to tell that the appetites of my- self and companions had been sharpened to a keen edge by a carriage ride of seven and a half miles in 'a nipping and an eager air,' salted with the spray that the wind swept in from the bosom of the broad Atlantic. "We began the feast by each one con- suming about fifty steamed clams not the tough little morsels that we call delicacies, 82 THE STEWARD'S HANDBOOK. but the long, soft shell tid-bits, of which you eat only the sweet morsels at the end after you have dipped it in melted butter. Fifty are looked upon as constituting only a moderate appetizer. Each dish that fol- lowed this was labeled by a small card bearing in letters of gold the name of the subject about to be discussed and held in place and aloft by a toothpick piercing both the card and the fish or bird, which- ever the dish happened to be. The first dish proved the piece de resistance. It was a large turbot The card bore this legend : TAFT'S TURBOT. * KING OF THE SEA. It was truly * beautiful sight. At the edges it was of a creamy white, that deep- ened on the sides into a golden hue that became gradually richer and richer, until at the top it became a delicate brown. And then what snowy flakes it broke into under the fork! And what sweetness when it entered the mouth! I can truthfully say that I have never eaten fish before. Its memory haunts me still. I confess that when I had fully realized the wonder of that turbot I reached over the table and seized that little card, and I have it before me now. " The next fish placed before us was a rock cod, which was excelled in delicacy and sweetness only by the glorious turbot, of which, by the way, we did not leave one morsel. Taft accompanied each dish into the room and for our especial benefit de- livered a brief dissertation on its merits. The rest of the banquet consisted solely of game. The list may make your mouth water. We had chicken grouse and Lake Erie teal, both the finest I ever tasted in my life; jack snipes, , eeps wee litt'e birds and very toothsome; reed bids not equal to those of Philadelphia; and last of all humming birds cooked in nut shells. The last were really not worth eating, being dry and tasteless. But I wanted to say that I had eaten a humming bird, and now I can say it. Taken altogether, it was a banquet fit for the gods, and it made me " feel glad that I was permitted to live and to be at point Shirley!" THE RESTAURANT STEWARD AND THE MARKET MEN. Mr. Taft evidently experienced keen en- joyment in his avocation, yet it may be doubted whether he, being practically without competitors, ever knew the su- preme exultation of the city restaurant steward who "get's a scoop" on all his rivals in the business by securing the entire supply of some coveted delicacy and compelling the best patrons of other estab- lishments to come to his place for it. He may have absolutely all the frogs' legs the city contains, and the blissful knowledge that no more can arrive for a week; or all of the early chickens, or the very last quail and partridges. And such being the object of his ambition, he must think of ways to gain the preferences of the market and commission men, for if he fails to make friends of them, unless he has very good private sources of supply from out- side markets, he may as well quit the busi- ness. When a thing is cheap and plenti- ful he will be solicited to buy even if disliked and despised, but then he does not want it; and when it is scarce and in de- mand, he may hear of its being obtainable at this or that restaurant, but if not in the circle of favorites the dealers will take great pains to be " just sold out " every time he tries them. And still his favored rivals are getting all they want from hid- den stores for days in succession. Many a new restaurant that is opened with a dis- play of gilding and plate glass fails of suc- cess through this unconsidered particular of not having a steward or buyer who can secure the good will of the dealers in specialties, the game dealers, fish importers, the merchants who can always obtain everything worth having; not depending upon the northern markets alone, nor the southern markets alone, but wiring to fifty places if necessary; knowing where the goods are to be found. Without this com- THE STEWARD'S HANDBOOK. 83 mand of the markets, and the co-operation of the market mea the restaurant fai's from Inability to "fill the bill." After two or three disappointments the most profitable patrons become chagrined and pass the place by with the contemptuous remark: " Oh, you can never find anyth'ng there." HOW TO " STAND IN " WITH THE MARKET MEN. The surest and best way to secure favors from the dealers is to be in a measure in- dependent of them by opening communi- cation with the same sources of supply which they draw from, at least often enough to show them that their withhold- ing of supplies in favor of old friends will not have the effect of destroying the new restaurant, which may possibly, by reach- ing out, even gain advantages over all the older houses, and wake them up to a realizing sense that they don't yet own the ( arth. This, however, is only possible with a command of capital to stand occa- sional losses. Some, having but a limited business, can join another party, or several whose places are far enough apart not to compete, and import profitably that which one alone could not afford. Next best way to secure a fair share and even a preference in what is going, is to pay cash on the spot. Old friendships and well-ripened business relationships may be strong, but cash in hand will draw the last and best thing from the darkest bacV corner of the refrigerator when the other fellow is not looking, nevertheless. To stand well with the market men it is not necessary to ?ttempt bribery, or to buy favors in that way. There is a good deal in having a pleasing address and sociable ways, but there is a kind of reciprocal accommodation which these dealers, being business men, appreciate above everything else they want the buying steward to help them out occasionally when their enterprise has led them to bring on too much stock which threatens to spoil on their hands. They wiJJ not urge the man they have sometimes favored with the things that were scarcest to help to unload them in a glut, but if on once asking he does not see what is the matter, and do what he can afford by taking more or less, they are liable to remember it against him at some future time when perhaps they uil have the only basket of turkeys or sucking pigs in the whole city, and he wants them badly. KEEPING PROVISIONS. Not the least of the means of keeping abreast with the foremost in the trade is a thorough knowledge of how to keep pro- visions after they have been procured. The best restaurants have refrigerators of special make, cold rooms, fitted with drawers and shelves in which prepared provisions are kept awaiting orders to cook them. In some places the main depend- ence is upon large ice boxes containing broken ice, and cotton sacks full of small quantities of such things as are not injured by being kept wet are buried deep in the ice where they keep for a l^ng time. A FIRST-CLASS RESTAURANT BILL OF FARE. Regarded as reading matter a bill of fare may not have very strong claims upon the attention, but as showing what need the restaurateur has of extensive acquaintance with the markets and of ways and means of keeping a vast number of articles In good condition when secured, the grand bill of fare here shown must prove an ob- ject of lasting interest. Merely as a list of dishes for the composition of bills of fare it will be found useful ; as a list of prices charged where prices are the highest it will serve to brace up the timid ones who don't know how to charge. Tw j dollars and a half, it must be admitted is a good " live and let live " price for a beefsteak see the list of " Dishes to Order." A por- tion of the price of every dish in this place was needed, however, to pay for the music of Gilmore's band playing outside. 84 THE STEWARD'S HANDBOOK. Guests will please Pay their Checks to the Waiters, and see that Prices charged correspond with those on Bill of Fare. BILL. OF FARE. SA.TTJianD-A.ir, CTTTZSTE 14, is SHELL FISH Little Neck clams on half ahell 25 Clam, roasted 40 Clams, stewed 40 " Little Neck, roasted .." 5 " fried ....40 " steamed 40 " fritters 40 Plain lobster 40 Soft shell crabs 50 SOUPS Consomm* 25 Printanier Royal 35 Clam chowder S Mock Turtle 40 FISH Baked bluefish, wine sauce 46 Boiled sheepshead, hollandalse 60 Eels, tartar sauce 50 Connecticut River salmon broiled 50 Striped bass, broiled 40 Spanish mackerel " 50 Biuefish " 40 Blackfish 40 Sheepshead " 5 Sea bass " 40 Freshcodfish " 40 Filet of sole, tartar or tomato sauce 50 Fresh codfish, hollandaisc 50 BOILED Leg of mutton, caper sauce 50 Turkey with pork 6b Corned beef and cabbage 45 Chicken, Florentine sauce 75 Ox tongue with spinach 45 ROAST Ribs of Beef 40 Spring chicken with cresses, whole i 50 Lamb, mint sauce 50 half 75 Spring turkey