The Best Pick-me-up

known to the writer is “the Boy, the whole Boy, and nothing but the Boy.” ’Tis an expensive restorative, no doubt; but, just as you cannot make an omelette without breaking eggs, so are most of our pleasant vices more or less costly in the long-run. Champagne, i.e. genuine champagne, is about the most valuable restorative known to science, and has—I believe, though this is not within my own experience—saved the lives of sufferers from the “black death,” cholera. Whether blended with beaten eggs, bitters, or brandy, or in his pure natural beauty, there is, believe me, no such effectual sorrow-chaser as “The Boy.”

Anchovy Toast.

The next best restorer of the faculties is a quasi-solid; and the recipe for its con­coc­tion has already been given in Cakes and Ale. As, {205} how­ever, a portion of the public may be fated to enjoy the ale with­out the cakes, here it is again.

First and foremost, bear in mind that this appetizer must not be made in the kitchen. It comes under the heading of “parlour cookery,” and can even be man­u­fac­tured in the bedroom of the sufferer.

A hot-water plate is necessary for the operator, or, better still, a slop-basin filled with water as near the boiling point as possible, with a plate placed atop. Melt on this plate a piece of butter about the size of a walnut, and when the butter is oiled stir therein with a fork the beaten yolk of one egg. Keep on the stir, and add, gradually, a dessert spoonful of essence of anchovies. Add cayenne, according to your disposition, or indisposition, and then you will be ready for a nice strip or two of delicately-browned toast, brought up hot from the kitchen fire. Soak the toast in the mixture, and eat as much as you can.

Above is the estimate for one invalid. It is essentially a pick-me-up for a bachelor—benedicts never require these things—and if, whilst in barracks, or chambers, Jack, Tom, and Harry should call, the proportions of the ingredients must, of course, be increased. A glass or two of the Boy will be found to go down excellent well with this toast, the secret of which I learnt long years ago, in British India. It is not a dish for the dinner-table.

A

Baltimore Egg Nogg

reads like a “large order.” It is said by its {206} author to be “an excellent drink for debilitated people, and a nourishing diet for consumptives.” And he would be a Good Samaritan, who would wait outside the big gates of Holloway Castle, on a Monday morning, in order to administer the nogg, in full doses, to the starved captives on their release. It would also, I should imagine, make an excellent hospital drink, for a score or so of patients.