The Feasts of Autolycus: The Diary of a Greedy Woman

by Elizabeth Robins Pennell

What great expense it takes to make it good;

You must have cheese, and honey, and sesame,

Oil, leeks, and vinegar, and assafœtida,

To dress it up with; for by itself the onion

Is bitter and unpleasant to the taste.

A pretty mess, indeed; and who is there brave enough to-day to test it? Honey and onion! it suggests the ingenious contrivances of the mediæval kitchen. The most daring experiment now would be a dash of wine, red or white, a suspicion of mustard, a touch of tomato in the sauce for onions, stewed or boiled, baked or stuffed. To venture upon further flights of fancy the average cook would consider indiscreet, though to the genius all things are possible. However, its talents for giving savour and character to other dishes is inexhaustible.

There is no desire more natural than that of knowledge; there is no knowledge nobler than that of the "gullet-science." "The discovery of a new dish does more for the happiness of the human race than the discovery of a planet!" What would be Talleyrand's record but for that moment of inspiration when, into the mysteries of Parmesan with soup, he initiated his countrymen? To what purpose the Crusades, had Crusaders not seen and loved the garlic on the plains of Askalon, and brought it home with them, their one glorious trophy. To a pudding Richelieu gave his name; the Prince de Soubise lent his to a sauce, and thereby won for it immortality.

A benefactor to his race indeed he was: worthy of a shrine in the Temple of Humanity. For, plucking the soul from the onion, he laid bare its hidden and sweetest treasure to the elect. Scarce a sauce is served that owes not fragrance and flavour to the wine-scented root; to it, Béarnaise, Maître d'Hôtel, Espagnole, Italienne, Béchamel, Provençale, and who shall say how many more? look for the last supreme touch that redeems them from insipid commonplace. But Sauce Soubise is the very idealisation of the onion, its very essence; at once delicate and strong; at once as simple and as perfect as all great works of art.

The plodding painter looks upon a nocturne by Whistler, and thinks how easy, how preposterously easy! A touch here, a stroke there, and the thing is done. But let him try! And so with Sauce Soubise. Turn to the first cookery book at hand, and read the recipe. "Peel four large onions and cut them into thin slices; sprinkle a little pepper and salt upon them, together with a small quantity of nutmeg; put them into a saucepan with a slice of fresh butter, and steam gently"—let them smile, the true artist would say—"till they are soft." But why go on with elaborate directions? Why describe the exact quantity of flour, the size of the potato, the proportions of milk and cream to be added? Why explain in detail the process of rubbing through a sieve? In telling or the reading these matters seem not above the intelligence of a little child. But in the actual making, only the artist understands the secret of perfection, and his understanding is born within him, not borrowed from dry statistics and formal tables. He may safely be left to vary his methods; he may add sugar, he may omit nutmeg; he may fry the onions instead of boiling, for love of the tinge of brown, rich and sombre, thus obtained. But, whatever he does, always with a wooden spoon will he stir his savoury mixture; always, as result, produce a godlike sauce which the mutton cutlets of Paradise, vying with Heine's roast goose, will offer of their own accord at celestial banquets. What wonder that a certain famous French count despised the prosaic politician who had never heard of cutlets à la Soubise?

However, not alone in sauce can the condescending onion come to the aid of dull, substantial flesh and fowl. Its virtue, when joined to sage in stuffing, who will gainsay? Even chestnuts, destined to stuff to repletion the yawning turkey, cannot afford to ignore the insinuating shallot or bolder garlic; while no meat comes into the market that will not prove the better and the sweeter for at least a suspicion of onion or of ail. A barbarian truly is the cook who flings a mass of fried onions upon the tender steak, and then thinks to offer you a rare and dainty dish. Not with such wholesale brutality can the ideal be attained. The French chef has more tact. He will take his gigot and sympathetically prick it here and there with garlic or with chives, even as it is roasting; and whoever has never tasted mutton thus prepared knows not the sublimest heights of human happiness. Or else he will make a bouquet garni of his own, entirely of these aromatic roots and leaves, and fasten it in dainty fashion to the joint; pleasure is doubled when he forgets to remove it, and the meat is placed upon the table, still bearing its delicious decoration. Moods there be that call for stronger effects: moods when the blazing poppy field of a Monet pleases more than the quiet moonlight of a Cazin; when Tennyson is put aside for Swinburne. At such times, call for a shoulder of mutton, well stuffed with onions, and still further satiate your keen, vigorous appetite with a bottle of Beaune or Pomard. But here, a warning: eat and drink with at least a pretence of moderation. Remember that, but for an excess of shoulder of mutton and onions, Napoleon might not have been defeated at Leipzig.