Mr. Wilkins was the first proprietor, and in 1842 it was in the hands of a company. In 1860 Pfordte, who had become director of this Keller, aimed at higher things. Being a good organiser and administrator, he eventually moved the Keller to the street that runs from the Alster Dam to the Rathaus gardens, and there, at the corner of the gardens, established a restaurant which is one of the best in the world.
Pfordte is a man of small stature but of most courteous and polished manners, and is no exception to the general rule that small men have usually great brains. His restaurant is facile princeps of all the houses of entertainment at Hamburg where riches abound, and where good cheer is scientifically appreciated. Entering the establishment from the street, you find yourself in a fair-sized hall, where a deferential servant in livery is prompt to relieve men of their overcoats and ladies of their wraps. On the left, a large folding-door gives entrance to three public rooms en suite which look out on the Rathaus gardens, and are furnished with small tables—some for two, some for four, some for six persons. Here a most excellent dinner or luncheon can be obtained at short notice. The service is capital. The waiters are German, but appear to be conversant with every tongue in the world. All sorts and conditions of men have to visit Hamburg, the great centre of maritime commerce in Germany. All seem to be able at Pfordte's to give orders in their own language, and find themselves understood. English seems as much spoken here as German.
On the right of the entrance-hall, a fine staircase leads to the first floor, where are rooms for private parties of any number, from two to a hundred. Hardly any important public dinner is held at Hamburg which does not take place at Pfordte's. The cuisine is perfect. The menus are original, the wines are of the best. If you are at Hamburg in the proper season, do not fail at Pfordte's to order oysters, trout from the hill streams, partridge with apricots, and truffes en serviette.
To the above there is but little to add except that there is a certain cosiness about Pfordte's, a sense of personal supervision, which is difficult to define but which everybody who dines there feels and appreciates. One Londoner put it thus, referring to the little rooms, "It's what Kettner's ought to be." I append a menu of a dinner of the day at Pfordte's, there being a choice of four or five dishes in each course. The charge is 6 marks. This bill of fare is by no means an exceptionally good one. Indeed it is below the average rather than above. The "English" adjective to the celery is used to distinguish it from celleriac or "Dutch" celery, which is largely used in salads in North Germany. The Junger Puter is a very little turkey poult. It is to the turkey what the poussin is to the fowl:—
Potage à la Stuart.
Potage crème d'orge à la Viennoise.
Potage purée de concombres au cerfeuil.
Consommé Xavier.
Filets von Seezungen (soles) à la Joinville.
Steinbutt (turbot) sauce moscovite.
Rheinlachs kalt, sauce mayonnaise.
Bœuf braisé à l'alsacienne.
Rehbrücken (venison) à la Conti.
Lammviertel à la Provençale.
Roast-beef à la Clamart.
Artischoken sauce hollandaise.
Salat braisirt mit jungen Erbsen.
Engl. Sellerie mit Mark.
Junge Flageolets à la Maître.
Spanishe Pfefferschoten farcirt.
Junge Ente (duckling).
Rebhuhn (partridge).
Junge Puter.
Escarolle-Salat mit Tomaten.
Erdbeer-Eiscrème panaché Fruchttorte.
Kasé.
Dress clothes are not de rigueur when dining at Pfordte's. Bordeaux wines are a speciality of the house, as indeed they are in every good restaurant in Hamburg and Bremen, better claret being found in those cities than anywhere else outside France that I know of. There is a celebrated picture in Pfordte's hall which has a story attached to it. The painter wished to give a dinner to his club friends, and consulted Pfordte as to the price. Pfordte said that he would supply the dinner, and that the artist afterwards should paint him a picture. The dinner was given to the entire club, and was said to have been the best dinner ever served in Germany: the artist showed his appreciation of it by painting a masterpiece.
This is a specimen of one of Pfordte's dinners of ceremony:—
| Nectar old sherry. | Natives. Astrachan Caviar. |
| 1894 Louis Roederer grand vin sec. | Potage Malmesbury. |
| Truffes du Périgord à la Savarin. | |
| 1876 Geisenheimer Hothenberg-Auslese. | Saiblinge aus dem Königssee. Bayrische Sauce. |
| 1889 Chât. Dauzac Labarde (Tischwein). | Engl. Hammebrücken à la Courdomage. |
| 1878 Chât. Marquis de Therme. | Côtelettes de Macassins à la Montalembert. |
| 1869 Clos St-Hobert. | Suprême von Strassburger Gänselebern in Madeira. |
| Crème de Chicorées aux pointes d'asperges vertes. Fonds d'artichauts à la St-Charles. | |
| 1874 Chât. Larose Schloss-Olbzug. | Enten von Rouen. Salade à la Française. |
| Moet and Chandon Crémant blanc. | Pouding glacé à la Jules Lecomte. |
| Dessert. |
At the Zoological Gardens there is a good restaurant where one dines in a balcony overlooking the beer-garden, in which a military band plays.
The oyster-cellars of Hamburg are noted for their excellent lunches. Bouillon, cutlets, steaks, caviar, lachs, and other viands are served, and English "porter," generally Combe's stout, is much drunk. Another British production, "Chester" cheese, which is red Cheshire, is much in demand. At supper in these cellars, and also in Berlin, caviar is much in demand, the small black Baltic variety, not the Russian, which is lighter in colour and larger in grain. A large pot of it is put on the table in a bowl of ice, and your Hamburger, who is a good judge of victuals as he is of drink, makes his supper of it.