The Gourmet's Guide to London

by Lieut.-Col. Newnham-Davis

Before the soup was brought up, the master of the ceremonies explained that the Frimsell was made from stock, and a paste of eggs and flour rolled into tiny threads like vermicelli, while the Matsoklese had in it balls of unleavened flour. When the soup was brought the two were combined, and the tiny threads and the balls of dough both swam in a liquid which had somewhat the taste of vermicelli soup. The master of the ceremonies told me I must taste the pease and beans soup which followed, as it is a very old-fashioned Jewish dish. It is very like a rich pease-soup, and is cooked in carefully skimmed fat. In the great earthenware jar which holds the soup is cooked the "kugel," a kind of pease-pudding, which was to appear much later at the feast.

Goldstein's is the restaurant patronised by the "froom," the strictest observers of religious observances, of the Jewish community, and we should by right only have drunk unfermented Muscat wine with our repast, but some capital hock took its place, and when the master of the ceremonies and the faithful soul touched glasses, one said "Lekhaim," and the other answered the greeting with "Tavim." Then, before the fish was put on the table, the master of the ceremonies told me of the elaborate care that was taken in the selection of animals to be killed, of the inspection of the butcher's knives, of the tests applied to the dead animals to see that the flesh is good, of the soaking and salting of the meat and the drawing-out of the veins from it. The many restrictions, originally imposed during the wandering in the desert, which make shell-fish, and wild game, and scaleless fish unlawful food—these and many other interesting items of information were imparted to me.

The white-stewed gurnet, with chopped parsley and a sauce of egg and lemon-juice, tempered by onion flavouring, was excellent. In the brown sauce served with the carp were such curious ingredients as treacle, gingerbread and onions, but the result, a strong, rich sauce, is very pleasant to the taste. The great cold fried soles standing on their heads and touching tails, and the two big sections of plaice flanking them, I knew must be good; but I explained to the master of ceremonies that I had already nearly eaten a full-sized man's dinner, and that I must be left a little appetite to cope with what was to come.

Very tender veal, with a sauce of egg and lemon, which had a thin, sharp taste, and a steak, tender also, stewed with walnuts, an excellent dish to make a dinner of, were the next items on the menu, and I tasted each; but I protested against the capon and the chicken as being an overplus of good things, and the master of the ceremonies—who, I think, had a latent fear that I might burst before the feast came to an end—told the waiter not to bring them up.

The smoked beef was a delicious firm brisket, and the tongue, salted, was also exceptionally good. I felt that the last feeble rag of an appetite had gone, but the cucumber, a noble Dutch fellow, pickled in salt and water in Holland, came to my aid, and a slice of this, better than any sorbet that I know of, gave me the necessary power to attempt, in a last despairing effort, the kugel and apple staffen and almond pudding.

The staffen is a rich mixture of many fruits and candies with a thin crust. The kugel is a pease-pudding cooked, as I have written above, in the pease and beans soup. The almond pudding is one of those moist delicacies that I thought only the French had the secret of making.

Coffee—no milk, even if we had wanted it, for milk and butter are not allowed on the same table as flesh—and a liqueur of brandy, and then, going downstairs, we looked into the two simple rooms, running into each other, which form the public restaurant, rooms empty at nine p.m., but crowded at the midday meal.

Mr Goldstein, who was there, told us that his patrons had become so numerous that he would soon have to move to larger premises, and may by now have done so, and certainly the cooking at the restaurant is excellent, and I do not wonder at its obtaining much patronage.

What this Gargantuan repast cost I do not know, for the designer of the feast said that the bill was to be sent to him.