First, there was croûte au pot—the nicest soup in the world, said a King of France, and full of nourishment.
Then there was a small slice each of tender, juicy boiled beef out of the big soup-pot, never betraying for a minute that that beautiful soup had been made from it.
With that beef went the potatoes sautée in butter, and sprinkled with chopped green.
After that came the chicken mayonnaise and salad of asparagus tips (otherwise cold scraps and weeds).
There are five of us to supper in that little room behind the milliner's shop—an invalided Belgian officer; a little woman from Malines looking after her wounded husband in hospital here; Mdlle. Alice, the daughter, who keeps the millinery shop in the front room; the old mother, a high lace collar on now, and her grey hair curled and coiffured; and myself. The mother waits on us, slipping in and out like a cat, and we eat till there is nothing left to want, and nothing left to eat. And then we have coffee—such coffee!
Which reminds me that I quite forgot to say I caught the old lady putting the shells of the hard-boiled egg into the coffee-pot!
And that is French cooking in War time!
Permit du Dunkirque.