Edward Gorey would design the costumes and the stage set for this menu. Cats would be stealthily stealing rolls and delicacies as wan people engaged in witty conversation, ignoring their food.

Ah, let's see...

I envision a time in the late 30's to early 40's. The decor in a great hall in a manor home or old palatial hotel still celebrates its art deco past.

Beautifully dressed men and women stand talking and laughing with their cocktails and hors devours.

They are called in to dinner not knowing that bomb-carrying planes are on the way.

Their last meal is glorious.

You girls really know how to set a mood.

Combining food on a stick with our moribund demcracy with its arbitrary red and blue state categories? Brilliant Mr. Meat. More political commentary please. Your visual wit is titillating. Anyone for a rubber of whist and some chamber music? Delightful.

Actually, "agneau" is lamb, so "Selle d´agneau à la renaissance" is saddle of lamb, which sounds awfully English. Taking a riff off of Rosebud's thoughts, I'm picturing Churchill in his underground war room during the Blitz, insistent on enjoying a civilized [civilised] dinner, bombs be damned. All that's needed to complete this menu would be copious quantities of alcoholic beverages and cigars.

I swear on the eyes of my grandmother that today is an English-free day! After last week, I promise nothing remotely English in design today, no brown soup or sinking ships. As Loki is my witness!

I apologize for my translation; I used Babelfish. In all fairness, if you were at this international gathering, you would only get the French version,

Do you think Churchill EVER ate a bad meal, even when his countrymen were eating cardboard? Doubtful. I don't there there were ration cards for cognac, Cuban cigars, and Château Lafite-Rothschild.

Churchill could have been here, but he could have been almost anywhere during a sixty year period.

Alright OMG, if you're swearing on Loki's name, who can believe that trickster?! Now I know what you're up to, deception, smoke and mirrors!

This menu was served in a great chateau in France...perhaps Provence? I see ladies and gentlemen in 1920's evening dress. They're seated at a long table set with the best china, crystal, silver, and napery. Of course, there are servants. The wines were produced locally, and the chateaux are so exclusive that they bottle only tiny lots. There's a pianist playing in the next room (so as not to be intrusive). The conversation is spirited and erudite.

Good call Barb. It ain't called Honestastic Thursdays. But seriously, nothing English about anything today.

Maybe it's the booth line-up for this year's "Taste of the Elysees" festival?

I'm gonna hazard a WAG here, maybe something like this:

The setting is Paris, some great hall where Napoleon and Josephine are attending a grand dinner in celebrations of one of his conquests.

OMG, I think it's cruel how you keep taunting me with Logo #3 without revealing its meaning.

This is the menu from the Hoity Toity Society's Annual Gack Fest.

Back to the Cheeseburger topic I go.....

Logo 3 taunts us all. I would have had more photoshopped logos this week but my faux-toshop s/w melted down and now I'm learning GIMP and have to redo lots of stuff.

Ah, yes, I remember it well: this lovely menu appeared in Indochina during the height of French colonialism. Edith Piaf is playing on the gramophone in the background. The "delicacies" are opium. Bon appetit!

Mystery Menu #1 was the menu for the 1921 Nobel Prize banquet.

http://nobelprize.org/award_ceremonies/banquet/menus/soderlind/index.html

http://nobelprize.org/award_ceremonies/banquet/menus/menu-1921.html

A young recipient named Albert Einstein was overhreard to say, "So many forks."

Trivia question of the moment: Who are brothers David and Albert Einstein better known as today in Hollywood?

1921 Nobel Recipients:
Albert Einstein - Physics (the photoelectric effect)
Frederick Soddy - Chemistry (radioactive decay and the theory of isotopes)
Physiology/Medicine - no prize
Anatole France - Literature
Hjalmar Branting, Christian Lange - Peace (work with the League of Nations. Great work dudes.)
Branting, the Prime Minister of Sweden (inside job) should have gotten a special award for mustache of the century:
http://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Image:Hjalmar_branting_stor_bild.jpg

I imagine a lot of cello music.

I didn't find any actual banquet pictures, but I did finf this photo l;abeled "1921 hats"

http://www.fashion-era.com/images/Wedding/1920s_weddings/1921_wedding_hats_line.jpg

Not a great era for hats.

And there you are aboard the Orient Express, just a few minutes outside of Sevastapol. As the great train sways and lurches, you stumble into the dining car, collapse onto a seat and scan the carte to learn how you will assuage your hunger. As you lower the carte, you find yourself staring into the clear eyes of a passenger who wasn't there a moment ago, a dapper Frenchman with a magnificently waxed moustache. "Do not eat the vraie tortue claire," he warns, "if you value your life."

Albert Einstein is Albert Brooks, and David Einstein is Super Dave Osborne. I didn't know they were related, let alone brothers.

Owl Meat -- I doubt there was an "inside job" for the Prime Minister of Sweden to get the 1921 Nobel Peace Prize, which was (and is) awarded by the Norwegian Parliament -- especially given the fact that Norway had been only too eager to get out from under Swedish rule less than 20 years before the award was made.

I can't help but think of this guy in the kitchen trying to kill a tortoise with a wooden spoon.

http://thehurricanewatch.files.wordpress.com/2007/01/swedishchef2.jpg

In my fantasy, the chef gave the presentation speech for Einstein since he could not attend.

Yuoor Mejesty, Yuoor Ruyel Heeghnesses, Ledeees und Gentlemee. Zeere-a is prubebly nu physeecist leefing tudey vhuse-a neme-a hes becume-a su veedely knoon es thet ooff Elbert Ieenstein. Bork bork bork! Must deescoossiun centres oon hees zeeury ooff releteefity. Bork bork bork! Thees perteeens issenteeelly tu ipeestemulugy und hes zeereffure-a beee zee soobject ooff leefely debete-a in pheelusuphicel curcles. Um gesh dee bork, bork! It veell be-a nu secret thet zee femuoos pheelusupher Bergsun in Perees hes chellenged thees zeeury, vheele-a oozeer pheelusuphers hefe-a eccleeemed it vhuleheertedly. Bork bork bork! Zee zeeury in qooesshun elsu hes estruphyseecel impleeceshuns vheech ere-a beeeng reeguruoosly ixemeened et zee present teeme-a.

Good scenarios today. All much more interesting than the actual event probably. You never hear, "I'm gonna party like it's Stockholm in 1921!"

I love the many references to doom and colonial decay. I had to look up Edward Gorey, that was a good one. I think I will award the prize to Michael Gray for his mini-novel.

Well played everyone.

MYSTERY MENU #2

STEAKS AND CHOPS
Porterhouse, Sirloin, Tenderloin, Chicken broiled, Mutton Chops, Pork, Veal Chops, Veal Cutlets

EGGS AND OMELETS
Ham, Ham and Eggs, Bacon and Eggs, Eggs, three, any style, Omelet, plain, Omemlet, rum

COLD MEATS
Roast Beef, Ham, Beef Tongue, Holland Herring, Sardines

Wiener Wurst and Potato Salad
Wiener Wurst and Sour Krout

RELISHES
Lettuce, Sliced Tomatoes, Olives, Dill Pickles, French Peas

POTATOES
French Fried, Lyonnaise, Hashed Browned, German Fried

CHEESE
Swiss, Limburger, Brie, Neichatel

SANDWICHES
Ham, Swiss, Limburger, Roast Beef, Sardine, Caviar

=======================================

Mmmmmm ... yeah! This menu has got real stick-to-your-ribness. No post-colonial affectations. Gimme a rum omlet and make it a double!

Good call on the Einstein brothers. I'm getting sloppy today. They are indeed brothers, but Super Dave was born Bob Einstein. Why not Super Bob? And as for my igorance of post-war Scandanavian relations, I confess feebleness.

The now gone Maison Marconi at #106 W. Saratoga Street. Menu for dinner or after theatre on a cold winter night. Everyone started with a Manhattan or an Old Fashioned. Women had them up; men on the rocks. Doubles for the men. Martinis were so wrong then.

After cocktails, bottles of French reds were passed.

Oh yes, winter tomatoes and Boston lettuce were expensive then. And, the little crepes filled with fruit were flamed in the rum. Remember?

PS. They made the caviar sandwich with buttered brown bread on the bottom, a paper-thin slice of cucumber, caviar, crème fraîche, and buttered white bread on top. Speared with a tiny sprig of watercress.

Omelette, rum--??? Not omelette, runny?

Mystery Menu #2 sounds like the lunch menu at a place H.L. Mencken might frequent, although it's a bit light both in Maryland cuisine (what, no terrapin soup?) and in German cuisine (apart from the wurst).

Mystery Menu #2 reads like upscale, old school, Midwest

good meat, stinky cheese and fish, german and nordic remnants, and undue emphasis on relishes

Chock full o' hints:
President McKinley was assassinated here.
This event featured, super-ironically, the first x-ray machine and electric lights.
After President McKinley was shot, they refused to use the new-fangled x-ray machine to find the bullet because they were afraid of the side effects of x-rays and there were no electric lights INSIDE for doctors to use to treat him.
The side effect of NOT using an x-ray machine in this case? Dead President.

It was a world-wide event in an unlikely place.

That's supposed to be a rum omelet. Sounds great. I just copied the info, so any spellings errors are not mine. Gotta go, Chino is making one of his famous eggless Jameson omemlets, McNulty style.

Wow, EL is on the boards late.

A friend told me today that Lemongrass and/or Tsunami on Central Ave were closing.

I get a reward for staying up. If true, it must be Tsunami. EL

Rumors rumors rumors

1) (full dsclocsure) I can never go back to Lemon Grass because the "Beverage Director" (the bartender)
objected to my claim of food poisoning when I woke up in the early morning in respiratory arrest. I know poison and that was ir. It wa bad, VERY VERY bad.

McKinley caught that bullet in Buffalo NY, so it would be some Presidential dinner served up there by an influential Buffalonian? Interesting... at the time, his successor Teddy Roosevelt was tramping around the woods in the Adirondacks, not all that far away.

No, I didn't google it, I've read quite a bit about TR. Quite a character!

Buffalonian? Interesting. I just thought it was a cool American menu.

Total reveal:
It was the Pan-American Expo of 1901, which was supposed to be held in Cuba a few years earlier but there was a bit of trouble there. This was the menu for the Schlitz Restuarnt at the Pan-Am Expo. It's pretty fascinating. Why Buffalo? Well, it seems like they needed the mighty power of Niagra Falls to get their new fangled electrical lights a-working. And the poorly utilized x-ray machine. I didn;t mean to edify, I just thought it was a restaurant that I would like to go to after a hard day of collating papers and squeezing my Executive Stress doll.

Here are some interesting links:

http://ublib.buffalo.edu/libraries/exhibits/panam/food/pabstmenu.html

http://www.foodtimeline.org/food1.html

http://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Pan-American_Exposition

Some fascinated magazine articles on "the future" as seen from 1901. I particularly like how American girls are far superior to European ones and how Orientals looks funny as hell in Western dress. Ah, vintage racism, it smells like ... team spirit.
http://panam1901.bfn.org/documents/

If it seems like I'm phoning this one in, you're right. I'm on vacation. Dedicating myself to eggless rum omemlets and the best Irish tan that future melanoma can buy. Yet I persevere in my semi-give a crap way. Hey, I LOVE games, so here we are. An hour? It's only been like 48 minutes! That doesn't count. You can take away time for a phone call from your daughter in the emergency room! This is me time! I want my full 50 minute hour!

I saw a chicken chasing a dog on the beach yesterday and that still is more normal than the crap that goes on in Little Italy every day. Duke it out paisan's, I'm playing games with my virtual friends. Woo hoo! Chino, another run omemlet. Cuba Libre!!!!!

OMG -- you're definitely phoning it in if you're mixing up Schlitz and Pabst -- it was Pabst's menu in Buffalo.

So, have you suffered through your vacation with the illness that required the Robitussin®-tinis, or was that your cover to play hookey from work, or whatever?

The limes in the Cuba LIbres are fantastic here. They are green on the outside and ORANGE on the inside, but veyr limey. Woo hoo, suck it Baltimore! More Sunny D and rum Chino!

Owl,
If you're away, who is taking care of Snickers?

Okay, hmpstd, my rum addled sun broasted brain bucket mixed up Pabst and Schlitz, but seriously that's an easy mistake. But as Quiz Master, correctitude should matter. Points off for me. I'm starting to think that maybe you ARE me. Scary. Chino! Get me another Margarita! And make sure she's at least 18 this time. Back to work.

Oh Owlie, you and Chino went on vacation without me? Can I guess where you are? Does the water go the opposite way in the toilet?

No the water goes down the toilet Rock Chicklet. Other way, ay caramba!

Oh no, Snickers, caballito! Dios mio! I left him at Velleggia's. He was in the bar eating gelato. Rock and Roll Chick maybe you can take him bakc to his house and give him an apple. I will pay you back ten times in massage and I will walk your monky. If anybody see a tiny horse wandering around little italy axing for beers, call him a cab. This is not good. NO more email Cousin owl. The inter web is closed today for renovatin. Relax, I get you two nice Margaritas, they are froma village where they make hats.

Correctitude? Is that anything like "truthiness"?

Dahlink -- believe it or not, Merriam-Webster Online actually defines correctitude as "correctness or propriety of conduct". The word is itself a blend of correct and rectitude -- or, to use the fancified terminology, one of those portmanteau words.

Correctitude? Did I say that? Damn, the Robitussin-tini withdrawal is worse than I thought. Dr. Bombay said that tequila was the best antidote for OTC-tinis. And shark wrestling. Chino! Another Margarita!

hmpstd, I think you need a hug or to be murdered immediately. Would you settle for hugicide? You're like the smarter less inebriated version of me. The world just isn't ready for that. Chino ... dispatch him. Don't worry his knowledge of idiomatic English is terrible -- he will probably just write you a letter.

hmpstd, I generally love portmanteau words, since I am a huge fan of Lewis Carroll, but this one sounds as if it came from the mouth of Stephen Colbert.

Dahlink -- since the Merriam-Webster entry dates correctitude to 1893, five years before Lewis Carroll died, but 71 years before Stephen Colbert was born, it's more likely a Carroll concoction. Unfortunately, M-W Online doesn't credit the 1893 usage, and the online OED isn't free, so the original usage source must remain a mystery for now.

I don't know, hmpstd--I associate Carroll with portmanteau words like "slithy" and "mimsy"--correctitude doesn't seem quite in that category. This calls for more research! Stay tuned.

hempstem, you need a Benadryl-tini. Chino, send Snickers over to shempstain's house pronto with my saddle bag of OTCinis. Sobriety is killing your humerus. Chino, Margarita isn't breathing, bring me a new one! With salt around the rim.

Good thing some of us still own actual books, which--remarkably enough--are still very good sources for information. From the OED: that 1893 use of correctitude came from the National Observer. And we can throw Churchill's name into this thread again--from vol. 4 of his The World Crisis (The Aftermath, 1929) he is quoted: "Lord Curzon...soused him in sonorous correctitudes." Winnie was workin some wacky alliteration.

Point to chez G!

Agreed, Dahlink -- and now chez G will have to await, with dread, whatever choice comments Owl Meat may care to make about somebody who actually owns the OED. ;-)

My dream man would give me, instead of a ring, the OED (full set, not the microscopic version) as an engagement present.

Seriously.

Still looking...

I would be honored to be soused by OMG.

One bit of software I have moved from computer to computer, over the years is my New Short OED. Its so old I think its DOS software. I have to run it in a 16-bit window and it has to live in a directory using the old 8dot3 naming conventions. But it still runs. Sadly, it does not have all the good stuff contained in the big book.

LJ -- the full set of the OED may well be a dream engagement present, but a ring is a lot easier to show off to your friends.

chez G -- apparently, OMG is too soused to souse you at the present time.

hmpstd wrote chez G -- apparently, OMG is too soused to souse you at the present time Perhaps Margarita took her revenge?