The Gourmets Guide to Europe

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Title: The Gourmet's Guide to Europe
Author: Algernon Bastard
Editor: Lieut. Col. Newnham-Davis
Release Date: July 17, 2006 [EBook #18854]
Language: English
Character set encoding: ISO-8859-1
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GOURMET'S GUIDE TO EUROPE ***
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THE GOURMET'S
GUIDE TO EUROPE
Publisher's Announcement
DINNERS AND DINERS:
Where and how to Dine in London
By Lieut.-Col. Newnham-Davis
_New and Revised Edition
Small Crown 8vo. Cloth._ 3/6

WHERE AND HOW TO DINE
IN PARIS
By Rowland Strong
_Fcap. 8vo. Cover designed cloth._ 2/6

London: GRANT RICHARDS
The
Gourmet's Guide
To Europe
BY
LIEUT.-COL. NEWNHAM-DAVIS
AND
ALGERNON BASTARD
EDITED BY THE FORMER
[Illustration]
London
GRANT RICHARDS
48 LEICESTER SQUARE, W.C.

1903
The pleasures of the table are common to all ages and ranks, to all
countries and times; they not only harmonise with all the other
pleasures, but remain to console us for their loss.
Brillat Savarin.
PREFACE
Often enough, staying in a hotel in a foreign town, I have wished to
sally forth and to dine or breakfast at the typical restaurant of the place,
should there be one. Almost invariably I have found great difficulty in
obtaining any information regarding any such restaurant. The proprietor
of the caravanserai at which one is staying may admit vaguely that
there are eating-houses in the town, but asks why one should be

anxious to seek for second-class establishments when the best
restaurant in the country is to be found under his roof. The hall-porter
has even less scruples, and stigmatises every feeding-place outside the
hotel as a den of thieves, where the stranger foolishly venturing is
certain to be poisoned and then robbed. This book is an attempt to help
the man who finds himself in such a position. His guide-book may
possibly give him the names of the restaurants, but it does no more. My
co-author and myself attempt to give him some details--what his
surroundings will be, what dishes are the specialities of the house, what
wine a wise man will order, and what bill he is likely to be asked to
pay.
Our ambition was to deal fully with the capitals of all the countries of
Europe, the great seaports, the pleasure resorts, and the "show places."
The most acute critic will not be more fully aware how far we have
fallen short of our ideal than we are, and no critic can have any idea of
the difficulty of making such a book as we hope this will some day be
when complete. At all events we have always gone to the best
authorities where we had not the knowledge ourselves. Our publisher,
Mr. Grant Richards, quite entered into the idea that no advertisements
of any kind from hotels or restaurants should be allowed within the
covers of the book; and though we have asked for information from all
classes of gourmets--from ambassadors to the simple globe-trotter--we
have not listened to any man interested directly or indirectly in any
hotel or restaurant.
Hotels as places to live in we have not considered critically, and have
only mentioned them when the restaurants attached to them are the
dining-places patronised by the _bon-vivants_ of the town.
Over England we have not thrown our net, for _Dinners and Diners_
leaves me nothing new to write of London restaurants.
In conclusion I beg, on behalf of my co-author and myself, to return
thanks to all the good fellows who have given us information; and I
would earnestly beg any travelling gourmet, who finds any change in
the restaurants we have mentioned, or who comes on treasure-trove in
the shape of some delightful dining-place we know nothing of, to take

pen and ink and write word of it to me, his humble servant, to the care
of Mr. Grant Richards, Leicester Square. So shall he benefit, in future
editions, all his own kind. We hear much of the kindness of the poor to
the poor. This is an opportunity, if not for the rich to be kind to the rich,
at least for those who deserve to be rich to benefit their fellows.
N. Newnham-Davis.
CONTENTS
CHAPTER I
PARIS
PAGE
The "Cuisine de Paris"--A little ancient history--Restaurants with a
"past"--The restaurants of to-day--Over
the river--Open-air
restaurants--Supping-places--Miscellaneous 1
CHAPTER II
FRENCH PROVINCIAL TOWNS
The northern ports--Norman and Breton towns--The
west coast and
Bordeaux--Marseilles and the Riviera--The

Pyrenees--Provence--Aix-les-Bains and other "cure" places 35
CHAPTER III
BELGIAN TOWNS
The food