Evening Star Newspaper, November 6, 1936, Page 36

THE EVENING Traveling Around in Europe Dining Adventures in London Must Include a_Quest for a “Truly English Dinner.” (No. 8 of a Series.) BY 1. WILLIAM HILL, Staff Correspondent of The Star. ONDON.—You come to a time, after perhaps a week ir Lon- don, when you think you would like to dine on some truly English dishes. Up to then, busy doing the things you ought to do, and a few of the things you want to do, you haven"t thought much about food. You have been content to order a “tournedos,” a “Chateaubriand” or an “entrecote” from the inevitable French menu at your hotel, knowing you will get a steak not greatly different from one you might get at & Washington hotel. Perhaps you have even gone so far in “Anglicizing” your table habits as to have a self-conscious 4 o'clock English tea with scones and jam. If you are more experimental you might have dropped in at one of the milk bars to be found in downtown Lon- don and taken your “pasteurized” astraight. You may even have stopped one of the men in white who pedal around on bicycles with a box before them bearing the words “Stop me and buy one,” only to find a “Stop me and buy one” was just ice cream. An “English Dinner.” But one evening you begin to think about this food question more seri- ously. You scan your menu rather hopelessly and resolve you will not have a steak by any name. Finally you call the maitre d’ hotel and sug- gest you would like what you call a “real English dinner.” Whereupon that worthy, with polite bows, in- forms you that anything served in England is an “English dinner.” You shrug despairingly and subside to hors d’oeuvres, potage Jacques, gigot d'agneau, etc. But where, we began to wonder at this point, are the roast beef and ‘Yorkshire pudding, the plover's eggs, the grouse or the saddle of mutton that are traditionally London's? One evening we set out to find them. The American traveler about to be- gin adventures in dining usually starts out with Soho, London’s principal restaurant district. That's a strange thing about this city—the localiza- tion. You'll find the artists and writ- ers in Chelsea and Bayswater, the newspapers huddled about Fleet street, the dressmakers in White- chapel, the fruiterers in Covent Garden, the fishmongers in Billings- gate, the restaurants in Soho, etc. Restaurants in Soho. But on this occasion, since we de- sired English food, we avoided Soho, London adventures in dining. for the restaurateurs there are Ital- ian, French or Swiss. We set forth down Piccadilly. Nevertheless, we dined on “tournedos” and “haricots verts” that night, ordered from a menu in French. It was three days later and not until we had examined menu cards in the windows of exactly 29 res- taurants that we finally located one in the Strand where food remained proud of its English ancestry. It was crowded, too, but it was not until later that we learned the place is an institution, comparable in the minds of many a Britisher to the Bank of England. . ‘The first thing we noticed was that the dining room on the ground floor was reserved for men. Gentlemen with ladies had to ascend to the first floor. Incidentally, in Europe you ale ways have to go up a flight of steps before you reach the first floor. Real English Dishes. Once In the dining room one dines leisurely and at length. learn that saddle of mutton must be serve with horseradish sauce and red currant jelly, that bubble-and-squeak is good even if it is only a patty of ‘white potatoes and Brussels sprouts, and that after a trifle (English for a kind of sponge cake and sauce) the thing to do is to either have cheddar Here you | S and Cheshire cheese with crackers or fruit, especially fruit. Nowhere we have been and no- where in the world, according to those who have traveled it, are there cherries or strawberries or apples with that certain fruity blend of tartness and sweetness that fruit possesses here. We were told it was because of England’s equable climate. Since it never gets very warm (a tempera- RESORTS. ATLANTIC CITY, N. J. HOTEL DENNIS| ATLANTIC CITY Perfection in outdoor enjoyment and indoor comfort ideally blended at the ocean’s edge. o Fall rates. WALTER J. BUZBY, INC. 7% TRAYMORE “&i7° The Preeminent Hotel Ackievement: STEAMSHIPS. MEDITERRANEAN and all Europe—De Luxe service on famous express liners vis the smooth Boulhfit{:l l;.:)llle STAR, WASHINGTON, ture of 70 maintained for two weeks constitutes a drought), fruit stays on the trees much longer, thus having much more time to absorb from the air ‘and sunshine those things that go to make up flavor. We sigh to think how long we missed enjoying it because it was hidden away on French menus in English restaurants as “corbellle de fruit.” Carvers Are Proud. At the table next to ours sat a gourmet. We suspected he was a gourmet because his fingertips were 80 sensitive to the temperature of the bottle of wine that was brought him. We listened to his conversa- tion just to make sure. He was discusing the man in white in a chef’s cap who wheels & cut of meat over to your table and carves while you watch. “They're specialists,” sald he. “A man who carves saddle of mutton dis- dains to carve silverside of beef. And don’t think because they expect a gratuity of sixpence for their carv- ing that they are less proud than prima donnas. They're not. They're as proud as royalty. In fact, there is a nobility to their profession. There's one man here who inherited his job. It's been in his family for generations and is handed down from father to son like a dukedom.” Mark of a Gourmet. But it was when we heard him ex- tolling the good sense of not having music or entertainment at a dining place that we were really certain he was a gourmet. “Where the chef is an artist,” he said, “music is as out of place as a dance orchestra in the National Gal- lery of Art.” Such is Simpson's—London’s prin- cipal English restaurant. But don't look for it if you come abroad for coronation—at least by the name it D. C, bears today. Certain newspaper peo- ple, who profess to know, tell us that this famous eating place, because of certain confusion lately, will display & different name before next May. Next: Monday morning in a London Police Court, DIES AS SWOLLEN RIVER CARRIES BOAT OVER DAM Allegheny River Locktender Is Victim of Steady 24- Hour Rain. BY the Associated Press. . PITTSBURGH, November 6.—One man died yesterday in the swollen Allegheny River, which began reced- ing as skies cleared after a steady 24-hour post-election day rain. Charles L. Mason, 36, of Cheswick, locktender at Allegheny River Dam No. 3 at Acmetonia, drowned after his yawl was swept over a dam. The high water crester yesterday at the point—where the Allegheny and Monongahela Rivers join to form the Ohio—at 23.7 feet, the United States Weather Bureau re- ported. Flood stage at the point is 25 feet. The stage last night was 235, In the March flood it was 46 feet, Hard to Distinguish, Police of Longford, Irish Free State, have given up their efforts to regu- late the age of persons attending dances because of their inability to tell the difference between a girl of 16 and & woman of 30 or 40 success- fully trying to look 16. FRIDAY, NOVEMBER 6, 1936. THREE CHILDREN DIE AS HOME IS BURNED Father at Work and Mother Call- ing on Sick Neighbor as Fire Breaks Out. BY the Assoclated Press. MADAWASKA, Me., November 6.— Three small children perished yester- day in a fire which destroyed the home of Joseph Pelletier and dam- aged six other houses. The children, the oldest 4 years, were slone when the blaze swept swiftly through the house. Neighbors recovered the bodies. Pelletler, the father, was at work in a paper mill and the mother call- ing on a sick neighbor at the time. Four other Pelletier children were at school. Nothing was saved in the Pelletier home. The fire spread to six other homes but was quickly controlled. TRAIL HIKE PLANNED ‘The Potomac Appalachian ‘Treil Club will make a trip Sunday to the Southern section of the Shenandoah National Park on the Appalachian Trail. The short hike is only six miles and the longer one is 13 miles. A spe- cial bus leaves Treasury place at 7 o'clock Sunday morning. The trip leader is Gordon Durr, 5620 Nevada avenue, phone Cleveland 0514. EDUCATIONAL. BERLITZ ch, Spanish. Italian, , or any other lansuage made by the direct Berlits " Method - avaiiable anly st the BERLITZ ACHOGL OF, LANGUAGES 1115 Conn. Ave. Ational 0270. 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Our beautiful new store at 1106 G Street is a source of pride and satisfaction to us. Its business policies, its reputation for honest values in fine furniture and its reliability in all dealings with the Washington public are insured by the P. J. Nee name and all that it has stood for—for 56 years. THE quaint charm of early colonial furniture is reflected in this lovely mahogany bed- room suite. The design and construction are the finest. All posts are turned in a most pleas- ing and unusual manner. You will be proud to have this most attractive bedroom furniture in your home. This tempting offering is one of the principal reasons why you should shop P. J. Nee before buying furniture this Fall. Pieces Included: @ Gracefully Styled Bed ® Dresser With Mounted Mirror @ High, Roomy Chest ® Charming Mirrored Vanity Regular Price $215, Now $168 ® Higher Fidelity Tone ® Silent Tuning ® Range Through 60,000 kilocycles ® Built-in Antenna Coupler ® More Foreign Stations ® Richer, Finer Cabinets In the New 1937 We want you to share in our progress. When we announced the purchase of the entire stock and convenient loca- tion of the United Furniture Factories, P. J. Nee Co. made available to the furniture purchaser not only two fine stores beautifully stocked with the largest assortment of fine furniture in Washington, but also the convenience of a location in the heart of the down- town shopping district in addition to our big Seventh Street store. You are cordially invited to shop both stores and compare the quality and prices. We assure you that the furniture is the kind that sensible Washington peo- ple buy for their homes. Important . . . 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