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From Carême to Dumas: Beauvilliers

Of Laguipière, the chief cook of Murat, to whose talents he ascribes the elegance and éclat of the culinary art of the nineteenth century, he is unstinted in his praises. Of Beauvilliers he has little to say, and although a volume appeared bearing the combined names of Beauvilliers and Carême, one fancies that the proverbial jealousy of cooks was not wanting in their case.

Carême has modified the adage on se fait cuisinier, mais on est né rôtisseur, claiming that to become a perfect cook one must first be a distinguished pastrymaker, and citing as instances his favourite teacher Laguipière, with Robert, Lasne, Riquette, and numerous other celebrities. He speaks of the "lightness," the "grace," and the "colour" of pastry; of the "order, perspicuity, and intelligence" required in its preparation. "It is easier," he says, "to cook pastry There are ovens and ovens than to make it. • (fours). There is the four chaud; there is the four gai; there is the four chaleur modérée. The best oven is that which is often heated and which retains its heat. If there is too much loft and too little floor, or much floor and little loft, only meagre results may be expected." When one orders a vol-au-vent à la financière or a pâté d'écrevisses (that triumph of Orléans) at a restaurant, therefore, it will be perceived it becomes a question of the oven as well as the capacity of the artist directing it that counts in the success, and which the conscientious diner should take into consideration ere finding fault with the addition. Again, the analogy between cookery and painting becomes apparent. Thus the conditions noted by Carême find a parallel in the artist endowed with a vivid imagination, but possessed of only mediocre technique; or a painter whose feeling may be admirable, but whose execution is deficient. The four gaihow it suggests a landscape of Cuyp steeped in the splendours of the setting sun-to say nothing of a nicely gilded omelette or a soufflé of apricots! To glacer à la flamme, as Carême expressed it, calls for a four d'enfer, and one has in mind a crême gelée d'Alaska, with the fire managed by a Mephistopheles. Let the cook and the painter continue to lay on the colours gaily-the one with his braise and the other with his brush. Art is art always, and finds its sure reward in whatever sphere talent, conscientiousness, and application are united.

In the autobiographic preface of the "Cuisinier Parisien" an instance is cited of the care and variety which the author claims every industrious cook should bring to bear in his work, in order to excite the appetite of the amphitryon: "One day the Prince-Regent of England, whom I served, said to me, 'Carême, you will make me die of indigestion; I am fond of everything you give me, and you tempt me too much.' 'Monseigneur, I replied, 'my principal office is to challenge your appetite by the variety of my service; but it is not my affair to regulate it.' The prince smiled, saying that I was right, and I continued to supply him with the best." "The charcoal shortens our lives," said Carême; "but what matter?-we lose in years and gain in glory." A born epicure, he never risked his health by over-indulgence of his epicurean taste. "I have been prudent," he states, "not by inclination, but through a profound sense of my duty." To his culinary accomplishments he joined those of a master director and maître-d'hôtel. Witness his remarks concerning the functions of a chief steward: "The maître-d'hôtel cuisinier should possess that unification of qualities which is seldom bestowed, even in an isolated form. He will be a cook, above all-able, alert, productive; he will be cut out for active command and be animated by an invincible ardour for work; he will be a man of parts, an enthusiast, vigilant even to minuteness. He will see all, and know all. The maître-d'hôtel is never ill. He presides over everything, his impetus dominates all; he alone has the right to raise his voice, and all must obey. He must be sufficiently learned to write out, when occasion calls for it, without the aid of books, the principal part of his bills of fare. These are his book of resources, the journal of his fatigues and his victories. Alas! that which he may not preserve in these copies are the spontaneous fire and ready tact he has displayed in connection with his ranges-these are things of the moment that die at their birth."

Many anecdotes of the famous gastronomers and great personages of his time have been recounted by Carême. To Cambacérès he refers at length, disputing his claim to a distinguished place among epicures. The cuisine of the arch-chancellor, he states decisively, never merited its great reputation. This was through no fault of his chef, M. Grand'Manche, an excellent practitioner, but was due solely to the excessive parsimony of his employer, who at each service was in the habit of noting the entrées that were untouched or scarcely touched, and of forming his carte for the morrow with their remains. "What a dinner, merciful heavens! I would not say that the dessert may not be utilised, but that it may not supply a dinner for a prince and an eminent gastronomer. This is a delicate question; the master has nothing to say, nothing to see; the skill and probity of the cook alone should enter into the facts. The dessert should only be employed with precaution, skill, and especially in silence. "The arch-chancellor received from the departments innumerable gifts of provisions and the finest of poultry. All such were forthwith engulfed in a vast larder of which he retained the key. He kept tally of the provisions, the dates of their arrival, and he alone gave orders for their utilisation. Frequently, when he issued his orders the provisions were spoiled. "Cambacérès was never a gourmand in the scientific acceptance of the word; he was naturally a great and even voracious eater. Can one believe that he preferred, above all dishes, the pâté chaud with forcemeat balls? a heavy, unsavoury, and vulgar dish. As a hors-d'œuvre he had frequently a crust of pâté reheated on the grill, and had brought to table the combien of a ham that had done duty for the week. And his skilful cook who never had the grand fundamental sauces! neither his under-cooks or aids nor his bottle of Bordeaux! What parsimony! what a pity! what an establishment! "Neither M. Cambacérès nor M. Brillat-Savarin knew how to eat. Both were fond of strong and vulgar things, and simply filled their stomachs. This is literally true. M. de Savarin was a large eater, and talked little and without facility, it seemed to me; he had a heavy air and resembled a parson. At the end of a repast his digestion absorbed him, and I have seen him go to sleep."

Charles Monselet has termed Savarin a mere seltzer drinker, while Dumas says he was neither a gastronomer nor a gourmet, but simply a vigorous eater. "His large size, his heavy carriage, his common appearance, with his costume ten or twelve years behind the times, caused him to be termed the drum-major of the Court of Cassation. All at once, and a dozen years after his death, we have inherited one of the most charming books of gastronomy that it is possible to imagine-the 'Physiologie du Goût. ” "My work is a manual to be ceaselessly consulted," Carême remarked with reference to his "Maîtred'Hôtel Français." The truth of this assertion becomes manifest at once on reading the exquisitely careful directions which characterise all his treatises. The published works of the versatile authorchef include "Le Maître-d'Hôtel Français," "Le Cuisinier Parisien," "Le Pâtissier Royal Parisien," "Le Pâtissier Pittoresque," and "L'Art de la Cuisine Française au Dix-neuvième Siècle," in several of which the copious illustrations reveal his skill as a draughtsman. His death occurred while giving a lesson in his art. The day of his decease one of his scholars gave him some quenelles of sole to taste. "The quenelles are good," he remarked, "only they were prepared too hastily; you must shake the saucepan lightly." In so saying he indicated by a slight motion the movement he desired to communicate. But after two or three motions his once facile hand refused to respond to his will, and the great artist was no more. "The asparagus plumps out at the name of Carême!" exclaimed one of his admirers; "the hare that roams the forest utters his name to the stag who passes by; the stag repeats it to the pheasant; the lark sings it in his flight to the sun."