Sunday, January 27, 2013

Dolly Parton's Dixie Stampede



A wild west & southern country theatre show in tree locations in southern United States. Very popular with local and international tourists as a slick family show. A four couse dinner is include (no cutlery) and lots of country music, especially recordings of Dolly Parton of course. This menu has Dolly's signature on it but I suspect it is printed on....

Saturday, January 26, 2013

Le Cirque. Dessert Menu. New York

Widely acclaimed as one of the worlds best restaurants, Le Cirque has several restaurants both in America and overseas to its credit. This is just the dessert menu and the descriptions do not match the elaborate inventions of their pastry chef. For example; the "Le Cirque Stove" is an actual old fashioned stove sitting on black and white kitchen tiles (all edible). The stove door is open and contains a small decorated cake and on top of the stove are two chocolate saucepans with fruit sauces in them.



Le Cirque is french for circus and is a guide to the decor you can see in the main picture of the dining room. The restaurant opened in 1974 but outgrew its position and shifted several times until its final address in the prestigious Bloomberg building.

Tuesday, January 22, 2013

Melbourne's Tram Car Restaurant




This fabulous Melbourne tourist attaction has won many awards for its high standards and professional service. The old trams were given extensive makeovers with plush velvet seating, cooking facilities, refrigeration and of couse stabilisers. You would not believe how smoothly this old ram glides along with nary a clink of its glasses or a rattle of its cutlery. The one-way darkened windows allow patrons to see out but outsiders cannot see in. What better way for tourists to see Melbourne by night than from a travelling restaurant.This particular menu is from the 1990's and was served hot and with great style by the waiting staff.

Monday, January 21, 2013

The Melbourne Cup 1963

This is a fascinating menu from the Hotel Australia in Collins Street Melbourne in 1963. The Australia Hotel was a very popular hotel with the racing crowd with many trainers and jockeys staying there. more than once was the old safe at the hotel a temporary resting place for the gold cup. In 1963 the prize money for the cup was 25,000 pounds and it was won by Gatum Gatum ridden by J. Johnson. Also on offer was 12 new Falcon cars for the best dressed ladies.
This race is the richest "2 mile" handicap race in the world with prize money in 2012 being $6,175,00.00 plus trophies valued at $125,00.
The menu is interesting historically because notice the chicken being the most expensive item on the menu. ( there were no large chicken farms in those days ).

The mention of Rising Fast with the souffle refers to the famous New Zealand bred horse which is the only horse ever to have won the Melbourne Cup, the Caulfield Cup and the Cox Plate in the same year. Consomme Jockey Club is a chicken consomme garnished with diced carrots, pea and chicken royale.

Tuesday, January 15, 2013

National Restaurant Association. U.S.A.

Now for a function menu, a very memorable function menu. The 1982 Grand Banquet and Show for the National Restaurant Association of America in Chicago. This was definately the biggest and most impressive banquet I have ever been to, on the most gigantic scale. This was a sit down banquet for 2,500 people with a 5 course meal, a 60 piece orchestra and a dance floor for 600.
The menu as shown was excellent, served hot and all 5 courses completed in 1 and 3/4 hours which is quite a feat for large scale catering. This was followed by a floor show featuring Doc Severinsen on the trumpet ( he was the band leader on the tonight show ) and comic Flip Wilson. On our table we had 10 Koalas stacked up in the center and you could get a dance with the prettiest girl in the room for a Koala, in fact I danced with the daughter of the President of the NRA for a koala.
Also it was amazing to talk to some of the American people on our table who were all carrying concealed weapons evan in their dinner suits, even the wives were carrying 38's in the hand bags. Chicago did have a reputation in those days.