SECOND-HAND DINNERS.

Taranaki Daily News, Volume LIV, Issue 30, 29 July 1911, Page 10 (Supplement)

SECOND-HAND DINNERS.

A CURIOUS PARIS SHOP. Dinners (it for any lover of gastronomy are to be had' at the second-hand dinner stalls in Paris, where the hotel and r«. tauiant scraps are mode up anew and sold in a very appetising manner. ' Every day the stailkeeper calls at his particular hotels and retaurants' for their leavings, which are put together for him in a clean and careful manner. Carefully he separates the different scraps, put/ting all the bits of fish in one 'dish, the moats in another, and the vegetables, the >wecls, and the desserts in others. Then through skilful handling lie works miracles with the scraps, and with sheer culinary genius makes a plateful of them look—and taste, too—most exeitin« and appetising. °

How* and rows of plates are arranged along the front of his stall in neat ana symmetrical order. Some contain two or three sorts of food that go well together, other have only one kind. All the potatoes which he'has rescued from the leavings are placed in a ilittle pile on a piece of clean white paper covering their wooden platter or chinaware dial). To them he lias added a small bit of cold roast meat, a spoonful of peas, and a garnishing of herbs or parsley ana tansy. On the top of all a slice of juicy lemon is laid, and, whether hunger is the additional sauce or not, this dish is infinitely more savory than many of those to be obtained at the average '-baithouse" in Great Britain and Ireland. A filet do boeuf that costs a formidable sum at the Cafe Blank.can he hought at the second-hand dinner stall' for a very insignificant sum. It lias lost a little of its pristine freshness in the rewarming, and the mushrooms with it nave .been collected from many cafes and Imve as many flavorings. The filet itself is rather diminutive and raggedly cut, but the triclo of melted butter, and the most praiseworthy method in which the dish is presented, makes it infinitely more edible and satisfying than many of the strange mixtures served in some of the enterprising cheap foreign restaurants in the West End.

If one wants a salad to follow, it j s at once provided. Scrap by scrap it has been carefully rescued from the leavings and as carefully been gone over, regarnished, and topped anew by fresh slices of egg; and, all for the price of four sous, the diner has a salad as good as that which made the gourmet's mouth water a few hours previously. For those who want table d'hote the staHkeeper has also provided, though the soup is necessarily omitted, its liquid' qualities tending to make hotch-potch of the other items.

On a fairly big plate the stall-restaur-ateur has put a little of everything that goes to make a dinner a la table d'hote. First comes a piece of fish that still has something of its original firmness and flavor. Then follows a small slice of roast beef or mutton or fowl garnished with comforting .potatoes and carrots bmisaels sprouts, or other vegetables. Then succeeds a spoonful of beetroot or other salad, and finally a taste of sweets or a piece' of genuinely good cheese. With such a plateful, together with some morsels of live charcoal, and a stewpaot or two, M. le Proprietaire, who usually in very adroit in small things culinary, presents one with a dinner to which only the squeamish may object. He does confess though, good man, that despite his cunning, the sweets and the desserts give him infinite trouble, and accordingly he does not much favor the table d'hote dinner. Pastry, souffles, etc., do not stand the re-handling with the same degree of success as docs the filet de boeuf, though by some sleight of hand lettuce and chicory and celery and other ingredients of the salad are sufficiently revived for the short time they are offered for sale. ,