This was the hour of the restoration of the Spanish monarchy.

 

On this very day in 1875, the 18-year-old fledgling King Alfonso XII had triumphantly returned from exile and arrived in his capital, Madrid, to reclaim the Spanish throne amid the thunder of welcoming cannons and cheering crowds. ​ The Bourbon restoration was complete. 

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Back in Paris, the Champagne bottles were ready to burst at the home of the beaming and elated dinner host, Prince Antoine d’Orléans the Duke de Montpensier, who had been up to his eyeballs in the plotting, scheming, knifing, murdering and conniving that culminated in today’s events.

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He knew already that his 15 year-old daughter, Princess Mercedes d’Orléans, was arranged to marry the teenage King and, in doing so, would soon become Queen of Spain and give this night’s dinner host renewed and immense political power.

 

The banquet he hosted was as elegant as it was stunning: not overly glutinous, but each dish carefully considered with a superbly paired list of matching wines.  The Duke, after all, was the youngest son of the last King of the French, Louis Philippe I, and knew all too well how to entertain in the Cuisine Classique style of his deposed father’s French royal court.

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On this night of celebration, the Duke was at his Paris residence, Château de Randan, and for the time being was denied a passport to return to Spain. 

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Years earlier he had married the sister of the then Queen of Spain, Isabella II, but had disloyally bankrolled an attempt to overthrow the monarch so that he could install his wife as Queen and he as an all-powerful Prince Consort. 

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It all failed quite spectacularly and backfired on the arguing royal households. Isabella II was exiled to Paris and abdicated in 1870. Exiled too were the Duke’s royal ambitions as Spain toppled the monarchy entirely and ultimately created a Republic, with the Duke facing all sorts of nasty charges, convictions and accusations including the murder of a Prime Minister; killing the deposed Queen’s brother-in-law in a duel; and the very strong suggestion he had funded the attempted assassination of the next temporarily installed King, Amadeo I. All very messy and untidy; and ruthlessly ambitious.

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At the start of 1875 the Duke and his wife found themselves in Paris. They had patched up their relationship with the deposed and exiled Queen Isabella II, and parked their own royal ambitions. With their daughter committed to marry the heir to the Spanish throne, the Duke de Montpensier was now a stalwart subscriber to a Bourbon restoration that would also restore the power and influence of his House of Orléans.

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It’s uncertain if the ci-devant Queen Isabella II joined this celebratory dinner. But it’s hard to imagine she didn’t as the royal dispatches kept her updated on her son’s journey and entry into Madrid to reclaim the throne.

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The menu card for the night is embossed with the Duke’s initials “A” and “O” for Prince Antonie d’Orléans, beneath the ducal fleurs-de-lis coronet of a “Son of France”: son of the King.

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With a refreshing Champagne granita served halfway through the dinner, guests were treated to an array of truffled dishes including the delicately prepared Poulardes à la Toulouse.

 

Here the Prince’s chefs had poached chicken fillets in truffled butter - pointedly poached and not sautéed for this recipe - to ensure they remain white, softly plump and creamy rich before being garnished with a ragout of foie-gras, mushrooms, cockscombs and kidneys; and dressed in a white sauce flavoured with mushroom and lemon juice. When served, each fillet is skewered with a hâtelet of a cockscomb, a truffle poached in Champagne, and a chicken quenelle.

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The spit-roasted pheasants were deglazed in Madeira and stuffed with truffles before being arranged with truffled game quenelles and dressed in a Perigueux sauce made from Madeira, veal stock, red wine and more truffles: this time chopped and sautéed.

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And the woodcocks too, boned and served cold, had been deglazed in a brown sauce made from truffles, woodcock fumet and Port.

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Fittingly, the flavours of Spain book-ended the dinner with a pale dry Manzanilla served with the choice of soups, and a sweet Pedro Ximénez sherry to finish the meal.

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After this dinner, it would be more than another 18 months before the Duke himself arrived back in Spain to take up residence at his famous San Telmo Palace in Seville.

 

For now, his presence was seen as destabilising to the new King, despite his hand in the restoration. His daughter would marry the King in January 1878, now 18 years-old, and became Queen Mercedes; but would be dead by June from ill-health.