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Tsars of Russia
The Tsesarevich's 16th birthday
Twelve years before his Coronation, Nicholas II celebrated his 16th birthday to great imperial fanfare. The day marked the coming-of-age for the Tsesarevich and made him eligible to inherit the throne. His parents, Tsar Alexander III and Tsarina Maria Fyodorovna, hosted this gala dinner at the Winter Palace in Saint Petersburg. Stuffed salmon-trouts baked in red wine were garnished with sautéed roe, truffles and poached crayfish as a precursor to dainty pastries filled with lark’s breasts and platters of roast woodcocks, great snipe and prized ducklings from Rouen.
Princely House of Yusupov
Before their name became synonymous with the murder of Rasputin, the Princely House of Yusupov was associated with some of the most decadent banquets of imperial Russia. The beautiful Princess Zinaida serves guests a soup garnished with the poached marrow from the spine of a sturgeon before platters of spit-roasted ortolans arrive smothered in creamed watercress.
Imperial Chef, Pierre Cubat
"Cubat was a most interesting person, late
head chef to the Czar, whose service he had only just left. When asked the reason, he said that the supervision in the kitchen of the royal palace was so irksome and stringent — dozens of detectives watching his every gesture and pouncing on every pinch of salt — that the salary of £2,000 a year did not compensate him".
Lady Randolph Churchill
1908
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