Late Nineteenth-Century to Late-1940s Dishes

Among the Sunday and holiday dishes that were most popular in all parts of society was the pot-au-feu, the famous boiled beef that to this day is prepared throughout the winter by a large percentage of French families.

Mique Grandchamp, in his concern for good food in the bourgeois household, gives a recipe for Tenderloin of Beef à la Savoyarde, which he lards with salt pork, garlic, and truffles, and garnishes with artichoke bottoms stewed with tomato essence and green olives. This may sound very Provençal but it is not. Mique was using expensive imported ingredients, which he knew a certain part of the bourgeoisie was very well able to afford; the hostess received from him this eminent piece of advice: “The tenderloin à la Savoyarde served cold surrounded by aspic is marvelous for formal dinners, formal lunches, and formal evenings and can replace a galantine.”