With Valentine’s Day the next day, Etiquetteer returned to The Book of Lists for foods once considered aphrodisiacs. The resulting menu therefore includes caviar, lobster, and asparagus*:
Bachelor Cocktail, from Cocktail Hour Meets . . . a Presidential Election
Petite pommes de terre à la crème sure et au caviar
Homard Newburg Asperges
Salade à la chandelle
The Bachelor, named for President James Buchanan, is a deliciously smoky concoction composed of tequila, amontillado sherry, Cointreau, and a bit of pineapple and lime juice. It’s best sipped slowly, and also works well as a highball with club soda if you feel it necessary to pace yourself.
Should have remembered the minced green onion, and added a parsley garnish for a livelier plate.
To work in the caviar (salmon roe was what the market had, but red for Valentine’s Day totally works), I remembered an hors d’oeuvre from Pirate’s Pantry involving hollowed new potatoes topped with sour cream and caviar. Rare for me to have an appetizer course — I like to spend the cocktail hour relaxing in the parlor before clashing pans — but prep time was just a bit too long for these to get to the table hot. Still tasty, but next time I won’t forget the minced green onion, or to tap a little salt and pepper inside the potatoes before filling.
I had never cooked lobster before, and this Lobster Newburg came out rather well for a first attempt. Once a dear friend and I were talking about tough recipes, and he confided that he was most afraid of the instruction “Bring to just under a boil.” Here it was very clear: DO NOT BOIL, HEAT GENTLY. This, of course, could take forever! But patience, James Cagney in The Public Enemy, and a few sips of pink champagne helped me stay the course. And I remembered to trim the asparagus to the size of the dinner plate, so that worked well.
That frill pick is definitely more flamelike than a pimiento.
For a candlelight dinner the night before Valentine’s Day, only candlelight salad would do. I first learned about this recipe from Jane and Michael Stern’s Square Meals, in which they described it as “the paradigm of cunning cuisine” and included it in a bridal shower menu. Looking at other photos on the internet, I could have used more mayonnaise for the melted wax. Never having thought a pimiento looked very flamelike, I substituted something more sparkly.
But the real hit of the evening was my first attempt at a Queen of Sheba cake in a heart-shaped cake pan I rediscovered in my cellar. Several suggested recipes came from Facebook readers (thank you all very kindly!) but this one from my friend Ric (a disciple of Julia Child) looked simple enough for me to achieve and also involved chocolate. The production comes in three stages: meringue, batter, and glaze. The cake broke in transferring from cake pan to cooling rack, but as Julia Herself famously said “When you’re alone in the kitchen, who’s to see?!” Because there wasn’t enough glaze to cover the sides, I ended up using sliced almonds to outline the cracks on the top — a broken heart. But any broken heart can be healed with chocolate! This cake was amazing. I couldn’t believe I made it!
It’s not unusual to serve only champagne through a formal dinner, and pink champagne seemed Perfectly Proper to serve with everything on the menu and for a Valentine’s dinner.
However you’re celebrating, Etiquetteer would like to wish you a Perfectly Proper Valentine’s Day!
*Other items include eel, garlic (never Perfectly Proper at a formal dinner), ginseng, honey, oysters, peaches (Etiquetteer is allergic, boo hoo), and truffles. Etiquetteer cannot understand why chocolate is not on this list.