Whole Lot of Elsa Going On

Elsa Maxwell is one of the reasons I have stopped reading so much fiction.  Clearly, one could simply never conger up such a character.  In today's book-to-screen environment, there is clearly no actress who could even come close to playing Elsa Maxwell -- OK maybe Nathan Lane -- but no actress -- Wait...maybe Kathy Bates -- yes, I think it could be the best biopic ever.  But we both know this will never happen.  

Moving on...Elsa has been on my mind lately as I have been reading Sam Staggs wonderful book, Inventing Elsa Maxwell.

At the very same time, I received an e-mail from someone searching for a recipe.  It seems that her client, a woman of a certain age, remembered a recipe from Elsa Maxwell for a soup with a chicken base and tomato purée.  One might serve it hot or if chilled it would make a gelled consommé.  I do love a challenge.

I grabbed my copy of How To Do It by Maxwell and found only a few recipes. My first guess was this gazpacho, though it is never heated.

Andalusian Gazpacho a la Joan Fontaine

Place the following in a bowl: 4 small cucumbers, seeded and finely chopped; 6 ripe tomatoes, peeled and coarsely chopped; 1 green pepper, finely minced; 1 clove garlic, finely mashed; 2 tablespoons grated carrot; 2 tablespoons grated onion.  Add cold water to cover with 2 tablespoons lemon juice, or lime juice (I greatly prefer the latter); I teaspoon dry mustard, dash Tabasco, salt and pepper to taste.  Chill thoroughly at least 8 hours.  Serve in individual bowls with a dab of sour cream -- about 1 tablespoon -- on top.

The closest match was a consommé without tomato one.  It is a spinach consommé that can be served hot or cold.  For proof that Elsa Maxwell was from another generation, she lists the recipe as belonging Mrs. T. Reed Vreeland, known to subsequent generations as Diana!   Maxwell notes that Vreeland acquired the recipe from  Elise de Wolfe.

Mrs. T Reed Vreeland  Consommé Vert- Pré

Make a very good rich bouillon.  Add enough spinach juice to color it green, and just before serving add finely chopped fine herbes.  Serve hot or iced.

Neither fit the criteria of the requested recipe.  Since Maxwell mentioned de Wolfe, I thought I would try there.  It is not a great stretch to think that someone who was familiar with Maxwell's recipes might also know de Wolfe's.

I checked Recipe's For Successful Dining. The recipe for Consommé Vert- Pré was identical to Elsie de Wolfe's with the only difference being de Wolfe's was Consommé Vert- Près and she called for "a little" juice to "make" it green.  Spelling and word choice aside, I continued looking at the list of

consommés, and stumbled upon this.

Consommé Madrilene

Make a good chicken consomme.  Add one tablespoon tapioca to each pint of liquid.  Add finally a puree of tomatoes which has been strained through a cloth, and before serving add raw tomatoes cut in a a small dice and leaves of chervil.

This was, indeed, the long lost soup that our châtelaine had been craving.   Everyone is happy.

Think about it...Kathy Bates as Elsa Maxwell... you would definitely go and see that movie.  Sam, if you are reading this...call me.
 

Etiquette Wednesday -- Diana Vreeland

Diana Vreeland by Louise Dahl-Wolfe

I was terribly dismayed that little augury failed to list my post on Diana Vreeland in her Favorite Post Topic for 2009. Then I was further dismayed to find that I never uploaded my DV post. I looked and I couldn’t find it. I was sure it had been an early post, so I searched and searched and there it was, still in "draft" form in my March posts. It was meant to be an Etiquette Wednesday entry it never got posted.

So in keeping with little augury’s admonition to post more on Diana Vreeland, and since today is Wednesday, here is the post that never was!

I adore Diana Vreeland. She is for me a great beauty, like Edith Sitwell and Andrée Putman, with a face the French would describe with the phrase jolie-laide. (Leave it to the French to have a beautiful phrase for non-traditional beauty.)

Beginning in the 1930’s, Mrs. Vreeland was fashion editor at Harper's Bazaar. Her career at Bazaar began, however, with an unusual advice column entitled, Why Don’t You? a profoundly over-the-top collection of fashion, decorating, cooking, grooming and generally wild ideas to make the heads of the most creative of people quite literally -- spin! In 2001, John Esten collected much of Mrs. Vreeland’s advice into the book, Diana Vreeland: Bazaar Years.



Why Don’t You? would be considered a bit over the top by today’s extravagant standards, so one can only imagine what these suggestions did for readers in the 1930’s. Vreeland wrote with an absolute disregard for the reality in which most of her readers found themselves living. Perhaps it was the very fantasy of her suggestions that kept them coming back to find out what Mrs. Vreeland was suggesting for the coming month.


Here are some of my favorites, so as Diana Vreeland might ask,

Why Don’t You?

…give someone an enormous white handkerchief linen table-cloth, and in different handwriting and colors (black, acid green, pink, scarlet and pale blue) have embroidered all the bon mots you can possible think of?

…have and elk-hide trunk for the back of your car? Hermès of Paris will make this.

…turn your old ermine coat into a bathrobe?

…bring back from Central Europe a huge white Baroque porcelain stove to stand in front hall, reflected in the parquet?

…have a private staircase from your bedroom to the library with a needlework carpet with notes of music worked on each step – the whole spelling your favorite tune?

DV's bookshelves
Her portrait by Cecil Beaton is behind the polished horn

Cecil Beaton wrote of Diana Vreeland:

“Although she is one of the most remarkable creatures who has ever lived and worked in the zany confines of the fashion world, a combination of Madame Sévigné and Falstaff, Mrs. Vreeland graces that world with her presence, as unique a presence as it has ever boasted.”

Since I positively adore living with total disregard for reality, I might just ask:

Why Don’t You?

…read Diana Vreeland: Bazaar Years?

Etiquette Wednesday -- Elsa Maxwell

Since it is the day before Thanksgiving and also Wednesday, we thought we would provide you with etiquette and entertaining as you approach the holiday. Actually, it might be more “entertainment” than entertaining. If you are facing a family fiasco or “your” friends are bringing “their” friends, just close your eyes and think, “What would Elsa Maxwell be doing…”

Simon Doonan wrote of Elsa Maxwell:

"Even if you took Martha Stewart, Julia Child, Two Fat Ladies, Regine, Suzanne Bartsch, Nigella Lawson, Diane Brill, Carmen D’Allessio, Pat Buckley, Amy Sacco, and Phyllis Diller and threw them all into a gigantic blender, you would still fall short of producing anyone as compelling and scrumptious as the late, great, über-hostess Elsa Maxwell."

While Miss Maxwell is no longer with us, she has left us with the blueprint in How To Do It.



Here is a typical seating arrangement at one of Miss Maxwell's parties.



It seems Stavros Niarchos wasn't invited to the above party, but he did make it to her Tiara Ball.



Here are just a few party pointers from Miss Maxwell that I have translated for Thanksgiving:

Avoid people with causes to boost or grievances to air.

(Since it’s Thanksgiving and you are probably having the family in, rest assured there are grievances and at least one PETA pushing adolescent. Sorry)

Avoid the very shy, uncertain, introverted types.

(Seat them at the kids table.)

I always make it a point, for instance, even in a predominantly eggheaded group, to have a smattering of beautiful women regardless of whether they are dumbbells or not (and
most beautiful women are not very bright.)

(Remember, Elsa Maxwell tipped the scale at about 300 pounds, so she might be bitter, still when you tell this story and your brother’s girlfriend asks, “Who is Elsa Maxwell? “, feel free to move them to the kids table.)

As for the limits of age, there are none.

(Bravo Elsa. Feel free to move two young folk from the kids table to the big table. Pick the boy who laughed when the girlfriend asked “Who’s Elsa” and the overweight niece who can program your Blackberry.)


Miss Maxwell called on some of her friends to provide the recipe selections in How to Do It. The ever-emaciated Mrs. T. Reed Vreeland (Deeeahhna to her friends) actually stole this recipe from Elsie de Wolfe.

Consomme Vért-Pré

Make a very good rich bouillon. Add enough spinach to color it green, and just before serving add finely chopped fines herbes. Serve hot or cold.

(This is the perfect dish for PETA lovers and super-models. In a pinch, add one vegetable bouillon cube to a quart of hot water. When it is dissolved, add 1 oz. of green food coloring. Voilà, Consomme Vért-Pré. Don’t worry what people think. You know in your heart the model will dump your brother before Christmas.)


Now get out there and entertain!