Tuesday, December 21, 2021 – WHERE TO DINE FOR THE HOLIDAYS IN THE EARLY 1900’S

By admin

JOYOUS HOLIDAY GREETINGS FROM OUR FRIENDS AT COLER.
THANKS TO MARGARET LOPES AND THE THERAPEUTIC RECREATION STAFF FOR THE WONDERFUL DECORATIONS

TUESDAY, DECEMBER 21, 2021

ISSUE #551

FROM EPHEMERAL NEW YORK

THE HOTEL WOLCOTT

IN DAYS GONE BY

A stunning Christmas feast served to guests at a posh Gilded Age hotel

The Wolcott at 31st Street and Fifth Avenue, about 1910

In the Wolcott’s Gilded Age heyday, however, the hotel’s clientele were a lot higher on the social ladder. Opened in 1904 in the hopping theater and shopping district near Herald Square that was fast supplanting the rough and ready Tenderloin, this Beaux-Arts beauty hosted notables like Edith Wharton and Isadora Duncan.

The Wolcott menu front cover The Wolcott operated on what was known as the “European plan,” which meant that meals were not included in the room price. So when the hotel dining room put together this mind-blowing Christmas dinner menu for December 25, 1905, hotel guests had to pay extra.

What a feast it was! The menu featured more than a hundred options, starting with an array of oysters and clams and then 25 or so relishes (lots of caviar and “chow-chow”), soups (turtle, of course; it’s an old New York favorite), and fish (codfish tongues?) before getting to the official entrees.

If beef, ham, or chicken isn’t your idea of a Christmas dinner main course, the Wolcott offered plenty of game options, like grouse, woodcock, and partridge.

A chef in the Wolcott kitchen, 1917

The vegetable choices were quite extensive, and that list included different varieties of potatoes, including “French fried”—perhaps an early mention of the classic side we’re so used to with a burger today.

The dessert course went old-school with plum pudding. But look at all those ice cream options! Fruit, cheese, and then coffee and tea rounded out the feast. I wonder what “Wolcott special milk” is?

The menu reveals some things about life among the upper classes in Gilded Age New York. Unlike today’s pared-down, curated restaurant menu, variety seems to have been important. French dishes were certainly popular, likely thanks to the influence of Delmonico’s, which by 1905 had moved up to 44th Street and was still a leading option in a city where dining out was becoming more of a regular thing.
How the hotel’s dining staff managed to obtain and store all of these food choices is mind-boggling. Chefs must have been down at the city’s great food markets, like Washington Market, early in the morning, and an army of cooks likely chopping, peeling, and cleaning all day.

One thing remains the same, though: Christmas dinner was meant to be a celebration, just as it is today.

Tuesday Photo of the Day

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#MONDAY PHOTO OF THE DAY

At the foot of Old Fulton Street in Brooklyn Bridge Park, sits a clapboard house with a tower. Built in 1926 at the former site of the Fulton Ferry landing, this structure was a fireboat house for the New York City Fire How the hotel’s dining staff managed to obtain and store all of these food choices is mind-boggling. Chefs must have been down at the city’s great food markets, like Washington Market, early in the morning, and an army of cooks likely chopping, peeling, and cleaning all day.

One thing remains the same, though: Christmas dinner was meant to be a celebration, just as it is today.

ED LITCHER, ARON EISENPREISS, LAURA HUSSEY GOT IT..
IF I MISSED YOUR NAME, SORRY, I AM CATCHING UP FROM 3 DAYS AWAY!!

Text by Judith Berdy
Thanks to Bobbie Slonevsky for her dedication to Blackwell’s Almanac and the RIHS
Thanks to Deborah Dorff for maintaining our website
Edited by Melanie Colter and Deborah Dorff

EPHEMERAL NEW YORK

[Top image: MCNY, x2011.34.303; Second image: NYPL

All image are copyrighted (c) Roosevelt Island Historical Society unless otherwise indicated

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