Trip to London 4 - Secret Women's Business

While in London, we went into a pub called The Grenadier in order to have some lunch. These beautiful anonymous watercolour sketches from the Crimean War decorated the walls of the ladies' loos.

The one that first attracted my attention was this menu for a dinner at Camp Balaklava, March 55, (presumably 1855). The dinner was supposedly given to Lord Rokeby in Colonel Ridley's hut, with guests listed as Lord Rokeby, Colonel Hamilton, Major Ellison, Captain Higginson, one illegible,  (plus a reference to Lord Arth-Hay, possibly as co-host?) I am assuming it is a fantasy dinner - in battlefield conditions would it really have been feasible to produce such a fine meal?

The dishes served, supposedly, were:

Consomme aux Oeufs - Clear soup with eggs (presumably a kind of straciatella)
Petit Pates a la Menshikoff - some kind of pasta (this is the only reference I can find to Menshikoff)
Filets de poulets aux Champignons - Fillet of chicken with mushrooms
Cotelettes de illegible, (Mouton? probably) aux petits pois - Cutlets of some kind with young peas
La Dinde Rotie - Roast turkey
Jambon au vin de Madere - Ham with a madeira sauce
Choufleur, sauce Hollandaise - Cauliflower in hollandaise sauce
Creme au Chocolate - Chocolate cream (a mousse?)
Tarte aux confitures - Jam tart

Then we have a zouave on a cold day, in a place or a set of clothing I cannot make out, dated 12th December, 1854:

a zouave in his daily dress, 11th December, 1854:

and a zouave cloaked up, 13 December, '54

Maddeningly, a woman started banging on the door and shouting loudly, so I had to take the rest of my pictures in a hurry. I did try to go back in later, but, strangely, the same thing happened again, so the writing on the last ones, on each occasion, came out blurred, because I was in a hurry and nervous, so I suppose my hand started shaking, because I am such a shrinking flower (alternatively an incompetent photographer):

I think the caption on the picture abovesays, "A specimen of Private in the Guards, before serving in the Crimea, and afterwards"

As far as I can make out from my shaky photography, the caption on the upper of the two pictures below says: "After coming off night duty in Crimea, with illegible gaiters of his own construction and very warm illegible". "New hooded cloak sent out from England illegible, but rather striking to look at" The lower picture is simply captioned: "At post in Crimea"

This one, I think, says, "A baggage pony, before service and after he has seen service in the Crimea, in this state", with something written at the very bottom that I cannot make out at all - I will have to return to the pub and find out the truth!

Anyway, these little pictures were a quite unexpected pleasure - and they represent to me part of what makes travelling so thrilling.