The magazine (Town and Country) sent its distinguished writer, Charles H. Baker, on assignment around the world to find the very best food and drink. The result was an eclectic compilation called The Gentleman's Companion, a legendary and extremely rare literary work, worthy of Jules Verne's Phileas Fogg.
The two volume set, including both an "Exotic Cookery Book" as well as an "Exotic Drink Book," provides a provocative and insightful snapshot of the civilized 1940s. In The Gentleman's Companion, Baker outlines a grand cocktail tour that takes the reader on imaginative flights fueled by drinks like the Vladivostok Virgin, "being a risky little heart-warmer from out Frozen Siberia," or "the unpredictable Balloon Cocktail from Calcutta's smartest restaurant, Firpo's." American readers whose idea of exotic travel goes no farther than the Grand Canyon can prepare an Aguacate Cubano, a spine-stiffening matter of Bahama Conchs, or Queen Elizabeth's Roasting Marinade for Saddle of Venison.
Few books, before or since, have even approached this urbanely masculine treatise on gastronomy.
Sounds interesting enough. On one website, the going rate was around $400 for the set, but for those interested I found it on Abebooks at a substantially reduced price. I'll offer a review as soon as I finish it.
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