THE LAST SCUPPER
Oysters, foie gras and eclairs are on the menu as a food blogger recreates the final dinner aboard the Titanic,
What does it take to recreate an 11course meal from 100 years ago?
Three days of prep, 16 hours of actual cooking, and several weeks of recipe testing, according to Paula Costa, a food blogger based in Waterloo.
To mark the centenary of the Titanic’s sinking on April15,1912, Costa will host a dinner party Friday night, featuring 13 menu items from the original first-class dinner on that fateful night. Poached salmon with mousseline sauce and chocolate-painted éclairs with French vanilla cream are among the delectable dishes.
“It’s a little bit all-consuming right now. When I’m not working or doing anything else, it’s pretty much what I’m thinking about,” said Costa, 43, who founded her blog Dragon’s Kitchen, which showcases her home cooking, in 2009.
The ambitious cook knew she wanted to take on the multi-course meal after seeing an exhibit about the ship at the Ontario Science Centre back in 2008.
and Dana Mccauley.
Mccauley says she applauds Costa and those who want to tackle such a titanic task.
“It is a herculean effort, and I actually caution anybody who thinks they can do it by themselves,” she said.
A dinner for eight, this will be Costa’s fourth time hosting a Titanic-themed dinner. Her previous efforts focused on second- and third-class menus.
Costa says she made minor tweaks to the original first-class menu. Her previous dinner did not include a recipe for pate de foie gras, so she had to find a recipe on her own.
Still, “I pretty much stayed faithful to the menu,” Costa said, adding that her biggest challenge was finding the ingredients.
Mccauley, a judge on the Food Network Canada Food Network Canada show, Recipe to Riches, says it would be difficult to recreate every dish from the Edwardian period. “There’s some things you just literally cannot replicate . . . the ingredients just don’t exist anymore.”
For her part, Costa admits she wanted to host an even bigger dinner, but time and appetite constraints made it difficult.
There, Costa had bought the recipe book Last Dinner on the Titanic by Rick Archbold