Entertaining with Style Book

Worried about which glass to use for which wine at dinner parties? Having a cutlery crisis? Faced with a globe artichoke for the first time? Stumped for a simple but stylish supper menu? Paul Burrell has the answers in Entertaining with Style. This useful volume is packed with solid information about dinner-party etiquette (including instructions on how to eat such difficult social-indicator foods as asparagus, fresh fruit, the dreaded artichoke and even cheese), planning and executing a wedding, flower arrangements for several occasions and dealing with unwanted guests (greet them warmly, then deal at a later date with whoever so inconsiderately brought them). A collection of seasonal menus covers the gamut of social eventualities from a Romantic Dinner for Two, by way of a Summer Wedding and a Spring Family Lunch, to a Christmas Lunch and New Year's Drinks and Canape Party. The recipes are pleasant, uncomplicated British classics, such as "Beef Wellington", "Simnel Cake", "Roast Beef and Yorkshire Pudding" and "Punch Jelly". The clincher, though, is that Paul Burrell used to be butler first to the Prince and Princess of Wales and later to the Princess alone. His pride in having served the Princess, and his affection for her and her memory, are touchingly evident throughout. Many of the recipes are revealed to be royal favourites. Nuggets of information about the running of royal households are discreetly distributed. The risks of kitsch or tastelessness in a project like this, it must be said, are high, and by and large they have been avoided. --Robin DavidsonRead More