LAKE, Nancy “Menus Made Easy” [Frederick Warne & Co., 1901]

LAKE, Nancy. Menus Made Easy; or How to Order Dinner and Give the Dishes Their French Names.

London and New York: Frederick Warne & Co., 1901. Thirteenth Edition. Small octavo. Publisher’s bright blue cloth, front cover and spine elaborately lettered and decorated in gilt and black with pictorial menu design; patterned endpapers. Signed by a previous owner on the front endpaper. Light rubbing at extremities with minor fraying at spine ends; a few small spots of wear to boards; spine gilt bright; inner hinges sound; text clean and complete. Very Good.

A charming late Victorian culinary guide aimed at the aspiring host, offering translations and structure for formal French-style menus. The striking cobalt binding, with its whimsical menu vignette and gilt decoration, makes this one of the more visually appealing Warne domestic manuals of the period.