Hollandaise of Our Lives

New York City, 1894

Lemuel was hung over. A failure in the Argentine wheat crop had sent the markets tumbling, and the exchange was in chaos. He had escaped the trading game in time to avoid wading through the mire personally, but now his retirement was looking grim. At least we have old Grover back, thought Lemuel. He'd been a Bourbon Democrat through and through, and the threat of economic collapse had seemed as opportune a reason as any to honor his party with a generous imbibing of its patron libation.

But bourbon had always been an investment of severely diminishing returns. In the end, it was his head that split, and his eyes that swelled. Lemuel shuffled through a drizzle, up Fifth Avenue toward the recently-erected Waldorf Hotel. Heck of a time to open a hotel. Uncle Sam is pulling lint from his pockets and old Astor throws up a testament to luxury to remind everyone he's rich, Lemuel mused. New York was 35% unemployed, and he figured the jobless must have appointed Fifth Avenue their new point of congregation. He walked through a gauntlet of outstretched hands. The rain pooled in the beggars' palms and ran into the gutter. His head throbbed.

At the Waldorf, Lemuel ordered a breakfast aimed straight at his hangover. He had long relished the incidental contact of assorted breakfast fare; today, he would live intentionally.

"I'll have buttered toast, poached eggs, some bacon—nice and crisp—and a hooker of Hollandaise," said Lemuel.

"Very good, Mr. Benedict," said the head waiter, who was in the habit of taking things personally, Lemuel's order included.

When the head waiter, one Oscar Tschirky, returned to the kitchen, he instructed the cook to make him an extra portion—his interest was piqued.

Through the rainstreaked window, past the wet and emptyhanded poor, far down Fifth Avenue at Delmonico's (the Delmonico's), Charles Ranhofer was enjoying his own "peach pudding à la Cleveland" as he penned the final pages of The Epicurean. It would be a tome for the ages, as long as the Good Book, and every bit as practical, if he dared say so. His fingers wagged over his vintage Hansen Writing Ball as if controlling an invisible marionette before descending on the keys.

Under the heading, "A selection of interesting bills of fare of Delmonico's from 1862-1894," Ranhofer carefully punched a new entry onto the page: "Eggs à la—Benedick / Eufa à la Benedick."

Ranhofer had always enjoyed naming his finest creations after his favorite people. It was an honor for all involved, and elevated his dishes to their proper level alongside the era's finest achievements in architecture and engineering. If tariffs and bridges could wear the stamp of personhood, why not veal pie? A veal pie certainly beat the Dickens out of a tariff, anyhow.

"Cut some muffins in halves crosswise, toast them without allowing to brown, then place a round of cooked ham an eighth of an inch thick and of the same diameter as the muffins on each half. Heat in a moderate oven and put a poached egg on each toast. Cover the whole with Hollandaise sauce."

There. Charles thought often of the Captain and Mrs. Le Grand Benedict. The Mrs. had been positively impossible to sate after some time, owing to the frequency of her visits. (And to the opulence of her rearing, Charles posited.) But the muses had been kind, and a few staples had been enlivened considerably by that pillar of haute cuisine, that matron of sauces, Hollandaise.

Charles pondered the endeavors of Oscar Tschirky, his one-time second, his apprentice of years past, not a dilettante but neither a virtuoso in matters culinary, and wondered what pilfered shadows he was serving far down Fifth at the Waldorf. He wondered if Oscar would be so bold as to use the very same pet appellations that gave his (Charles's) own fare such distinction. Certainly he would content himself on simply absconding with the recipes. The names must remain inviolate.

Meanwhile, Lemuel Benedict finished his breakfast. In the kitchen, Oscar Tschirky savored a final, Hollandaise-sodden bite of Lemuel's suggestion. He would add this creation to the menu immediately, under the moniker of its poor, beleaguered inventor.

And so two truths were born of one, never to reunite.