Royal Haunts Royal Recipes

The royal family are steeped in tradition,

and throughout history the royal tables have showcased culinary excellence.

In celebration of royal food...

We know it's the Queen's recipe

because we've got it in her own hand.

..from the present and the past...

That is proper regal.

..we recreate old family favourites.

Now, the Queen Mother had this really wicked trick with these.

What a mess!

We sample royal eating al fresco...

-Oh, wow!

-That is what you want.

..and revisit the most extravagant times.

"Pheasant, stag, turkey, salmon,

"oysters and turbot dressed in a lobster champagne sauce."

Unbelievable!

This is Royal Recipes.

Hello, I'm Michael Buerk, and welcome to Royal Recipes.

This is Audley End, one of Britain's finest stately homes -

built in the style of a royal palace and once owned by a king.

In the splendour of the gardens, halls and kitchen

of this grandest of country houses,

we'll be recreating the food served at the highest royal tables.

And it all starts here, with this gem -

a royal kitchen maid's cookbook,

the only surviving recipe book of its kind in the royal archive.

This is an exact copy of the original,

which is kept at Windsor Castle.

Inside, the recipes of Mildred Nicholls

who worked at Buckingham Palace in the early 1900s.

And for the first time in over 100 years,

we'll be bringing these recipes back to life.

This time, we cook the food members of the royal family choose

when they're away from their public duties -

the personal favourites they enjoy with family and friends,

whether at a picnic or dining out.

Today, in the Royal Recipes kitchen,

chef Anna Haugh creates a dish that would have found favour

with Edward VII and his mistress Lillie Langtry.

I admire Edward VII.

If I had this, all I'd want to do after this is go to sleep.

Historian Dr Polly Russell

visits the restaurants given the royal seal of approval.

Princess Margaret so loved this pie

that she would send her butler from Kensington Palace

to come and get one.

In the magnificence of the Victorian kitchen wing,

we start with stout-hearted fare

fit for the gourmand king Edward VII.

Hello, I'm here in this grand kitchen of this stately home

with Anna Haugh, who's executive chef of a top London restaurant.

-A bit different from this, I imagine?

-Oh, absolutely.

It's like a dungeon where I normally work!

THEY LAUGH

Today, we're going off duty with the royals,

taking a look at some of the dishes they're served

in some of their royal haunts.

First stop, Rules Restaurant in Covent Garden, London.

It's supposed to be London's oldest restaurant.

Yeah, famous for its game.

Famous for its game and famous for being the rendezvous for Edward VII

when he was Prince of Wales, and his mistress, Lillie Langtry.

Yes, naughty Eddie.

With the banquette. Anyway, we won't go into that.

One of the things he probably had, actually,

-because it's famous for game, is woodcock on toast.

-Yeah.

Anyway, you're not going to do this kind of woodcock...

-No.

-You're going to do a completely different woodcock dish.

Absolutely, I'm going to do a woodcock pudding.

And I love recipes like this.

When you say "woodcock pudding",

this is woodcock pudding like a steak and kidney pudding,

not like a dessert.

Exactly, exactly.

OK, so the first thing I'm going to start with is the suet pastry.

You can make it hot, you can make it cold.

Today I'm going to make it cold.

So you just add your suet in, pinch of salt.

And then you want to add your water in kind of gradually.

It's roughly about 100 mls or so of water. It's a really simple mix.

You just have flour, suet, pinch of salt and water.

So what are you doing here?

You're just mixing it or are you trying to crush it as well?

No, I'm just bringing it all together.

You see, if I add any more water, it would come together easier

but it would be too wet.

-Can you dispose of that for me, please?

-I can.

I've lined the mould with just a little bit of butter

-and then also...

-You've got something on the bottom there.

Yeah, a bit of greaseproof paper on the bottom just to make sure...

Ah, is that so it doesn't stick?

I don't think it would stick but I'm just being extra careful.

Well, yours never stick.

Just because you're around, Michael, I'm just being extra careful.

I'm actually going to take a little bit of this off

and this will go as the top.

-Yeah.

-Then on the line of it, just roll it out.

It really has a feel of an Edwardian dish, doesn't it?

Mm, it does, yeah.

I'm just going to roll it on the rolling pin

so that it doesn't break.

-Yeah?

-And just place it over the bowl and fit it in.

It's a very forgiving pastry.

Good squeeze around.

So I'll roll the lid before I go to finish the mix.

OK, so this is going to be the top of the thing.

You're going to pop this on here

once you've put the contents of the pie in there.

Exactly. You want to have a lot of time to do this.

So what are you going to put in here?

OK, so now we're just going to add in the raw chopped woodcock.

-Raw?

-Yeah, raw now because you're going to cook this pie

for quite a few hours. And a bit of parsley.

In here I've sweated down some mushrooms with some onions

-and I've got a bit of demi-glace in there.

-Demi-glace?

Yeah, it's a bit of a fancy word

-for meat stock that has been reduced down.

-Right.

It has some red wine in it

and a little drop of Madeira has gone into our one as well.

So that's ready to go inside the centre.

-That's great, a demi-glace.

-Yeah.

-Poncey, isn't it?

-Doesn't that look beautiful?

-It does.

-Just look at it.

Yeah. Put that on the top.

Yeah, I'm going to squeeze it down.

Our forgiving pastry is going to let me away with blue murder.

This is brilliant because it barely even shrinks at all.

It will shrink a very small amount,

but you'll see when I open up my pie later on.

So you just want to clean it up, cut around the edge.

Now...

Then your tinfoil goes on top.

Buttered tinfoil so it doesn't stick to your pie

and you just make sure that your foil is nice and tight

because you're going to steam this.

-Yep. Steam it?

-It's important that you actually don't let the steam in,

it's more that the steam is cooking it from the outside.

-A steamed suet pudding.

-Yes.

This is straight out of the past, this, isn't it?

So here is one that's been simmering away now for the past few hours.

-How many hours?

-Three.

-Three hours?

-Three hours.

This isn't fast food we're talking about, is it?

Now, Michael, my hands aren't asbestos

-so you're going to have to move.

-Oh, sorry, sorry!

-Thank you.

-OK.

I'm so excited. I love this!

I love this so much!

Like, genuinely, I love this.

Do you like woodcock itself or is it just the pudding that excites you?

Game in general just excites me.

OK, oh, look at that!

Look at that!

-Isn't that beautiful?!

-Yes, yes.

That's absolutely stunning.

Just going to run a knife along the edge,

just to make sure that when I flip this over

that it doesn't stay stuck.

Oh, but that just smells AMAZING!

-It does, doesn't it?

-It smells amazing.

-Now, this is a big moment.

-This is a big moment.

You're just going to sort of...boomph!

Pretty much, so let's hope I don't mess it up. OK...

Oh!

-Very deft.

-Yes, well,

the second thing I'm hoping for is that it releases.

Ah, right.

Oh-ho-ho-ho!

Oh, I say!

Oh, the smell of that is just...

-Let's have a sniff.

-It's amazing.

Oh, yes! It's...

..warm and... Oh, yeah.

So the last thing we're going to add...

The two things we're going to add is a bit more demi-glace,

-or a bit more gravy.

-Demi-glace?

Oh, is that gravy?

Yes, demi-glace is posh gravy.

And then to really make it luxurious and special,

I'm going to put some truffle on top.

Oh!

Just for you. It's just for you.

OK. This is aroma, pure aroma.

So the joy of truffle is the speckles going everywhere.

That, to me, is just beautiful.

So there you have it,

steamed woodcock pudding with demi-glace and truffle.

Wow!

OK, let's crack this...

This is really hearty stuff, isn't it?

Oh, my goodness!

-Look at that!

-That is so delicious!

If I do say so myself!

OK, come on, come on.

-First I'm going to try the filling.

-OK, I'll do that, too.

Mm!

I'm not sure I've had woodcock before.

Tell me what you think.

Mm!

This is lovely but I admire Edward VII.

If I had this, all I'd want to do after this -

finish the glass of port, go to sleep.

ANNA LAUGHS

The Prince of Wales was breaking with royal tradition

when he dined out in a restaurant, but I can see why.

Decades after Edward VII's first forays,

younger royals started dining out as regulars on the restaurant scene.

Historian Dr Polly Russell explorers the range of royal tastes.

Princes William and Harry are as at home in a burger bar

as a royal banquet.

Their mother, Princess Diana,

was a regular at fashionable eateries like San Lorenzo,

having her own table there in the 1980s.

But the idea of princes or princesses

going out to dine at a restaurant was once unthinkable.

It wasn't until the 1930s that a restaurant actually reserved a table

for an HRH, and that's where I'm going now.

Opened in 1929, Quaglino's quickly became the restaurant

for bright young things.

Until this time, fine dining had been stuffy,

but here the dress code was relaxed,

with cocktails flowing and a heaving dance floor.

By 1935, it had even tempted notorious party boy

the future Edward VIII.

-Hi.

-So nice to meet you. Thanks so much for having me.

This is the most amazing place.

Thank you.

Current head chef James Hume has been overseeing

the most recent refurbishment.

Prince Harry was at the launch party.

There is a sort of history of royals coming to Quaglino's, isn't there?

Yeah, it goes back to the '30s when the old Prince of Wales came in.

-He had his own room.

-He had his own room?

Yeah, there's a private dining room just behind you.

We still call it "The Prince of Wales" to this day.

Two decades later, following the royal abdication

and post-war depression,

a new set of young royals emerged and started to hit the town again.

By the 1950s,

the Princess Margaret was ready to party again

and this is where she came.

She used to have a cornered-off table called the Royal Enclosure.

It was called the Royal Enclosure?

Yeah, just for her, every night reserved.

So she could be seen and see everyone else.

By the 1960s, however,

Princess Margaret sought out a different dining experience.

Around the corner from Kensington Palace,

this hideaway became a favourite for her and her husband,

Anthony Armstrong-Jones.

In 1965, when Princess Margaret and her husband used to come here

to eat, these were her favourite booths to sit in.

It's a space that's about intimacy, relaxing and feeling comfortable.

That must have been the most wonderful thing

if you were Princess Margaret.

This new relaxed style of dining in the 1960s was a direct contrast

to the traditional formality of eating out.

To me, that really speaks of a moment in Britain

where we are starting to question the sort of hierarchies and rules

and that plays out in terms of food.

The restaurant was originally named Nan's Kitchen in the 1960s,

serving home-cooked food.

It's said that their chicken pie was Princess Margaret's favourite

and she enjoyed it so often that they changed the eaterie's name

to Maggie Jones, in her honour.

In the 1960s and the 1970s, Princess Margaret so loved this pie

that she would send her butler from Kensington Palace

to come and get one to eat at home.

And I've heard that some members of the royal family

still like to come here.

Glamorous royal haunts in fashionable London

but for many of the royals,

their favourite haunts have been as far away from London

as you can possibly get.

Yeah, and ever since Queen Victoria they've been mad about Scotland.

Yeah, the late Queen Mother in particular.

She had that Castle of Mey right up in the north of Scotland.

Any further and you're in the Shetland Islands!

The Castle of Mey's got its own cookbook

with a foreword by Prince Charles,

which gives you a bit of an insight into the way of life up there.

Yeah, and today I'm going to prepare a Queen Mother's favourite -

jam puffs - from that cookery book.

Also, it was one of my favourites when I was a little girl.

So I'm going to show you how to make them today.

OK. These are things you can gobble.

Yes, yes, and it's super easy.

All you need is some puff pastry.

This shop-bought, roll-out puff pastry is perfectly fine.

You just want to cut out...

..as many discs as you feel your belly can take.

MICHAEL LAUGHS

But I think recipes like this are so special because you feel like you

have a bit of insight into the kind of more normal or familiar side

of the royal family.

-So we have all our discs here now.

-Very neat.

And we're going to make six of the mincemeat and six of the jam.

So would you mind helping me with that?

Would you do the jam ones and I'll do the mincemeat ones?

-Absolutely.

-OK, so...

So what jam is this?

This is apricot jam.

So on one side you just want to give a bit like...

Like a small teaspoon of jam.

-Now, I will be judging you on this.

-I know, I know.

So if it's wrong, you'll be tidying up.

You can do the washing up afterwards.

You've got the easier one.

It's difficult to get the jam off the spoon, isn't it?

Yep. So try to keep it on one half, one side.

All on one side? OK.

Well, you're going to fold it over, of course, aren't you?

Exactly, and then we're going to put the egg wash on the other side.

Here we go. Oh, I got a lot on that one.

Yeah. Now, you're very slow.

I'm streets ahead of you. I'm very fast so I'm just going to go ahead

-with my egg wash.

-OK.

They love jam, the royals, don't they?

Apparently at Buckingham Palace every Sunday

they used to have something called jam pennies,

which was actually just a jam sandwich cut into penny-shaped sizes

by a cake cutter. I think it was mainly for the kids.

-Yeah, I'm going to say, I would have loved that as a kid.

-Yeah.

-So you need to egg-wash your...

-OK.

-Come on, chop chop, let's go.

All right. All right, chef.

I'm going to start folding as you're doing it.

-Oh, I'm making a mess of that.

-And give it a good squeeze.

Actually, I think I've got a rare talent for this sort of thing.

I think you do not, but let's keep going!

I think you've just got high standards.

You can't recognise potential when you see it staring you in the face!

Ha-ha! OK, so when you've egg-washed them,

you want to fold them over and give them a really good squeeze,

so you're kind of squeezing out the air of them

and sealing it really, really well.

Like a little fruit pasty, if you know what I mean?

There's nothing to this cooking lark, is there?

-No, it's easy-peasy, pie-squeezy.

-Turn it over like that?

-Yeah.

-Then what do you do?

-You're trying to tuck in the filling,

-so that you've just got the pastry on the outside.

-OK.

Ah, well, I shouldn't have been so greedy.

The jam's coming out, look.

ANNA LAUGHS

Might have been a little bit too much jam in that!

In all of them, yeah!

-That's greed for you. It's a man thing.

-Yeah.

Here we go.

Well, actually, the fun bit happens next.

So now we're going to cut them out. This bit I actually quite like.

As a little kid, this was definitely a side of it that I loved.

Yeah, neatness wasn't the Queen Mother's thing, really,

because they had jam puffs

but I think the Queen Mother had a bit of a wicked sense of humour.

Rather liked them as kind of...

..booby traps for her guests.

-Oh, dear!

-I'll tell you more about it.

So you're not going to tell me beforehand, you're going to booby-trap me?!

Yeah, maybe I'm...

I'm going to do what the Queen Mother did to her guests.

-Is that revenge for me getting you to help me to bake?

-Exactly.

They go straight into the oven just like this.

-We don't egg-wash the top of them.

-No? Why's that?

When we take them out we're going to dust them with icing sugar

and then a bit of magic happens. You put them underneath a grill

and they turn into this beautiful caramel mirror on top.

-Wow.

-It's lovely, yeah.

I might leave these ones for later.

Yeah. Yeah, absolutely.

I'm going to put these straight into the oven

for about 10 minutes at 180 degrees.

Now, these ones are already cooked.

But they're not finished, there's still one more stage to go.

So if you just pass me the icing sugar there, please.

-There we go.

-And the sieve.

-Yeah.

-So all we're going to do is dust these with icing sugar on top

and then we're going to grill it.

We're going to grill it underneath...

Just your normal grill but with the door open.

So I'm going to take this over to the oven.

Ah!

Come back soon.

How's it going, Anna?

They're ready!

Oh!

-Check these puppies out!

-Wow!

Now, the Queen Mother had this really wicked trick with these.

She'd set off on a picnic with her guests...

-And they loved a picnic, the royals.

-They loved a picnic.

And they'd sit down and these would be served

and the Queen Mother would say,

"There's a traditional way to eat these things."

You've got to bite the top off...

Mm! Really nice, by the way.

And you have to, traditionally, fill it up with cream.

Oh, my God! What a mess!

Wait a minute. Exactly.

Fill it up with cream and then eat it.

Now, there's no tradition whatsoever of doing this

but the end result is... Watch...

You can't do it without making a complete mess.

Yeah!

-Are you going to have one?

-Yeah, I'm going to have a go.

Have one of my better ones.

There's a tradition here, Anna.

You've got to fill this up with cream.

-Mm!

-There you go. I just want to see you make a mess of yourself.

I'm not going to make a mess. I'm not going to make a mess.

-I'm going to eat like a pro.

-Go on, go on! Go on!

Mm! I don't care that I made a mess. those are really good.

I might have another one.

A passion for jam puffs isn't the only royal favourite

of the late Queen Mother.

She also championed a rich egg and prawn dish

created at another Scottish haunt.

Drumkilbo House in Perthshire is just six miles

from the Queen Mother's childhood home of Glamis Castle.

Once owned by her nephew,

Drumkilbo was once often visited by the royal family.

It was here that the Queen Mother first tasted

their signature seafood delicacy, Eggs Drumkilbo.

Anna's here to find out the recipe's origins

from the Lord of the Manor, Geoffrey Bunting.

Welcome to Drumkilbo.

-Hi.

-I'm Geoffrey.

This is the drawing room.

Wow! My goodness, this place is fabulous.

This house evolved out of a medieval fortification

which belonged to the great Robert the Bruce.

So, Geoffrey, tell me - how did Eggs Drumkilbo come about?

There was a royal party staying here in my predecessor's time

and one member of the party was very late in arriving

and they realised would not be here in time for dinner.

And the chef, Gladys Davidson, improvised a cold dish to leave out

for the final member of the party

and that was the origin of Oeufs Drumkilbo,

which was then picked up and used at later royal occasions.

Waiting in the Drumkilbo House kitchen

where this royal favourite was created is chef Mark Bull.

It's a lovely dish. Very simple to make at home.

We'll put some of the harder ingredients in first.

The lobster...

..then we put in our prawns.

A bit of tomato puree, a small amount of Tabasco...

The anchovy essence.

I love anchovies. Get them in there.

Give this a little bit of a mix around just now.

You want everything... By the time you put the mayonnaise in,

you want it all evenly mixed and not any lumps, as such.

OK, so, we put the tomato in here now.

Mm-hm.

A lot of tomato goes in here.

We come to the mayonnaise.

That's a lot of mayonnaise.

You don't want it to be pure fish that you're eating.

It's like an upmarket prawn cocktail.

So it does have to have its proper amounts of mayonnaise and...

So, we'll mix this very lightly.

You don't want to...mush up anything at all in here.

Now, the last thing we put in, the eggs.

Have a taste.

Ah!

-Mm! Oh, my God!

-Good?

Mm!

So many different flavours.

Mm!

Next stage...

I think I can help you with this.

Yeah, you can. That's good.

Of course, yeah.

We put little bit of garnish on them.

Just a little piece of fancy tomato.

Easy to do, put a little bit of slice through it.

-I always like dill.

-I love a bit of dill.

I like dill with any kind of fish. It's nice and soft, plenty flavour.

Am I eating a dish fit for a queen?

Well, you are. Now some people will change it a little bit

but this is the original recipe.

Pudding time now. Time to wind back the clock.

Time to open the recipe book of our kitchen maid Mildred Nicholls,

who, remember, worked in Buckingham Palace

in the early years of the 1900s,

and a wonderful pudding.

Look, Anna - mille feuilles Mont Blanc.

Are you going to do this, the very same recipe?

I'm going to do it exactly the same as she did.

-As Mildred did it 110 years ago?

-Absolutely.

What do you start with?

OK, so start with our puff pastry.

You need to cut out five disks.

You need two cutters, one needs to be your large one

and then a smaller one to cut out the centres.

Now, this is the puff pastry, the thousand leaves

Escoffier thing. In the school tuck shop, it was called a cream slice.

-Oh, right. This is a very posh...

-Or vanilla slice.

This is a posh cream slice.

OK. So we're going to...

These have been baked in the oven

at about 180 degrees for about 20 minutes.

So we're going to stick these discs of puff pastry together

with an apricot jam. So I'm going to use a brush for this.

We brush it all around.

-You're going to make a tower of this stuff, are you?

-That's right, yes.

And use apricot jam as the glue?

That's right, exactly.

So it gives a bit of sweetness to it and, just like you say,

it's like a glue. So we place it on top.

You know I love building things. This looks like fun.

And this will really make it stick, will it?

Yes, this will make it stick because

the jam has been warmed up so to make it more liquid. So then it is,

it's like a little sweet glue holding it all together.

It's quite a tower, isn't it?

It is. Then we're going to fill the centre with some cream

and some chestnut puree.

So at the end we'll finish it as well with the marron glace.

-You're putting some on the top as well?

-Yeah.

Because that's the top of your stack.

Yeah, and I think it needs the sweetness as well, yeah.

So tell me about the other ingredients you've got there.

OK, so, you have your whipped cream,

you've got your chestnut puree and you've got your marron glace.

Now, marron glace is what?

A crystalline horse...

Not horse chestnut, chestnut.

Yes, that's right. A very...

-The French love them, don't they?

-Yeah, they do love them.

OK, so let's start with this.

I'm going to start with the puree in the centre.

-A spoonful...

-So is that a pureed version...?

Exactly. That's exactly it.

It's a pureed... And you can buy chestnut puree,

you don't have to make it yourself.

OK. I'm going to put a little bit of cream in the centre.

Oh, so you're doing this...

So you want to fill the centre. It's like a surprise inside it,

so nobody knows that that's there until you cut into it.

So another big spoon of that.

So you're doing a layer each of these as well?

Yeah. The whole thing is in layers

-but this is cream and the pureed chestnut?

-Yeah.

It's quite a unique cake.

I've never seen anything like this before.

But then it's a combination of two things, isn't it?

I mean, the mille feuilles is one thing

and Mont Blanc, that is a cake all to itself, isn't it?

You're so knowledgeable. Honestly, I think you're teaching me!

You know how it is. Years of experience!

But that's right, isn't it? Mont Blanc is a cake in and of itself?

With chestnuts. Oh, right.

And presumably it's got cream on the top like the snow on the mountain?

Yeah. OK, so...

Oh, my God!

So, plenty of cream on top.

-OK.

-Yeah!

So the whole idea is to pile it up on top

then gently nudge it around the sides.

That's why you want it

kind of top-heavy, so it can kind of drip down.

So you're putting pistachios on the top.

Yeah, I'm going to put pistachios on the top, and quite generous.

Give it a sprinkle.

Why? Well, it looks nice but...

it gives it a crunchy top to it?

It a lovely crunchy top

and a lovely flavour off your pistachios as well.

-So, now I'm going to...

-Whoa!

I know, actually, it's pretty heavy!

-Oh...

-This is the bit...

Don't drop, don't drop!

Well done.

I was never going to drop it.

OK, so now I'm going to bring this to here.

I think in Mildred's recipe

she does mention placing the marron glace around...

-On the side?

-Yeah.

I have a feeling this is partly her creation.

I don't know why I think that but, just reading the recipe,

I feel like there's an interpretation from her.

She made it her own?

Well, perhaps. I'm sure there would have been opportunities for them...

To experiment?

Yeah, there must have been.

Well, they must have spent long, long hours in the kitchens.

Also, I think Mildred did mention the idea that

she just piped a little bit of cream in between each one.

This is decoration, isn't it?

OK, shall I put that over here? There we go.

So there we have it - mille feuilles Mont Blanc.

-Tricky thing to cut, I would imagine.

-Yes.

But don't let that put you off.

It's not going to put me off because you're going to cut it!

OK. Here we go. Righto.

Let's put that there.

OK. Oh, yes.

Yes, yes, yes. It's going through.

Oh! OK.

I don't want to wreck it.

There we go.

-There!

-That's not bad.

-That's not bad!

Mm! Oh, there we go.

That wasn't exactly a big bite. What's it like?

I'm being careful. It's delicious.

-Is it?

-Mm!

-OK.

Mm! No, I like it and I'm going to finish it off.

It's going to take me a bit of time, and we have to go, I'm afraid.

That's it from the celebrations of delicious

and sometimes rather wicked royal haunts.

See you next time.