Pomp and Circumstance Royal Recipes

CLASSICAL MUSIC PLAYS

Hello, I'm Michael Buerk.

Welcome to a brand-new series of Royal Recipes.

This time we're at Westonbirt House, formerly a grand country house,

now a boarding school,

which has played host to royal visitors for over 100 years.

In this series, we're delving even further back in time,

to reveal over 600 years of royal food heritage.

You play Anne Boleyn, and I will play Henry VIII! SHE LAUGHS

And we've been busy unlocking the secrets of Britain's great food

archives, discovering rare and unseen recipes that have been royal

favourites through the ages,

from the earliest royal cookbook in 1390...

It's so precious, so special, that I'm not allowed to touch it.

..to Tudor treats from the court of Henry VIII.

-I can't wait for this! One, two, three.

-LAUGHTER

We'll be exploring the great culinary traditions enjoyed by the

Royal family, from the grand to the ground-breaking,

as well as the surprisingly simple...

I did think that was going to be a disaster! LAUGHTER

Whoo! LAUGHTER

..as we hear from a host of royal chefs...

Prince Philip would walk past or pop his head in and say,

"What's for dinner, what are we having? Oh, yeah."

It's not just a normal kitchen.

..and meet the people who provide for the Royal table.

It's OK for the Queen, it's OK for everyone.

Welcome to Royal Recipes.

There's nothing quite like a royal event for sheer scale and grandeur.

Whether it's a royal wedding, a Jubilee, or even just a party,

the Royals know how to do it in style,

and the food enjoyed at these great occasions is designed to impress.

So, we're rolling out the red carpet and sparing no expense.

Today on Royal Recipes...

-You might have to duck.

-Oh!

-Oh!

..chef Anna Haugh creates a culinary masterpiece.

That looks amazing.

Oh, look at that!

Dr Annie Gray is shown a precious antique with a peculiar

royal claim to fame.

This is the oldest silver chamber pot in the country.

It's incredible!

And chef Rob Kennedy remembers catering for a right royal occasion.

To me, perfect recipe, fit for a king.

With me in the Royal Recipes kitchen is executive chef Anna Haugh, and

we're starting off in style today.

Unless I'm very much mistaken, this is a bottle of champagne.

-Very thoughtful of you, Anna.

-Michael, that's not for you...

-Why not?

-..that's for the fish.

Ahh, so what are you cooking?

I'm going to cook salmon in champagne today.

That sounds really good.

Now this is a real royal recipe from the 17th century,

from the legendary chef Patrick Lamb,

who was master chef to four monarchs in the 17th and 18th centuries,

and this is one of his dishes.

So, how does it work?

Well, actually, you can open it,

-as long as you promise not to drink all of it!

-HE LAUGHS

-OK.

-So I'm going to start our poaching liquid.

I've some shellfish stock here.

OK. Woo!

You might have to duck. SHE LAUGHS

-Ready?

-Yes.

-CORK POPS

-Oh!

-Oh, my God!

Quick, quick, quick, quick! LAUGHTER

It takes years of practice to be able to do this, you know.

OK, well, I'm going to use about half a bottle of champagne,

-which is quite a lot.

-It certainly is.

I'm just going to add some bay leaf,

some peppercorn and some sliced shallot.

This is the recipe that Patrick Lamb did for Charles II,

"the Merry Monarch", in the middle of the 17th century.

-He would be merry if he was...

-If he had lots of champagne! LAUGHTER

He was quite a character, Patrick Lamb, actually.

-He was Master Chef for nearly 50 years.

-Wow!

He published this, he published this book in 1710,

and this recipe is actually in it,

in the book, Royal Cookery, or The Complete Court-Cook,

"containing the choicest receipts in all the particular branches of

"cookery now in use in the Queen's palaces."

-So there it is.

-So I'm just seasoning our salmon now,

and I'm going to place it into the tray.

-That is a lovely, lovely piece of salmon.

-It is, a beautiful piece of salmon.

So our liquid's coming up to boil now,

so I'm just going to pour some of the liquid on top of the fish,

so that it cooks nice and evenly.

It's a real luxury dish, this, isn't it?

-It is.

-I mean, that wonderful salmon, the champagne and so on.

I suppose you've got to see it in the context of the time,

haven't you? I mean, there's Charles II, we've had the Civil War,

his father's head was chopped off,

and Puritanism, and that idea of excess and luxury and

self-indulgence was banned. It was a very stern and a strict time.

And then you had the Restoration of the monarchy, Charles II comes back,

and all of a sudden luxury and pleasure and everything are

fashionable again, and that's the sort of historical context within

which this dish was created. If you're actually saying, salmon in

champagne, you're hitting two buttons at the same time.

Well, it's funny that you should say that, Michael. I'm also going to add caviar to it,

-just to add a little bit more luxury to it.

-HE LAUGHS

I'm just going to chop a little bit of dill,

which I think has got a fabulous flavour to go with salmon.

Round about the time that this wonderful dish was being created by

Patrick Lamb for King Charles II, you know, an awful lot was going on at that time.

The Court was back, luxury was back,

but there was still, you know, big tragedies and hardships going on.

The Great Fire of London was the same decade,

the Plague and all that kind of stuff, so, you know,

some people had it good and some people had it really bad.

-Now, what are you going to do?

-I'm going to lift...

-You're going to get it out?

-Yes.

-Now, this is a bit of...

-Get this beautiful salmon out of here.

This is a bit of a dangerous time, isn't it?

-Yes, it is a bit of a dangerous time.

-SHE LAUGHS

-You're trying to get it out in one piece.

-In one piece.

So, let's...

Oh, well done Anna! Well done, well done, well done! SHE GASPS

-Look at that!

-Yes!

-Ah, you'd swear I did this for a living!

-LAUGHTER

-OK, perfect, wonderful.

-Wow!

-Oh, I'm delighted with that now.

Doesn't that look utterly splendid?

So, now I'm going...

-Now what are you going to do?

-..to make the sauce,

from the liquid that we poached it in.

-All that champagne?

-All that champagne will not go to waste.

I'll just grab a tea towel.

With flavours of shellfish, with all those lovely things you stuck in.

If you wouldn't mind, Michael,

just to remove the shallots off the fish there for me, please.

Oh, OK, yeah.

Do I need to save them for eating or just get rid of them totally?

-I think just put them on the side, yeah.

-OK.

Patrick Lamb was even more of a celebrity chef than you, Anna, I think. If that is possible!

I mean, three coronation feasts he was responsible for,

and the one for William and Mary in 1689,

the feast cost the equivalent these days of £1 million...

-It's incredible.

-..which is amazing.

-It's incredible.

-But get this, he himself was paid, for that one meal,

by the Royals, £100.

-It doesn't sound much now.

-It doesn't sound much.

-£20,000.

-For one meal?

-For one meal.

Do you know, that's even more than you get?

-That's a lot more than I get!

-LAUGHTER

-Come on, what's happening over here?

-OK.

-Lots of sizzle.

-Just bringing up the cooking liquid to the boil.

I'm going to add the cream to it.

-Right.

-So this needs a pinch of salt, just a little pinch of salt in there.

-I'm going to give it another...

-A little whisk round.

-Yeah.

So I'm just going to whisk in some butter.

-Oh, it's not rich enough, eh?!

-Not rich enough!

-LAUGHTER

If you whisk in the butter too soon, it will split.

You do all these things gradually, don't you?

-Gradually, slowly, slowly.

-You don't sort of slosh, slosh around.

OK, it looks like our butter's all whisked in there now.

So now we're going to add in our caviar.

At the last minute. There might be some left?

There might be some left to have with a glass of champagne afterwards.

Absolutely. Ooh, yes, talking of which, have we got any glasses?

-Yeah.

-Yeah.

-There we go.

-OK, So I'm going to dress this now with some beautiful...

-Put the glasses there.

-..watercress, a little bit of pea shoots.

So I'm just going to put a little bit of olive oil on these.

So how are you going to put the sauce on?

I'm going to pour it into a jug first.

So I'm going to just pour it over the top of the fish.

Right over the top. Oh, look at that.

And then I'm going to finish it now...

-Yep.

-..with some lemon zest.

-Zest of lemon.

-And what goes so well with this is just some lovely crusty

bread, and if you like a little bit of mayonnaise before you break your

-salmon, go ahead.

-Mayonnaise as well! HE CHUCKLES

And, of course, what we desperately need with this is champagne.

-Would you like to pour it?

-I would like to, well I'd like to drink it,

I don't know about pour it. Here we go.

Observe the fine technique.

I think you've done this before, Michael.

-Yeah, yeah. Cheers.

-Cheers.

-Right.

-Come on, let's have a go.

-Right, onto the bread.

-Are you going to put it on the bread?

-Yeah.

-OK. There we go.

-Mmm!

-Mmm!

-Oh, it's lovely, isn't it?

-Mmm.

You cooked the salmon beautifully.

The sauce is great.

Salmon in champagne, fit for the Merry Monarch himself!

A luxurious royal recipe, and just the thing for a regal banquet.

And no royal occasion is complete without liberal quantities of booze.

One of Britain's oldest purveyors of wines and spirits has been supplying

the Royal family since the beginning of the last century.

Wine expert Joe Fattorini went to the centre of Mayfair

to uncork the story.

Berry Bros & Rudd has an illustrious history, stretching back over 315

years, based here at 3 St James's Street,

opposite St James's Palace in the fashionable heart of London.

You could say, from the outset, it's always had a royal connection.

Being neighbours with the reigning monarch was a good start for the

business. Simon Berry is the eighth generation of his family to work at

this supplier of fine wines.

But it hasn't always sold wine.

The business itself started in 1698,

founded by a lady called the Widow Bourne.

We don't know anything else about her,

we don't even know her Christian name, and she decided to open

a shop, basically, selling groceries,

specialising quite soon in tea and coffee.

The most expensive drinks of their day.

Her most expensive tea cost £10 for a pound of tea, and this was at a

time when the average wage was £15 a year.

So that makes some of these bottles look marvellously cheap in comparison.

It was the Widow Bourne's daughter who first sold goods to royalty.

Crikey! '43 Charon blanc!

George III bought their coffee during the 1700s.

Later that century, they began to specialise in wine.

That's really good stuff, and very expensive.

By the 1900s, they were supplying a different king with booze.

In 1903, King Edward VII bought

himself a horseless carriage,

which was a Daimler, and it was an open car,

like all cars were in those days.

1903 was a very cold winter, and his doctor was very concerned that

His Majesty might contract a bit of pneumonia.

So he came to us and said,

"Could you produce a warming cordial that His Majesty can drink as he is

driving the car? And incidentally, you better make it nice and strong."

And for 30 years we only sold it to the Royal family.

You couldn't buy it from us unless you were royal.

It's got a lovely sort of gingery afterglow.

-Oh, yes.

-But it is good and strong, isn't it?

But nowadays you can't really say,

"Why don't you have a bottle in your glove compartment when you're driving along the M4?"

I'm not sure that would go down very well.

Yes, how times have moved on.

Does this still gets sold to the Royal household today?

I'm not sure I'm allowed to tell you that, but, yes, it does.

The company has held a plethora of royal warrants.

Simon sells wine to both the Queen and Prince Charles.

Ask away...

But he has another rather special role -

he's the official Clerk of the Royal Cellars.

I run a committee who, every so often, meet to taste the wines

that will be served at Buckingham Palace or Sandringham or Balmoral,

which is a nice thing to do.

And how do you come across a role like this?

It's not something that you see advertised in the back of the Metro!

LAUGHTER

The reason why I was appointed is because I'm unbelievably discreet.

LAUGHTER

Today, Simon helps select the wine for the Royal household,

but back in the 1920s,

his shop stocked the cellar of a far smaller regal home.

Now, then, Simon, what is this?

Well, this is probably the most royal collection of bottles

that we have.

These are the bottles that were created for Queen Mary's dolls' house,

which is this amazing dolls' house.

It was something that was designed by Sir Edwin Lutyens,

the most famous architect of his day.

There's running water, there's electric light,

and there is a cellar of wine.

And we were commissioned to produce these bottles,

and whatever it says on the label,

the bottles contain.

There are some of your own labels.

Ah, there's, there's a cognac here, there is some sherry.

You know, my favourite thing is this, is the record book,

and it has "received" and then "consumed".

And there are items that have been consumed.

Oh, yes, well, you know, thirsty dolls.

Absolutely, I love it. I love it.

So, should you or I ever be invited to a royal celebration,

you'll know that you're in very safe hands.

Talking of wine, in 1972,

the story goes that the Queen hosted a dinner for the French president at

the time, George Pompidou, and she wanted English wine.

So they ordered some English wine to be sent to France,

to the Paris embassy where it was all taking place.

But it was impounded. The English wine was impounded by French customs.

And when the French customs officer was asked why, afterwards, he said,

"It says here, English wine. There is no such thing."

LAUGHTER

-Do you like English wine?

-Yes.

Especially sparkling English wine, I think is really fantastic.

There's a lot of politics, isn't there,

where the Royal family put on a banquet or something,

there's politics and etiquette.

-Were you taught etiquette at chefs' school?

-Yes.

You know, how to set the table and all that?

We did, like, a couple of weeks of training,

but really that's more for the front of house.

Our main focus was really on cooking and...and shouting.

LAUGHTER

No, I think it's quite... I've got,

I've got a list here from the bible of etiquette, which is Debrett's.

You know, utensils placed in the order of use, from the outside in.

-Yes.

-Obviously, forks on the left, knives on the right, tumbler for the water.

-Yep.

A different glass for white and red wine.

Bigger for the red. Why is that?

I think to allow the wine to breathe, so you can get the bouquet.

But at the big royal occasions, all those courses,

different wine for each course, it's amazing people were still

in a condition to walk out at the end of it.

I'm sure a few of them weren't in any good condition to be walking out.

It's not known whether one royal occasion in particular left guests

the worse for wine.

But the dinner has gone down in history as

an especially pomp-filled event.

Back in 1850, Prince Albert attended an extraordinary banquet that was

held in his honour in the city of York.

Annie Gray tells us more.

Putting on a dinner for a prince means you've really got to impress.

Everything, from the decor to the people to the food itself,

has got to scream, "effort".

The grand feast was hosted at the Guildhall in Mansion House,

home to the Burghers of York since the 1700s.

Richard Pollitt is the curator there.

Richard, paint a picture for me of what it would have looked like when

Prince Albert walked into this room.

Well, if you can imagine, this entire hall bedecked by tables

with beautiful white damask cloth.

He will have passed city maces hanging from the columns,

and a massive ornamental vase where the stained glass window is today.

So it sounds like a really big occasion. How many people came?

Well, there's 280 invited guests.

-Wow!

-But on top of that,

there would be at least 100 liveried servants,

there would be musicians, and also a select number of ladies were invited

-to watch the gentlemen eat the feast.

-To watch the gentlemen eat?

-I'm afraid so.

-Lucky ladies(!)

Now, behind us, I keep catching glimpses of light glimmering off

silver, and I'm assuming this is the kind of thing they were eating off.

Yes, it... Some of the silver we have behind us are very much day-to-day, sort of, eating wares,

but we do have one very important piece of silver.

Come on, then.

Tell me what we've got here.

Explain what these vessels would have been used for.

Well, essentially, these are serving dishes.

Now, every piece, though, has got the city coat of arms on, right in

the middle. This is part of the city promoting itself.

This is marketing the city.

You're not going to mistake where you are, are you?

The idea of something just gradually taking food from it to uncover that

York crest is quite fun, really.

But there's one particular piece of silverware used by Prince Albert

which he wouldn't have been eating off.

This is the oldest silver chamber pot in the country.

It's incredible.

It's really quite beautiful, isn't it? Very simple design.

And York crests absolutely everywhere.

And what does it say on it? 1672.

-Oh, my goodness.

-It was made in York,

by a chap called Marmaduke Best.

And certainly this would be reserved for the top table guests.

So, when Albert was caught short halfway through dinner,

it's this that he would have been using to relieve himself.

He probably nipped to the little anteroom

and would have used this pot.

-Well, perfectly logical.

-SHE LAUGHS

And if that's not enough to put you off your dinner, onto the menu.

The feast was prepared in the kitchens of Mansion House by a

French celebrity chef, Alexis Soyer,

arguably the most celebrated cook of the time.

Alexis Soyer is a bit of a hero to me.

So, hearing that he cooked here for this banquet for Prince Albert is

really quite exciting. What was on the menu?

The first course had 32 different types of soup. The second course,

40 roasts.

And most of the food has an exotic French-sounding name,

so it's, "a la Lady Mayoress", "a la Albert".

I mean, this space just doesn't seem big enough to supply a banquet for

280-odd people.

I have no idea how they did it.

I note that you sidled round my favourite dish from this particular banquet.

Well, to be honest, there's one particularly disgusting thing

they did create.

The 100 guinea dish. Which is ...

it essentially cost 100 guineas, but its main ingredient,

a most startling ingredient,

was turtle's heads with, sort of,

kebab skewers shooting out their mouths,

with other sort of animal parts attached to it.

And this was presented as the best

creation that Alexis Soyer would put together for this banquet.

I think the 100 guinea dish must've been spectacular.

You've got the oysters from turkeys, you've got bits of wood,

got the prawns leaping out of it.

-It's really quite disgusting.

-LAUGHTER

Shocking by modern standards,

that dish cost the equivalent of over £10,000 today.

With ten times that spent on the event,

York's Lord Mayor was clearly out to impress.

The banquet held here in 1850 must've been really magical.

To see this room decked out with buntings and flags and with the

tables just absolutely piled high with magnificent dishes, cooked by

one of my culinary heroes, Alexis Soyer,

I would have loved to have been here with Prince Albert.

That lavish affair would certainly have been something to behold.

Now, come on, what could you do that can possibly measure up?

Well, I don't know if it's worth £10,000,

but I'm going to make a pulpatoon today,

which is a multi-bird roast dish.

So that's one bird inside another bird inside another bird.

-Exactly.

-So what's inside what?

So we'll start off with the biggest bird, it'll be the turkey,

then it will be a duck, and then it will be, last, chicken.

But first of all, I'm going to show you how to batten out some of the

meat, cos you need to flatten out the meat, so that you can roll it into a ballotine.

When you say batten out, you mean beat the devil out of it.

-Yes.

-Yep.

-You want to cover with the clingfilm, because you want to protect the

meat, even though you're going to beat it up.

You don't want the rolling pin sticking to the meat and ripping it.

-Certainly not.

-So what's best is kind of consistent gentle taps,

as opposed to, like, really aggressive beating.

Do you think this is a bit of a self-indulgence?

I mean, not you, I mean, you know,

somebody who wants one bird stuffed inside another bird,

inside another bird, a bit of a novelty rather than a bit of haute cuisine.

Well, I think it's interesting.

I think the flavours are interesting together.

But also it creates quite a large ballotine,

so it's a good way to kind of prepare food for a group of people.

And it's the history, isn't it?

You know, it's been that sort of wonderful banqueting dish, way back

into history of the Tudor court, they'd have dozens of songbirds,

rather like that 100 guinea meal, you know, the biggest one

would be, what, a swan or a peacock or something like that,

right down to the little quail right in the middle.

-Incredible.

-Yeah.

OK, so, that's your duck and your chicken.

You've almost doubled the kind of area of the flesh.

Yeah. So I've also actually flattened out some bacon here as well.

Now what kind of bacon are you using here?

Smoky and streaky.

Beautiful, delicious smoky flavour, and the fat to add a little bit

more, kind of, that and moisture to the three-bird roast, because this

is turkey breast, duck breast and chicken breast, so they're all...

-Not much fat.

-Yeah, they're all quite lean.

So the bacon kind of helps reinforce that,

as will the forcemeat that we'll be adding in, in between the layers as

-well.

-So, what is it?

-Forcemeat?

-It's a stuffing made of turkey, chicken and duck legs.

A few down the centre.

OK, so we're ready to place our turkey,

so I'm going to season the meat.

And this is very important.

A little bit of beautiful, freshly cracked pepper.

Now, you're going to put the forcemeat...

-Yes.

-..in between each layer?

-That's right.

-And you've also put some herbs in there, by the look of

-it.

-Yeah.

-What sort of thing have you got?

-Chopped parsley, a little bit of thyme as well.

-OK.

-OK.

-Then we layer on our duck breast.

-And the duck next?

-I'm just going to season the duck meat as well.

-Once more, yeah.

-Once more, don't be shy.

There is a long tradition of these kind of bolted-together dishes,

you know, going all the way back to... There was a dish called...

Oh, what was it? It was called the cockentrice.

That's a catchy name.

Yeah, yeah, yeah. The idea was that they got the head of

-a suckling pig...

-Mm-hmm.

-..and the kind of rear of a turkey,

and they sewed them together.

Stuffed them and sewed them together.

-What do you think all that was about?

-Drama.

-That's just drama.

-Well, yeah, drama. But I've got a theory.

Because that was about the time, you know, just after Columbus and all that sort of thing,

and people were venturing off into these wild places,

the Americas and the South Seas and round Africa and so on,

and the sailors were coming back with stories of monsters,

and, you know, "Here be dragons," and all that kind of stuff

and I think, you know, people in the kitchen thought,

"Oh, I can knock up a monster. I can knock up something strange and exotic."

-And they did.

-And they did.

-A pirkey.

-LAUGHTER

Yeah, a pirkey. A new dish is born, well done.

Next, I'm going to put the chicken breasts in.

You can see, with each layer, it's slightly smaller and slightly smaller,

-because you want to be able to roll the ballotine.

-Yep. My word, look at that.

-A little mountain of meat.

-OK.

-A striated mountain.

Now it's time to roll.

I'm going to bring it over, over, over, over.

Pull it in tight,

and I'm going to tuck this turkey just under a little bit...

and squeeze it over again.

-Oh, you've made a giant sausage.

-Yes.

-It's not going to get away now.

Seal it nice and tight.

And what you need to do is chill that for maybe...

overnight, if you can.

And what that will do is, that will set all the meat up together,

and when you go to transfer it into the tinfoil,

it'll just leave it as a piece.

-Yeah.

-You'll butter the tinfoil and place that on,

so I've actually roasted one of these already, and you'll find it

just over there, if you want to grab it.

-I'll get it. Yep, yep, here we go.

-I'll get rid of these.

So I cooked this for about two hours at 160 degrees.

160, that's quite low.

Then I turned the oven up,

for another hour, to about 180.

It's really heavy, really quite a

-lot of meat there.

-There's a lot of meat here.

Oh, it's going to be brilliant, I just know it.

-Oh, yes.

-HE CHUCKLES

-That looks amazing.

-Oh, look at that!

OK. So you're just going to have to wait a little bit longer before I

get carving, cos I'm going to get the veg on.

Quite simple, since there's a lot going on with the meat,

I thought I'd do some mashed potato and some blanched broccoli.

Got some nice chicken sauce here,

so that's reduced down chicken stock, with a little bit of thyme.

So I'm just going to whisk in some butter.

I mean, it looks really impressive, doesn't it?

I mean, it's not quite

the 100 guinea dish, if I may say so, with its turtles' heads,

its capons, its turkeys, its poulardes, its fowls,

its grouse, its pheasants,

its partridges, its plovers, its woodcock, its quails, its snipe,

its green pigeons, its larks, and all the rest.

Oh, my goodness!

-You've got three.

-I'm so grateful that I just had three.

-THEY CHUCKLE

-Mm-hmm.

-OK, so I'll turn them down low...

-OK.

-..and I think it's time to carve.

-I think it probably is.

Oh, that does look good, doesn't it?

-Already.

-Oh, wow, look at that!

-That chicken look...

-Yes!

-So you can see your...

obviously your bacon, your turkey, forcemeat, duck, more forcemeat,

-and your chicken.

-You've got the lot.

-Our veg should be ready now.

-OK.

-Do you want this plate?

-Yes, perfect.

-OK.

-OK.

-So we have our mash.

-Creamy, very buttery mash.

-Lovely, hot, beautiful broccoli.

-Beautiful green broccoli.

-That's great.

-And last but not least...

Oh, look at that!

-OK, tuck in. Tuck in.

-Absolutely. After you, Madam Chef.

SHE CHUCKLES

I want a little bit of everything.

Yeah, and that's the trick, that's the challenge,

to get a bit of everything in your mouth at the same time.

-Fortunately, I've got a big enough mouth to be able to do this.

-Mmm!

Oh, look at all that!

You know, bird in the hand's worth three in the bush,

or three in the mouth, I suppose. There you go. SHE LAUGHS

Mmm. Oh, I like that!

Do you know, I didn't have very high expectations of this.

I thought it was just a gimmick, really,

but it's a dish suitable for any, you know, special occasion,

isn't it, really? A kind of, how can I put it,

a 50-guinea dish. LAUGHTER

A cut-price 100-guinea dish, but nonetheless impressive at that.

A chef who's no stranger to a bit of Royal pomp and circumstance

is Rob Kennedy. He's based at the Royal Military Academy at Sandhurst,

and has cooked for the Queen and other members of the Royal family several times.

One occasion was a lavish dinner hosted by Prince Charles,

for no fewer than seven Middle Eastern monarchs.

This extravagant supper was a celebration of Sandhurst's 200-year

anniversary and its tradition of welcoming overseas cadets,

including many Arabian royals over the years.

With seven foreign kings and a future King of England

in attendance, it required a show-stopping menu.

For the Middle Eastern dinner at Old College,

I cooked for the main course a lovely beef dish,

and that's what we're going to be showing you now.

Top royal dining.

When Prince Charles hosts such grand meals,

only the finest British ingredients are used.

Rob starts with a mini braised beef pudding.

He begins by caramelising seasonal root vegetables in a hot pan with

garlic, thyme, and star anise.

So, we're going to keep the same pan now,

and we've got this beautiful piece of cheek.

And all of this fat here is going to become gelatinous

and sticky and yummy.

So we pop that into our pan

and just let that colour and caramelise.

Once the beef is lightly browned,

Rob pops the veg back into the frying pan with a teaspoon of

tomato puree and a pint of beef stock.

You can see there, it's a lovely, nice jelly of beef stock.

He brings it to the boil before transferring the whole lot into a

-covered saucepan.

-And then in it goes.

And braising it for six and a half hours at 150 Celsius.

When the slow-cooking is complete, the beef will be tender and melting.

Absolutely yummy.

It's then removed from the liquid with some of the veg and left to cool.

And if a couple of bits of onion or thyme are in there,

it doesn't matter.

Just make sure it's not the star anise.

That would kind of be a little bit crunchy.

The remaining gravy is strained and reserved for service.

Rob then takes flour, suet, water,

and a little salt, and whips up a rich pastry.

When I had this Middle Eastern dinner, the closest I've probably

got to that many kings was four in a pack of cards, so, you know, a real,

real achievement, and something I believe will never, ever, ever

have been done, definitely in my culinary career, or probably done,

you know, in the history of Sandhurst again.

So, what an honour, what an absolute honour!

Rob rolls out small discs of pastry and adds the braised beef cheek.

He then moulds them into dumplings.

I'm going to wrap that in clingfilm, so that goes in there.

It comes up, and we put its raincoat on.

Give it a nice twist.

This way, you get to make them perfectly round,

and then you get your little clingfilm tie,

and then you just go round.

And then at the end of it, you get the two together,

and simply tie a knot.

Take the scissors and cut off.

And that there is your beautiful

braised beef pudding,

ready to steam for 50 minutes.

Once the steamer's nice and hot, and the water's boiling,

pop it in there and that will then cook.

Rob has already marinated a fillet of steak in star anise,

thyme and garlic for 12 hours.

He lightly seals the steak in a hot pan with herbs and butter...

Smells delicious.

..before roasting it at 180 degrees for eight minutes.

During the meal, I guess, no-one really puts their hands up and says,

"Thanks very much, it's great."

However, on most of the events...

Well, in fact, maybe a bit modest, in all of the events we've done,

we've always had clean plates, so we're doing something right.

It'd be nice to have a letter, though, you know, or an MBE.

HE LAUGHS

Rob plates up the steak with a garnish of baby root vegetables,

creamed potato and sauteed cabbage.

All that's left is the mini beef pudding.

And that little suet dumpling pudding can just sit in there,

very proud, very precise.

The dish is completed by adding the braised gravy, baby watercress,

and a dusting of dehydrated horseradish.

This dish was designed to be special but be British,

and celebrate Sandhurst and 200 years,

but more importantly, show off to our visiting guests, being the kings, of what we can produce.

MUSIC: ZADOK THE PRIEST by HANDEL

To me, perfect recipe,

fit for a king.

I would've thought catering for so many heads of state would be pretty daunting, wouldn't you, Anna?

-Yeah.

-I mean, imagine them all in your restaurant.

Imagine them being able to afford it. LAUGHTER

-What are you doing now?

-I'm going to make Black Forest gateau.

Ah! Now this is in honour of Queen Victoria, isn't it...

-Yes.

-..because she loved chocolate and she loved cherries,

and her mother was German,

and of course her father was from the British Royal family that were

originally German, so she loved everything German, cherries,

chocolate - Black Forest gateau. Come on, what do you do first?

OK, so the first thing I'm going to make is the last thing we'll be

putting on the cake, which is the cherry topping.

So we have some fresh cherries that have been stoned.

-They look fabulous.

-I'm just going to mix a little bit of water in with cornflour.

It's the cherry brandy, isn't it?

-That's the key thing.

-Yes.

-The kirsch.

-Where is it? Where is the cherry brandy?

-Well, it's in here, it's got some cherries soaking in it.

-Aaah.

It's called, actually, I think German, the Schwarzwalder Kirschwasser,

which means Black Forest cherry brandy, I suppose.

-You sound like a native.

-Well, I am.

My family originally came from the Black Forest long ago.

Oh, yeah. OK,

so I've just added a spoonful of cherry compote in here as well.

-Right.

-And I'm just going to add them to the cherries and just give it a stir.

So, the cherries, that was Queen Victoria's all-time favourite, I think.

-She had cherries...

-Oh, really?

-Yeah. She didn't have Black Forest gateau,

but she had cherries with rice pudding at her Golden Jubilee dinner

in Windsor, in 1887.

-OK, now what?

-Right, so we're going to make a sabayon,

which is essentially egg yolk and sugar whisked into a beautiful,

-creamy-like foam.

-This is rich, isn't it?

-This is rich.

-Imagine doing that by hand.

-What a lot of beating that would have been.

-Yeah, yeah.

And this is for one cake, and you know, the trick is,

-you know, they would never have been making one cake.

-No.

OK, so this is good.

Next, our sugar goes in the bowl.

-We're going to whisk up our egg whites.

-Right.

And I'm going to give my cherries a little check.

Oh, beautiful.

So I'm going to take these out, pop them into a bowl,

so that they'll be ready for us at the end.

-Lovely.

-I think, if you weren't looking, Anna,

I might be round there, trying those. SHE LAUGHS

So I'm going to fold in my cocoa and my salt while we're waiting for

this to whisk.

And then you just want to really delicately fold.

That looks gloopy and wonderful, doesn't it?

-Yeah, it's going to be really lovely when we get the egg whites in there, as well.

-Yeah.

OK, this looks like it's done now.

Yeah. Is this the sort of thing you want, the peaks and all that?

That's it, yeah.

So I'm being really careful with folding in my egg whites.

Oh, my word, look at that!

OK, so I think we're ready for this to go in the tin.

OK.

Lovely.

Oh, my God, this is so good!

Yeah, look at that.

This is going to be cooked in the oven at 180 degrees,

-for at least a half an hour.

-OK.

-Thank you very much.

-Thank you, Michael.

-180, half an hour.

-180.

-Next, we're going to whip our cream.

-Mm-hmm.

And icing sugar and vanilla.

The vanilla gives it a wonderful flavour, doesn't it?

Oh, absolutely. So you just cut your vanilla pod in half.

-Right.

-I just want to scrape out the seeds.

-Mm-hmm.

Hopefully this won't go everywhere.

-There's so much richness in this gateau.

-Mmm.

I'm just going to strain the kirsch of the cherries.

-Right.

-OK?

-Yeah.

Fold that in.

It's important that your sponge is really cool when you go to make it,

because if you put cream on a warm sponge, it's just going to melt.

-So I have a sponge that I made earlier here.

-Mm-hmm.

-Nice and cool?

-Nice and cool.

I'm just going to start off with my base layer.

Start off with a little bit of the jam that we put inside our cherries.

-Spread it out.

-Spread that around.

-That's all right.

Now our beautiful, gorgeous cream.

What would my doctor say about this? LAUGHTER

Now, how thick do you make these layers?

-To be honest, I really believe...

-I suppose it's a personal taste,

-isn't it?

-It should be as big as possible, because, you know...

Well, it's not an understated pudding, is it?

-No, and...

-This is all about display and, kind of, oh,

conspicuous consumption.

And the last one?

Our last layer, which I'm going to soak with kirsch.

OK, and now for the finishing touches,

-and our cake stand.

-Oh, yes, got to have a cake stand.

-Yes. OK,

and then I just have a little bit more whipped cream to go around the

-outside.

-Oh, yeah, yeah, yeah,

we're really of short cream for this dish. LAUGHTER

It's a kind of heart attack on a cake stand, isn't it?

-Heart attack of excitement.

-LAUGHTER

OK, and I think I might need your help with this one, Michael.

-OK.

-So...

-To lift it?

-Yes.

-Oh-oh-oh!

-You have to lift this one.

-Oh, OK.

-Yep.

O-o-o-oh. O-o-o-oh.

-I love it, I love it, I love it, I love it.

-LAUGHTER

There we go. And now

we're just going to put these around the side like this.

Making it a kind of stockade?

Yeah.

-I'm doing it incredibly carefully, you know?

-You're doing a great job, actually.

I am, I am, I think I'm a natural.

-It'll be a shame to eat this, won't it?

-Absolutely not.

-LAUGHTER

-Be a shame not to eat it.

OK, and now we're going to top it with our cherries.

-And the smell.

-Mmm.

-Mmm.

Last one.

OK. Whoa!

Look! At! That!

The Schwarzwalder Kirschwasser cake!

Black Forest gateau to me.

-Let's dig in.

-So...

Look at that! SHE SQUEALS IN DELIGHT

Go on, go on, after you.

OK.

-Let me in.

-Mmm! That's so good.

That's exactly what you want a Black Forest to taste like.

Mmm! It's really light, though, isn't it?

But it's rich.

-And the cherries give it that wonderful juicy...

-Mmm!

..juiciness as well. Oh, Victoria,

you've got it right.

Mmm. That was wonderful.

Join us next time for more Royal Recipes.