NEW ZEALAND DELICACIES IN LONDON.

Otago Witness, Issue 2253, 6 May 1897, Page 12

NEW ZEALAND DELICACIES IN LONDON.

VIEWS OF A FAMOUS CATERER.

(From Our Own Correspondent.) London, March 20.

Mr Lyons, whose name has attained such world-wide fame in connection with London restaurants and catering generally, has taken up a new idea iv which New Zealand is intimately concerned. Ho said the other day : '• I am going to give the British public an object lesson in Empire that will touch the imagination o? the average Englishman in its tenderest spot. Plenty of people kefcure about the colonies, and no one listens ; plenty of people write about the colonies, and few read or remember. That isn't the way to touch their imaginations. But what do you say to letting them taste the colonies ? That is what I atn going to do. I am going to give them tbe Empire to eat. lam going to reduce the map of the British possessions into * menu. lam going to give a series of dinners in which every dish will ba a characteristic and special delicacy from one or other of the British colonies." Mr Lyons went on to say: — " People here at Home li&vo no idea of the delicious food products that are grown on British soil all over the world. Give them these things, the like of which they have never tasted, to eat, and tell them where they come from, and you will provide them with an object leseon that will effsctively stir their interest in the colonies. Do you think anyone could fail to re&lisa the great resources of New Zealand, for instance, if he had once seen and tasted a 201b New Zealand trout — one of the finest fish the epicure ever tasted ? " Aftar touching briefly upon the products from other colonies, Mr Lyons went on to say : " I told you of the New Zealand trout, bub few people hive ever heard of or imagined such a glorious fish as the New Zealand frost flah." [New Zealand frosb fijh has a whole line to itself, in capitals.] "Then Paradise duck, and the Canterbury quail, the wild pig's ham, honey cured, and the paroquet pie are all New Zealand." Mr Lyons went on to enumerate the attractive colonial comeatib'es he intended to produce — lamb, mutton, poultry, &c, went without saying, — and after summing up all the delicious colon'al products he was going to offer his customers, he concluded as follows : — "When you taste them you will get a conception of the extent and variety of the resources of Greater Britain lucb. as you never had before, a dinner in which everything from the hors d'eeuvres to the dessert shall be a delicacy, and every delicacy shall be colonial grown. How is that for an object lesson in Empire ? The very flowers on the tables shall be colonial. If you know a Little Englander bring him along, and I will undertake to convert him at one sitting."

I look on this as an exceedingly valuable new departure in the interests of New Zealand produce, but what we really want is, as I have bo often pointed out, for somebody with capital to start a number of New Zealand restaurants about London, giving a mutton chop or a cut off a joint of mutton or lamb, with bread, New Zealand butter and cheese, and a glass of beer for one shilling. I have had a talk with a number of city men and others about this idea, and they all agree that such restaurants are badly needed, and would be immensely popular, and ought to return a very large profit.

Detectives detailed to look after professional shoplifters always look to see if their snspeots are wearing gloves. A "professional, lb IB declared, never works with his cloves on<,