Let’s try to forget the food and return to the operetta, the rivista frìvola, shall we? If you have been paying close attention, you will already have guessed that when entrées are served, diners are treated to the old synchronized-lifting-of-silver-plated-hemispherical-lids-from-dishes routine, second cousin to that most bizarre of sports, synchronized swimming. For those of you fortunate enough never to have witnessed this routine, I will describe it. A troupe of minstrels — sorry, we mean waiters — gathers. A platter bearing a hemispherical dome is placed before each diner. A waiter stations himself at each diner’s side, grasping a handle at the top of the hemispherical dome. At a signal, all covers are raised at once, with a flourish. The first time we saw this, we watched with sinking dread, sure that the encircling waiters were going to sing “Happy Birthday to You” in French, German, and Italian. They did not, thank God, though we heard them exclaim, ere they bowed out of sight, “Godo! Savourez! Erfreuen Sie!”
Oh, but wait. That pleasant fuzziness is coming over us again. Where were we? We had eaten, and in rosy memory it seems we were content. We found ourselves intrigued again by the graying man and flowering girl whose relationship continued to puzzle us. In the name of research, in duty bound to you, dear reader, we permitted ourselves to overhear their conversation, and we found that their alliance was something sweeter than what we had suspected, something charming and harmless, as close to innocent as such things can get these days, that he was not the drooling wolf we feared he might be but — how terribly old-fashioned, nearly obsolete — a gentleman. Watching them — surreptitiously, in a mirror — we were touched, we really were. When he bought her a souvenir menu, we understood, at last, the point of Café Zurich: it isn’t the evening that counts, but the memory of it. We’re sure it works for everyone, that it will work even for us, that in time only a fluffy, insubstantial sweetness will remain, masking even that terrifying moment when, with the swift precision of a Swiss cutpurse, our waiter whisked large sums of our money into Café Zurich’s numbered account.
— BWB
Glossary
de trop: too much
Erfreuen Sie!: Enjoy!
feinschmeckerlich: epicurean
fille de joie: working girl
Godo!: Enjoy!
nouveau riche: rich but still ignorant of major European languages
opéra bouffe: a farcical comic opera
outré: overdone, fulsome
rivista frìvola: extravaganza
Savourez!: Enjoy!
übermässigkeit: excessiveness
verschwenderisch: lavish, wasteful
Was das einege Zaubertrank?: Was that some kind of magic potion?
Café Zurich
22 Canton Street, 555-1648.
American Express, Visa, MasterCard, Diners Club, American money. No checks.
Handicapped: easy access.
Lunch 11–3, Monday–Friday.
Dinner 7–12 Tuesday–Saturday, 2–8 Sunday.
Reservations required.
[to be continued]
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🎧 526: Let’s try . . .