Nobel menus from the past

• 

  William Faulkner (1897-1962), the American author of novels like “The Sound and the Fury” and “As I Lay Dying,” was the recipient of the 1949 Nobel Prize in Literature but for various reasons didn’t pick it up until a year later. On the menu for the Nobel gala dinner in 1950 was beef of filet with Béarnaise sauce and a Nobel ice cream parfait with petit fours. All of which, presumably, Faulkner enjoyed.

• Have you ever wondered what the Nobel Prize recipients eat at the Nobel dinner? Would you like to try the food yourself? Everyone who doesn’t have the advantage of being invited to the Nobel ceremonies can still sample the food at Stockholm restaurant Stadshuskällaren, which offers all the Nobel menus that have been served since 1901.
  The restaurant is located in Stockholm City Hall (where the annual Nobel banquet is served in the Blue Hall). The Stadshuskällaren also offers Swedish favorites, a traditional “julbord” (Christmas buffet) and a shellfish buffet in the autumn.
  Let’s take a look at what was offered to William Faulkner, who won the Nobel Prize in Literature in 1949, although he was given it a year later in 1950. (Other prize recipients that year were: Brit Cecil Frank Powell in physics, Germans Otto Paul Hermann Diels and Kurt Alder in chemistry, Americans Philip Showalter and Edward Calvin Kendall and Swiss Tadeus Reichstein in physiology or medicine, Brit Bertrand Russell in literature, and American Ralph Bunche in peace.) On the menu was mushroom soup, fillet of beef on the bottom of artichoke and served with Béarnaise sauce, and for dessert Nobel ice cream parfait with petit fours.
  To view (in Swedish) the dinner served at the Nobel ceremonies since 1901: http://www.stadshuskallarensthlm.se/rum-och-matsalar/nobelmiddagar/

• To hear Faulkner’s speech given at the Nobel Banquet at the City Hall in Stockholm on December 10, 1950: http://www.nobelprize.org/mediaplayer/index.php?id=1397.