Alsio Vandrelli

Private Equestrian Estate

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Vol. I · The House Willowmere Lane The kitchen

The Table

what is eaten, and when the house sits down

For those staying, and those who have ridden that day

The kitchen at Alsio Vandrelli is not a restaurant on the lane. There is no menu in a window, and no hour at which the curious may sit down. You eat because you are staying, or because you have been in the saddle that morning and the house has asked you to remain. The table is an extension of the yard: composed, particular, and not performed for anyone passing.

Write if you wish to sit. Say whether you stay the night, whether you ride, and whether there is anything the kitchen should know. What is cooked is what the house has. Fees, if any, are in the letter — not printed here as a bill of fare.

A plate of the house, bread and wine at a dark table
What is set, when the house sits down — not a bill of fare in a window.

The Hours

When the house sits

three tables, and no sitting for the road

Loaves of the kitchen on dark wood

The morning

Breakfast after the yard

Taken when the first work is done, or before it if you have slept in the house. Bread of the kitchen, an egg if there is one, coffee that is not a performance. You are not rushed to a second sitting. Those who ride at first light eat later, and that is understood.

A table set with wine glasses and candlelight

The middle

The quiet table

A midday meal for those remaining between a morning and a later hour, or for two who have written to sit after the school. It is not lunch as a town understands it. It is what the kitchen has, set without ceremony, and finished when you are finished.

Glasses of the house, raised at the table

The evening

Supper

When the light has gone and the yard is put up. A joint if the season has one, a wine of the house, a table that is not dressed for a photograph. Those who stay eat here. Those who have only ridden that day eat here if the letter said they would. The kitchen does not keep a table for chance.

The cellar

What is poured

Wine of the house, and water, and nothing mixed to be seen drinking. We do not keep a cocktail hour. If you wish something particular, write it; the cellar will say whether it has it. There is no list of vintages printed for display.

Who sits

Not a dining room of the county

The table is not offered to those who have not been received. A wedding party, a lunch of the neighbourhood, a table booked from a guidebook — these are other houses. Here you sit because the morning brought you, or the night keeps you.

The keeping

What the kitchen sends

named as the house names it, not as a bill

The table How it is held
Breakfast of the house With a room, or after a morning in the saddle
The quiet table at midday If the letter has asked the kitchen to keep it
Supper For those staying, and those the letter has named
Wine of the house As the cellar has it — confirmed in the reply

The Plates

The cloth, and the cellar

what is set, and where the house looks after

A plate of the house at a dark table
Fig. I — What the kitchen sends.
Loaves of the kitchen on dark wood
Fig. II — Bread of the morning.
A table set with wine glasses and candlelight
Fig. III — The quiet table, when it is kept.
Glasses of the house, raised at the table
Fig. IV — Wine of the house, as the cellar has it.
A swan on the estate water, pavilion beyond
Fig. V — Toward the pavilion, after the cloth.
Chalk study of a rider in water
Fig. VI — A study from the kitchen wall.