Temple du Bonheur

[ChefAnnette]

I am researching the origins and the recipes for a French menu from 1906. After the salad course, there is a course titled "Temple du Bonheur". Does anyone know what that might be, or what it may reference?

[djyee100]

I have no idea what this is. But I went snooping around the web, as I like to do.

From a Googlebooks search, a phrase from La vie secrète de la cour de Chine By Albert Maybon: "restaurants où les mets rares sont servis en musique, comme au « Temple du Bonheur céleste »..." The Googlebook snippet leaves you hanging right there.

For what it's worth, the Google translation: "restaurants where meals few have used music like the "Temple of Heavenly Happiness."

http://books.google.com/books?lr=&cd=2&as_brr=0&q=%22Temple+du+Bonheur%22+food&btnG=Search+Books

A reference also to an Alain Resnais movie, in which the Temple du Bonheur was a fanciful palace on a theatre stage.

http://www.hellomovies.com/movie/la-vie-est-un-roman

Depending on the context of your menu , a dessert shaped like a sugar and pastry palace?

Edited March 31, 2010 by djyee100 (log)

[chezjim]

While I'd be dubious about finding an exact recipe (it may well have been some confection made for that event by that specific cook), actual sculptures of temples were made as desserts:

Temple a la Sultane (1905)

A description of a "weedding cake" in the same work describes colonnaded constructions (as I imagine top some wedding cakes today) (not a big wedding guy):

Ce gâteau à base de pâte à Plum Cake se sert

aussi à l'occasion des repas de baptême; il change

alors de nom et on l'appelle Christening Cake.

Mais quel que soit le cas pour lequel il se prépare,

et qu'il prenne le nom de Christening ou de Weed-

ding Cake, le gâteau reste le même ; le décor seul

varie sur ce gâteau. On dresse un temple ou pavillon

à colonnades, qui sera garni de petits anges ou bons-

hommes dans le Christening Cake, tandis que le

Weedding Cake sera largement embelli de boutons

de fleurs d'oranger, d'amours et de colombes se

becquetant. L'armoirie de famille, lorsqu'il s'agit

de baptêmes ou de mariages de distinction, est une

attention toujours bien accueillie par les intéressés.

This cake on a Plum Cake base is also used for baptismal meals; it then changes names and is called a Christening Cake. But for whatever event it is prepared, and whether it is called Christening or Weedding [sic] Cake, the cake remains the same: only the decoration varies on this cake. A columned temple or pavillion is erected, garnished with little angels or fellows on the Christening Cake, while the Wedding Cake will be largely embellished with orange-blossom buds, Cupids and kissing doves. The family arms, when this involves baptisms or distinguished marriages, is a touch always welcomed by those concerned. [To put it mildly; I'd guess they'd hit the roof it were omitted.]

Weedding/wedding cake entries

Edited June 5, 2010 by chezjim (log)