Beef Wellington

Serjeant Gibson and I have enjoyed two recent Waterloo Dinners, one at Bucks Club and the other in Boodles, where Andrew Roberts, the aficionado of Napoleon, spoke and spoke very well. I had expected it to be a series of Napoleonic excuses but not at all, it was a very balanced talk making the point of the number of mistakes the Great Man made. At both occasions we had Beef Wellington and I presumed it was all to do with a favourite dish of Wellington’s.  Not at all – that doughty and sadly late lamented Clarissa Dickson Wright argues that: “This dish has nothing to do with that splendid hero, the Duke of Wellington; it was invented for a civic reception in Wellington, New Zealand. But it is a splendid addition to any party.” I rather like myths so it seems a pity to dispel this one.

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