lf a dozen individual tins, made squarish
and standing high enough above the bath water to keep any of it from
getting into the stew. In these tins the cheese is melted. But since
such a tinsmith's contraption is hard to come by in these days of
fireproof cooking glass, we suggest muffin tins, ramekins or even
small cups to crowd into the bottom of your double boiler or chafing
dish. But beyond this we plump for a revival of the "cheese stewer" in
stainless steel, silver or glass.

In the ritual at "The Cheese," these dishes, brimming over, "bubbling
and blistering with the stew," followed a pudding that's still famous.
Although down the centuries the recipe has been kept secret, the
identifiable ingredients have been itemized as follows: "Tender steak,
savory oyster, seductive kidney, fascinating lark, rich gravy, ardent
pepper and delicate paste"--not to mention mushrooms. And after the
second or third helping of pudding, with a pint of stout, bitter, or
the mildest and mellowest brown October Ale in a dented pewter pot,
"the stewed Cheshire cheese."

Cheese was the one and only other course prescribed by tradition and
appetite from the time when Charles II aled and regaled Nell Gwyn at
"The Cheese," where Shakespeare is said to have sampled this "kind of
a glorified Welsh Rarebit, served piping hot in the square shallow
tins in which it is cooked and garnished with sippets of delicately
colored toast."

Among early records is this report of Addison's in _The Spectator_ of
September 25,1711:

They yawn for a Cheshire cheese, and begin about midnight, when
the whole company is disposed to be drowsy. He that yawns widest,
and at the same time so naturally as to produce the most yawns
amongst his spectators, carries home the cheese.

Only a short time later, in 1725, the proprietor of Simpson's in the
Strand inaugurated a daily guessing contest that drew crowds to his
fashionable eating and drinking place. He would set forth a huge
portion of cheese and wager champagne and cigars for the house that no
one present could correctly estimate the weight, height and girth of
it.

As late as 1795, when Boswell was accompanying Dr. Johnson to "The
Cheese," records of St. Dunstan's Club, which also met there, showed
that the current price of a Buck Rabbit was tuppence, and that this
was also the amount of the usual tip.

Ye Original Recipe

1-1/2 ounces butter
1 cup cream
1-1/2 cups grated Ches