There was one dish fashionable among the ancient Greeks mistaken by our neighbours, the French, for plum-pudding, which is still found in perfection in the Levant, where I have many times eaten of it. Julius Pollux[637] has preserved the recipe for making it, and we can assure our gourmands, that nothing more exquisite was ever tasted, even in the best café of the Palais Royal. They took a certain quantity of the finest clarified lard, and, mixing it up with milk until it was quite thick, added an equal portion of new cheese, yolks of eggs, and the finest flour. The whole rolled up tight in a fragrant fig-leaf, was then cooked in chicken-broth, or soup made with kid’s flesh. When they considered it well done, the leaf was removed and the pudding soused in boiling honey. It was then served up hissing-hot. All the ingredients were used in equal proportions, excepting the yolks of eggs, of which there was somewhat more than of anything else, in order to give firmness and consistency to the whole.[638] ----- Footnote 637: Onomast. i. 237. vi. 57, 69. Footnote 638: Vid. Schol. Arist. Eq. 949. Acharn. 1066. ----- Black puddings, made with blood, suet, and the other materials now used were also common at Athens.[639] Mushrooms and snails were great favourites; and Poliochos speaks of going out in the dewy mornings in search of these luxuries.[640] In spring, before the arrival of the swallow, the nettle was collected and eaten, it being then young and tender.[641] Leeks, onions, garlic, were in much request, the last particularly, which grew in great plenty in the Megarean territory, and hence, perhaps, the inhabitants were accounted hot and quarrelsome, garlic being supposed to inspire game, even in fighting cocks, to which it was accordingly given in great quantities.[642] ----- Footnote 639: Aristoph. Eq. 208. Footnote 640: Athen. ii. 19. Footnote 641: Aristoph. Eq. 422. Brunck. Footnote 642: Aristoph. Pac. 503. -----