We’ve seen a die-cut image of an apple used by the Northern Pacific as a breakfast menu. This one isn’t die-cut, but the words “Just a Bite for Lunch” on the front and the NP logo on the back are embossed into the paper.
Click image to download a 448-KB PDF of this menu.
Inside, it says that Northern Pacific “originated ‘cold dishes for hot days’ in June, 1910.” That’s the only hint of a date on the menu, but the menu could have been used any time in the 1910s, though it was probably before the government took over the railroads during World War I.
Inside, the dishes include cold soups, salads, cold salmon, various meats that are presumably served cold, cold desserts including ice cream, and beverage such as iced tea & iced coffee. Cold dishes made sense in the days before air conditioning. Presumably, the railroads’ ability to store ice and serve cold food during hot summer days contributed to Americans’ desire to have iced with beverages such as tea, something the English, whose country never gets as hot as the Great Plains, find ridiculous.