We’ve seen this cover photograph before in the upper-left corner of 1950 and 1958 dining car menus. Today’s menu places the same photo in the horizontal center of the cover. Another difference is that the 1950 menu has “Canadian Pacific” in script under the photo while this one says “Winter in Old Quebec” in Bodoni typeface.

Click image to download a 1.8-MB PDF of this menu.

What do these changes mean? Canadian Pacific continued to use center-portrait menus on dining cars at least as late as 1956 and on steamships until at least 1963. The Bodoni typeface disappeared from dining car menus in the 1940s but continued to be seen on steamship menus until at least 1957. Although Canadian Pacific had used menus that were unique to steamships, the steamships also used menus that were similar to those that had been used on dining cars, but often a few years after they had been discontinued on the dining cars.

This menu is dated April 25, 1957. According to the September 1956-April 1957 timetable, the Empress of Scotland left Montreal at 11 am on April 23 and arrived in Greenock, Scotland on April 29 and Liverpool on April 30. So this menu would have been for the third night out.

As part of an elaborate, seven-course meal, the menu offered seven different entrées. Most are various preparations of the usual meats, including beef, veal, lamb, chicken, and Cornish game hen. But there is also glazed banana fritters with maple syrup, which seems like more of a side dish than an entrée. Perhaps it was for children who might not appreciate some of the more sophisticated meals.