Two of today’s 1933 menus feature Canadian Pacific hotels and look to be part of a series that included one for the York Hotel shown here two days ago. All three menus are printed on nearly white paper with the hotel illustrations in bright colors and yellow stripes on either side of the menu card.

Click image to view and download a 798-KB PDF of this menu from the Chung collection.

The first menu, which shows the Chateau Frontenac, is for lunch on the Empress of Japan. The York menu was also for lunch in tourist class. This menu doesn’t specify what class it was used for, but it has about the same number of items of approximately the same quality of foods.

Click image to view and download a 800-KB PDF of this menu from the Chung collection.

The second menu, which shows the Empress Hotel, was for dinner aboard the Empress of Japan. Based on the dates, this menu was probably from the same voyage as the Chateau Frontenac menu. While the Frontenac lunch menu had 23 numbered items, this dinner menu has only 18.

Click image to view and download a 454-KB PDF of this menu from the Chung collection.

The third menu, which is a folder, not a card, is from the Empress of Asia eight months after the above two. There are only nine items on the menu: fruit cocktail, turtle soup, sole, chicken, French green beans, asparagus, savarin (cake), dessert, and coffee. If savarin was the first dessert, the second dessert was probably petit four or Mignardise, which means bite-sized pastries and sweets. The lack of choices for most of the courses on this menu is particularly amazing considering this was the “au revoir” dinner, which was usually a little more memorable than other meals on ocean liners.

Curiously, opposite the menu, printed in the same typeface, are the names of five people: Mr. & Mrs. Bedgood, Dr. & Mrs. Roberts, and Miss P.H. Smith. The Roberts and Bedgoods all signed the back cover, suggesting that this menu was collected by Miss Smith. Were these five people all seated at the same table during the cruise?