Anatole
Anatole, a fictional character in the works of P. G. Wodehouse, is a temperamental French chef employed at Brinkley Court. He was born and brought up in Provence, where he learnt his art.
He is described in Right Ho, Jeeves as "a tubby little man with a moustache of the outsize or soup-strainer type".
Anatole speaks in an idiosyncratic mix of upper-class-twit and working-class Brooklyn, having learnt to speak English partly from a chauffeur called Maloney while working for an American family in Nice, and partly from Bingo Little, in whose household he served immediately before coming to Brinkley. When agitated, he tends to resort to colourful French or Provençal expressions, such as "nom d'un nom d'un nom", "burluberu" or "marmiton de Domange".
Everybody who has tasted his cooking speaks in reverential tones of his artistry in the kitchen: he is often referred to as "God's gift to the gastric juices". He has an "impulsive Provençal temperament", however, which leads him to resign his post at the merest suggestion of criticism. Much effort has to be expended by his employers in pacifying him and inducing him to stay on.
In Clustering Round Young Bingo Dahlia Travers (née Wooster), chatelaine of Brinkley Court, poached him from Mrs. Bingo Little (née Rosie M. Banks) by inducing her to hire a parlour-maid with whom Anatole had had a prior liaison. The loss of her prized chef caused Mrs. Little to refuse to submit her "human interest" piece, "How I Keep The Love Of My Husband-Baby", to Milady's Boudoir, Aunt Dahlia's refined weekly paper for women, much to Bingo's relief.
Thomas Portarlington Travers, Aunt Dahlia's husband, suffers from terrible indigestion if he eats anything other than Anatole's cooking. Never a particularly generous-spirited soul, when Old Tom is thus afflicted he tends to become especially miserly, and is very unlikely to part with any money. This gives Aunt Dahlia another important reason to ensure that Anatole stays at Brinkley.
Dishes for which Anatole is renowned
- Ris de veau à la financière
- Nonettes de poulet Agnès Sorel
- Cèpes à la Rossini
- Suprêmes de fois gras au champagne
- Mignonettes à la crême d'écrevisses
- Timbales de ris de veau toulousaine
- Sylphides à la crême d'écrevisses
