The hotels named in this story are fictional, but there are still hotels around that were once part of the Harvey Company. One well worth visiting is La Fonda in Santa Fe, where you can take a step back in time and imagine meals served by smiling young women dressed in black with white pinafore aprons “setting your cup” and serving you a delicious meal.
While Fred Harvey and his sons eventually became famous for hotels and restaurants and even guided tours that helped the West become a major destination for travelers, it was his eating houses along the Santa Fe railway that started it all. Throughout the story, I have mentioned dishes made famous by the Harvey Company. Thanks to George H. Foster and Peter C. Weighlin, many of those recipes have been preserved in The Harvey House Cookbook (Atlanta: Longstreet Press, 1992).
With the publisher’s permission, here are two of those delicious recipes: