Carrick Hill - Guess Who Came to Dinner? Ali Carle enjoys the meal in the Adelaide City region of South Australia
Carrick Hill speaks of charm and grace and for a period from the end of the war through to the late sixties is was "party central".
If you didn't get an invite you simply weren't on the "A" list because when owners Sir Edward and Lady Hayward lived here, Carrick Hill was THE place to be seen.
"They had a lot of what we would call famous guests," explained Gastronomer-in-Residence, Allie Reynolds. "They included Sir Laurence Olivier and Vivien Liegh.
"The actresses and actors they hosted would have been in Adelaide for their theatre productions in '48 - '58. The Haywards loved theatre, they loved music so they went to a lot of concerts. And they weren't just always formal dinner parties. They gave a lot of parties after the concerts and that's what people remember."
Wander through Carrick Hill and you soon realise the Haywards were forever travelling the globe in search of new art works from the Continent and the Mother Country. On their return "Bill" and "Urs" as they were known to close friends, might invite the like of celebrated critic and historian Sir Kenneth Clark over for dinner.
The Haywards were considered to be fine hosts who kept a good table and knew the right way to do things, with the help of some well-trained servants of course. It's said they entertained with considerable but not ostentatious style.
In the servant's kitchen, we caught up with gastronomer-in-residence, Allie Reynolds as she whipped up a cold avocado soup. It's the creation of actress Googie Withers who was a regular dinner guest at Carrick Hill. The cook would prepare food that's pretty traditional by today's standards. Three courses with a roast as the main.
A roast beef, conversation about art, music and the theatre - it's all part of the Hayward story told in the latest Carrick Hill exhibition "Guess Who Came to Dinner". And who did come? Well, Sir Robert Helpmann, Sir Hans Heysen and his daughter Nora. Other notable artists such as William Dobell made their way to the Springfield estate in what were very different times.
"People recalled that Adelaide was as 'British' as it gets and they echoed the British style in the way they entertained," said Allie. "That included the formality of dressing for dinner. In the guestrooms upstairs you'll see we have Ursula's Christian Dior dress from the autumn-winter collection of 1953.
"The other thing that was very British was the ladies withdrew from the dining room after desert and they would go to the drawing room for coffee and Haigh's chocolates."
With wines from White Favell in London, the wine merchants to King George the Fifth, the conversation would continue into the wee hours often fuelled by some harder stuff.
"I'm told that ff Ursula poured you a gin it was a ninety percent gin and ten percent tonic," laughed Allie.
Allie has gone to exceptional lengths to track down the various tales of the rich and famous - what they ate and what they drank. And in this little journal cum cookbook she's uncovered the recipe for one of Anita Kingsford Smith's favourite cocktails. The wife of the famous aviator was partial to what she called an "old fashioned" - a base of whisky, some sugar syrup, Maraschino cherries, orange, lemons, some bitters and ice.
It was all part of life at Carrick Hill -a life relived in the exhibition Guess Who Came to Dinner. It's on until October 21st 2007.
Guess Who Came to Dinner?
Carrick Hill
Springfield
Exhibition ends October 21, 2007Published 2nd September 2007
