London — Soufflés were on the menu at Downton Abbey, and Lisa Heathcote was standing in a tent in a windy parking lot, making one after another in two makeshift ovens.
“Sometimes they would fall before the director was ready to shoot, sometimes they would fall in the middle of a take,” recounted Ms. Heathcote, who is Mrs. Patmore, Daisy and the rest of Downton Abbey’s kitchen staff rolled into one practical person responsible for all the food on the set. “The continuity people were freaking out. There were rows of collapsed soufflés, new ones continually coming out of the oven. It was a nightmare!” As any “Downton” fan feverishly anticipating the Season 5 finale on Sunday, knows, that’s a lot of food. From the early scene in the first episode, when the Crawley family hear of the sinking of the Titanic over breakfast — thus heralding a new heir for Downton and several seasons of romantic intrigue — to the endless dinners, teas, luncheons (not “lunch,” please!) and ceremonial banquets that mark the regular rhythms of aristocratic family life, few television series show more people eating more often.
Nor are they messing about. For breakfast, there might be eggs, sausages, bacon, kidneys, kedgeree (a rice and smoked-fish dish) and toast. Lunch would be at least two courses; tea would include cake and sandwiches; the evening meal would consist of at least three courses, finishing with a small savory (like prunes wrapped in bacon), or as many as seven courses if there were guests.
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So there is dough in Season 6 as well as marmalade? Story-line theorizing can commence.
A version of this article appears in print on March 1, 2015, on page AR15 of the New York edition with the headline: Maybe You Should Skip the Fish Mousse. Order Reprints| Today’s Paper|Subscribe
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