Beethoven and food

[Quijote]

We all like food, and as I've said before, I've never yet met a musician who doesn't like his/her victuals, especially after a concert or gruelling rehearsal.
We know from the literature that Beethoven enjoyed his nosh, and there are several anecdotes and occasional entries in the conversation books that attest to this.
One of the earliest stories I read is when he was a kid, chasing a chicken with his brother, catching it and wringing its neck and getting their mom to cook it. So he certainly liked fowl. Another one concerned entries in the conversation books where he praised the quality of this or that sausage in a given restaurant. Other stories tell us he quite liked macaroni cheese, stewed cherries and of course being from Bonn (the Rhine) he probably had his fair fill of river fish, which he is also reported to have liked.
I wonder though about the quality of food prepared in those days. Would there have been any notion of "gastronomy"? What was the quality of the cheese, meat, bread, wine and so on in those days? I'm convinced they would have eaten plenty of game (venison, rabbits, pheasants, grouse ...), but how was it prepared? Would it have been any different compared to today?
I suppose in essence I'm asking if there have been any significant changes in how we prepare food today compared to Beethoven's day, apart from hygiene aspects.
Any thoughts?

[Quijote]

Yes, I'm hungry, which prompted this new thread. I'm cooking boudin noir tonight (blood sausage, served on sliced apples and white wine sauce with sautéed potatoes). It's not in the literature, but I bet Beethoven ate that, too!

[Sorrano]

Preservation and such would have had much different consideration in those days; people probably got sick from eating rotten meat, but I imagine that there were ways of curing the meat so that it might last a couple of days. It would be interesting to see if there are any recipes from that era and that locality. Of course, there are many traditional dishes (even here in the US that come from abroad) that are based on those earlier dishes, adapted somewhat to our day and age.

(Now you've got me hungry, Don!)

[Quijote]

I did once find a reference to how cheese was made back in Beethoven's day. They added cow's urine! For that tangy taste, I suppose. I'm sure we don't do that any more. Do we?

[Megan]

I wonder if he had Oak smoked haddock, that's what's on our menu today.

[Quijote]

Haddock is a sea fish, so what with transport being as it was back in B's day maybe not? Then again, if it was smoked at the port (therefore a sort of "curing" and "preservation" process) maybe he did! I've got a fish lined up for the A-Z quiz, aha! Damn, what's German for 'haddock'? Must ask Matron, she knows everything worth knowing ...

[Chris]

Of course we know that Beethoven loved his coffee too!

[Peter]

Beethoven favourites were Macaroni, Stracchino cheese, Verona salami and Fish (Schill) & potatoes. Bread soup usually on thursdays, all washed down with Hungarian wine. The main meal was generally around 3pm with a light snack in the evenings.

[Megan]

Beethoven and food
When he [Beethoven] came to Vienna, he knew nothing at all of the fine art of cooking. He cared little about good food, his favorite dish being a mess of macaroni with plenty of cheese on top. He liked, too, the simplest kind of stew, and fish from the Danube. Ignaz Seyfried reported that Beethoven liked a kind of bread soup cooked like mush,

to which he looked forward with pleasure every Thursday. Together with it, ten sizable eggs had to be presented to him on a plate. Before they were stirred into the soup, he first separated and tested them by holding them against the light, then decapitated them with his own hand and anxiously sniffed them to see whether they were fresh. When fate decreed that some among them scented their straw, so to speak, the storm broke. In a voice of thunder the housekeeper was cited to court. (1)
He kept stracchino (an Italian cheese) and Verona salami in his room. He so often forgot about mealtime that he must have taken a bite when he got hungry. But once he did see himself in the role of master chef, having become sufficiently impressed by the fuss the Viennese make about cooking; he invited his friends to a dinner he was to cook himself. Seyfried remembers:
They found their host in a short evening jacket, a stately nightcap on his bristly stock of hair, and his loins girded with a blue kitchen apron, very busily engaged at the hearth.


After waiting patiently for an hour and a half, while the turbulent demands of their stomachs were with increasing difficulty assuaged by cordial dialogue, the dinner was finally served. The soup recalled those charitable leavings distributed to beggars in the taverns; the beef was but half done and calculated to gratify only an ostrich; the vegetables floated in a mixture of water and grease; and the roast seemed to have been smoked in the chimney. Nevertheless the giver of the feast did full justice to every dish. And the applause which he anticipated put him in so rosy a humor that he called himself "Cook Mehlschöberl," after a character in the burlesque, "The Merry Nuptials," and tried by his own example and by extravagant praise of the dainties which still remained to animate his continent guests. They, however, found it barely possible to choke down a few morsels, and stuck to good bread, fresh fruit, sweet pastry, and the unadulterated juice of the grape.



Source: Marek, George (1969) Beethoven: Biography of Genius. London: William Kimber, p. 171-172.

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[Megan]

I enjoyed a Black Forest trifle with rum today with my coffee in a restaurant , sheer indulgence, but it was delicious.

[Quijote]

I enjoyed a Black Forest trifle with rum today with my coffee in a restaurant , sheer indulgence, but it was delicious.

Phoar! I'm not really into sweet desserts and so on, but a good Black Forest Gâteau ... that's something else.
With rum???? OK, why not, but if you want to do it the traditional way it's gotta be with local schnapps (kirschwasser) !!

[Michael]

My doctor has put me on a diet due to my weight and blood pressure, therefore I strongly object to this thread.

[Quijote]

Bet Beethoven never had this: Vacherin (Mont d'Or) cheese which is melted in the oven with a good dash of white wine, and poured over boiled potatoes. Served with ham and white wine (the same dashed one). That's for me tonight. Cheers!
(Sorry "MM" M)