Mozart's cutlery in Vienna
© AFP Jakub SukupVIENNA (AFP) - While the musical genius has long been used to market the popular Austrian chocolate known as Mozartkugel (Mozart balls), the culinary use of Mozart was until now rather limited.
But with Mozart fever spreading in 2006, Austrians, well known for their love of food, are being treated to all sorts of cookbooks and dishes from the artist's era.
In Salzburg, the composer's birthplace, one can enjoy a feast "prepared as it was in Mozart's time," while musicians in period wigs and costumes play arias and duets from his vast repertoire.
Even the setting, the Stiftskeller St. Peter, supposedly Europe's oldest restaurant, dating back to 803, has a Mozart connection as the family is said to have dined there.
"Papa and henry (sic) had lunch at St. Peter... made music," Wolfgang's sister Nannerl wrote in her diary on October 28, 1783.
On the menu for the new Mozart Lunch Concert being launched this April is "glace turkey breast with vegetable rice and parsley cream sauce" prepared according to 17th and 18th century recipes.
The candlelit dinner, now in its 10th year, features a traditional three-course meal of lemon, wine and cinnamon cream soup, roasted capon breast on a bed of polenta with a truffle-sage cream sauce and a honey parfait as dessert.
For Wolfgang Amadeus's favourite dish of Leberknoedel (liver dumplings) with sauerkraut, one can head to Salzburg's new Viva! Mozart exhibition and its Cafe Staiger, named after the owner of a coffee house Mozart frequented.
A cookbook in Vienna
© AFP Jakub SukupThe former establishment, opened by Anton Staiger on Alter Markt plaza in 1753, was one of the first in Salzburg to serve exotic drinks like coffee, chocolate and tea.
For aspiring chefs, at least five books about food in Mozart's era have come out in the past six months, with period recipes and anecdotes about the musician's eating habits.
Austrian food critic Christoph Wagner has even combined his book "Amadeus a la Carte" with a CD of Wolfgang Amadeus's music for a truly melodic culinary experience.
It is not such a stretch to use Mozart, a notorious bon-vivant who liked his drink and whose compositions included "Essen und Trinken" (Eating and Drinking) and "Maenner suchen stets zu naschen" (Men always look for snacks), as a guide to food in the 18th century.
"Madame Mutter! Ich esse gerne Butter," (Madam Mother, I like to eat butter) the musician famously wrote to his mother in 1778. In 1783, he composed a poem entitled "Glueckwunsch beim Punsch" (Best Wishes with Punch) for Nannerl's birthday.
Having spent 10 years of his life on the road, Mozart tasted dishes from such diverse places as Italy, London, Prague and of course, Austria.
He was particularly fond of almond milk and lemonade, an expensive drink at the time when sugar was a precious commodity.
And while in Vienna, he would ask family and friends in Salzburg to send him his favourite foods from his hometown.
Mozart ate better than most of his contemporaries but even so, period recipes may surprise with their variety of exotic ingredients like lobster, rivercrab, sago and figs.
In a letter to his wife Constanze in 1770, Mozart also described a fruit that resembled a pumpkin, was green on the outside and light red on the inside, and was eaten with sugar and cinnamon: the watermelon.
For a period recipe of quail served with a watermelon stew, consult Wagner (Christoph, not Richard). As for music to accompany dinner, try Mozart. He is, literally, the flavour of the year.
© 2006 AFP. All rights of reproduction and distribution reserved. All information displayed on this section (dispatches, photographs, logos) are protected by intellectual property rights owned by Agence France-Presse. As a consequence, you may not copy, reproduce, modify, transmit, publish, display or in any way commercially exploit any of the content of this section without the prior written consent of Agence France-Presse.