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Hunt Music for the banquet!

Wolfgang Amadeus Mozart (quartet K458 "The Hunt", K299d "La Chasse"), Leopold Mozart ("The Hunt" 1769 for keyboard, "Sinfonia da Caccia" with hunting horns and gunshots), Joseph Haydn (Quartet No. 1 "La Chasse" 1762-64, Symphony No. 73 "The Hunt" 1782), Ditters von Dittersdorf (Ovid Symphony No. 3), Paul Wranitzky (Symphony Op. 25 "The Hunt"), Beethoven and many other composers of 18th century composed music inspired by the Hunting Parties of the Aristocracy they all worked for as composers.

The importance of this genre, the Hunt Music (or Jagdmusik) (a musical genre, based on the popular hunting trope, which exists even though the symphony, the quartet or the sonata are not clearly identified by the nickname "The Hunt"), is given principally by the fact that it's Hunt characteristic is derived by the peculiar rhythms and tunes used by the brass instruments (mainly Horns) to give signals during the Huntig Party in the Forests.

Aristocracy loved those Hunt rhythms and tunes and wanted to hear them again also in their palaces but, this time, performed by an orchestra and, why not?, while eating pheasants, boars, deers (the prize of their Hunting Parties) at their tables, during a magnificent banquet!

Enjoy these original Mozartian recipes!

The English modern version of these recipes is an exclusive property of MozartCircle.
Duck & Mozart
1790: Hunt Music or Ducks & Sandwiches! The Mozartian Game
1. Duck with Herbs (1773) &
2. Crockford's Club Game Fowl Sandwiches (1829)
Here a few original famous 18th century Game recipes used across Europe (1773). Many 1750s common recipes were so famous that kept being published in 19th century.
DIFFICULTY:
Duck, Duck, Duck!
1. DUCK WITH HERBS  (1773)

The best ducks are available only in December and in January.

INGREDIENTS:

Always be sure the meat of duck is soft and correctly high.

duck (ca. 2kg.)
(clean and ready to be cooked; remove liver, heart etc. to be cooked with butter separately; remove the head, the neck and the final section of the legs with their feet)
butter (150gr.)
ham (250 gr.: cut into medium dices)
lardo (cut into small dices, it must be a good   spiced one, like the Lard d'Arnad)
veal from heifer (250 gr. cut into medium dices)
onions (2 cut into round slices)
carrot (1 big cut into thick round slices)
garlic (1 big clove cut into dices)
cloves (2 crushed)
shallot (1 big cut into round slices)
bay leaves (3)
thyme (crushed)
basil (minced)
salt
pepper (crushed)
Alsatian white wine
light veal stock

For l'Erbolata (Herbs):
zucchini (3 sweet medium cut into regular rectangular segments)
carrots (3 medium cut into regular rectangular segments)
red onions (3 cut into rings)
golden onions (3 cut into rings)
spinach (sweet optional but already popular in 1773)
potatoes (optional: they became popular only at the end of the 18th century)
butter (200gr.)
stewed duck stock
salt
pepper (crushed)
nutmeg

METHOD:
1. In a large pot melt the butter with onions, shallot, carrots, garlic, cloves, pepper, salt, thyme. Put the duck into the pot and sauté it for a few minutes. In any case, the butter, the vegetables and the duck must never reach the brown colour.

2. Now add water into the pot and ensure that the duck is completely submerged. Add the light veal stock, the ham, the lardo, the veal from heifer, the bay leaves, the basil and the Alsatian white wine. Add pepper and salt. Then, during the preparation of the duck, check salt and adjust to taste.

3. Allow the broth in the pot firstly boil and then simmer and cook slowly.

4. After 2 hours of cooking, remove the pot from the fire and let it rest for a few hours. Then lay the stewpot on the fire again for, at least, 1 or 2 hours.

5. But be careful, because you understand the stewed duck is ready, when you see the meat starting leaving the bones by itself. Now the duck is hot and ready to be served.

6. Before serving the duck, with a large spoon, remove the fat of the duck which is floating on the surface of the stew broth and put the fat of the duck in a bowl and keep it in your refrigerator: you can use it in various occasions, i.e. for seasoning eggs or vegetables. Now you can serve the hot duck soaked with its stock.

7. In the meanwhile, you have prepared the Erbolata.

8. Into 2 different sauté-pans put a. carrots and potatoes (optional) and b. zucchini, onions, spinach (optional and must be sweet). In both cases, add butter, salt, pepper, nutmeg and some stewed duck stock: the vegetables must have a distinct flavour of butter. Start with the carrots and when they are almost ready, cook zucchini, onions and spinach. Check salt and pepper seasoning and adjust to taste. The carrots and potatoes must be soft, but the other vegetables must not be cooked too much and must remain rather firm and crunchy.

9. Now the dish is ready to be served. Hot pieces of duck a bit soaked with the duck stock itself and to be served with l'erbolata, various vegetables sautéed with butter.

10. The marvellous stewed duck stock can be used then to cook other wonderful dishes.


1. MALLARDO ALL'ERBOLATA.
Il Mallardo, ed Anetra sono dell'istesso gusto, e si condiscono della medesima maniera. La loro stagione è da Dicembre per tutto Gennaio.

Si cuoce il Mallardo lesso con erbe odorifere, un pezzo di presciutto, butirro, e cipolla; e si serve con erbe passate in butirro.


2. CROCKFORD'S CLUB GAME FOWL SANDWICHES (1829)

Sandwiches were invented by John Montagu 4th Earl of Sandwich and became popular in 18th century. Despite already in use before 1813, this version is the one commonly used in London at the Crockford's Club, when it was opened in 1828, one of the most important clubs in London, before the opening of the most famous Reform Club (1836).


INGREDIENTS:
pheasant (fillet)
quail (fillet)
duck (fillet)
guinea-hen (fillet)
butter
salt
bread for sandwiches (fresh, soft and moist)

For the Bechamel:
butter (60gr.)
veal (1.3kg. cut into small slices)
ham (120gr.)
mushrooms (Portobello cut into small pieces)
white onions (2 small cut into halves)
parsley (minced)
green onions
flour (3 spoonfuls)
cream (200gr. thick, thin and hot)
salt
pepper (optional)
nutmeg (optional)

METHOD:
1. Cook the fillets, by keeping the different types of meat in different sauté-pans.

2. The fillets must be cooked ca. 2 hours before cutting and serving them in the sandwiches.

3. Put little butter into the sauté-pan and melt it. Add the fillets and little salt. Do not cook the fillets too much and, in any case, according the type of cooking required by that special type of meat. Remove the fillets from the sauté-pan and keep them on serving-plates. After 2 hours, the fillets will be cut into very thin slices.

4. Prepare the bechamel. Put butter, veal, ham, mushrooms, onions, parsley, green onions, salt, pepper, nutmeg in a stewpan. Cook and add little water until meat starts becoming stewed thoroughly. Then add 3 spoonfuls of flour and hot and thick thin cream. Allow the ingredients be stewed thoroughly. Reduce the bechamel sauce until it become thick. Check salt, adjust to taste. Now the sauce is ready. Remove veal, ham, onions and mushrooms and strain the through a tammy (= a fine sieve). Now the bechamel is ready.

5. Now you can prepare the sandwiches. Slice the fillets as thin as possible, without trimming them. Lay two bits of bread side by side, spread upon them little bechamel, then put the thin slices of the fillets on them with a little salt. Join the two bits of bread well and cut the sandwich in half.

6. On silver plates create towers of sandwiches by putting one sandwich upon another. Keep the different types of meat in different towers. Write the name of the different types of meat on label-cards written in a beautiful ornamental style. Then position the ornamental label-cards on the edge of the silver plates with the towers of sandwiches.

2. SANDWICH OF FILLET OF FOWL AU SUPRÉME.
Cut off the fillets of as many fowls as will supply the party intended to be given. First make the bechamel well seasoned, as directed in the article Bechamel, No. 36; mark the fillets in a sauté-pan, with very little butter; dip the fillets in melted butter, put them in the sauté-pan, powder a little salt over them, and sauté them two hours before you make use of them, to have them quite cold when you cut up.
      When you make the sandwiches, slice the fillets as thin as possible, without trimming them. Take them up very thin, and leave them one upon another to prevent their getting dry.
      When you begin to make the sandwiches, lay two bits of bread side by side, spread upon them a very little of the bechamel; then put the white of the fowl on one of the bits of bread, with a little salt, and put the other piece on the same way as before, so that they may join well : cut the sandwich in half only. 
      Serve on silver plates, one sandwich upon another, a little turned.
      Write upon a paper cut in an ornamental manner, the name of the sandwiches, and put it on the edge of the plate.  

FOR THE BECHAMEL
Take about half a quarter of a pound of butter, about three pounds of veal, cut into small slices, a quarter of a pound of ham, some trimmings of mushrooms, two small white onions, a bunch of parsley and green onions; put the whole into a stewpan, and lay it on the fire till the meat be made firm. Then put three spoonsful of flour; moisten with some boiling-hot thin cream. Keep this sauce rather thin, so that whilst you reduce it, the ingredients may have time to be stewed thoroughly. Season it with a little salt, and strain it through a tammy.— This sauce should retain no taste of flour, and be very palatable.