MOBILE RED HEDGEHOG - Flipbook - Page 6
The Red Hedgehog Tavern
The Gasthaus Zum Roten Igel ('The Red Hedgehog'
Tavern) was a Viennese hub of socialising, beerdrinking and music. Schubert and Brahms went
there to hear gypsy musicians play and their
influence found its way into their writing, most
closely in the Brahms Clarinet Quintet and the
Schubert C major Quintet.
Crusty old bachelor Brahms was very attached to the
place and stubbornly refused to eat or drink
anywhere else. In fact he became such a fixture that
his and the name of the tavern became synonymous
- at least in pictures like the one on the previous
page. He rarely ate alone and always had two or
three acquaintances with him and the meal could be
accompanied by jokes and prickly insults of all sorts,
no doubt aimed at conductors, singers and
politicians.
Brahms was extravagantly fond of goulash and the
staû at the Roten Igel kept a small barrel of the finest
Hungarian Tokay in the cellar for his private
consumption. He was also known to have a special
weakness for Rindspilaw (beef pilaf), a simple
peasant dish. He also had a fondness for herring
salad and often made loud demands for whitebait, a
favourite fried food of dockworkers. There is even a
story that that, when opening a can of sardines,
Brahms would drink the oil directly out of the can.
The moral of the story? You can take the boy out of
the Hamburg slums, but you can’t take memories of
his favorite childhood foods out of the man.
