Yellow soup
Yellow soup was the name of a feast of the city council and city councilors held in Leipzig on the first working day of each year for more than 50 years, as well as the eponymous first course of the meal.
history
In Leipzig, after the introduction of the Saxon City Code in 1831, the assembly of city councilors was elected by the tax-paying citizens and a third of them was replaced annually by a new election. On the first working day after the New Year , the constituent meeting took place, at which the outgoing city councilors were adopted and the newly elected were introduced to their office. It became customary to get to know each other better afterwards at a social get-together in a Leipzig restaurant with good food outside of the official framework. The electoral code with the division into tax classes ensured that the city councilors were mainly bankers, wholesale merchants, industrialists, publishers, prominent lawyers, scientists and doctors, but also members of the commercial and artisanal middle class.
The first evidence of such a “follow-up meeting” comes from 1853 as an invitation to a “simple meal”. But the yellow soup is not mentioned yet. This term in connection with the feast appeared in the media coverage of the event for the first time in 1880 in the Leipziger Tageblatt , although it was used internally earlier, as the song text in the picture from 1860 shows. From 1890 onwards, the official invitations to the “yellow soup” also asked.
The yellow soup feast initially took place in various Leipzig restaurants, and the landlords applied to host it. There is evidence of bushings in Aeckerleins Keller until 1860 , then in the Hôtel de Pologne and from 1870 in the Schützenhaus . There were also applications from Bonorand im Rosental .
When SPD representatives were elected as city councilors in 1895, the conservative exclusivity of the event became apparent, as they did not attend the meal or the following. In 1898 the third replacement of the city parliament was extended to a two-year cycle, which was followed by the feast of the yellow soup. After the completion of the New Town Hall , the yellow soup was celebrated in its ballroom from 1909, served from the kitchen of the Ratskeller . The last feast took place in 1913. After the First World War , when the balance of power in the city parliament changed completely, the tradition was not resumed, especially not at the time of National Socialism .
After the Second World War , the city council tried to revive the tradition of the yellow soup. During this time of hunger, the meal began with pea soup and ended with it. The attempt remained.
The soup and the meal
Despite the numerous documents about the yellow soup, there is no reference to its recipe, apart from the assumption that in most cases it was probably a pea soup. A reference to its meaning can be found in the German dictionary by Jacob and Wilhelm Grimm , where the yellow soup is listed as a "picture of lush well-being" in the older German language. The yellow soup at the beginning of the menu is therefore to be understood as a symbol of well-being, but on the other hand also as a consistent symbol of tradition.
The food sequences for the yellow soup feast were quite extensive in later years, as the example from 1896 shows: yellow soup / turbot in oyster sauce / saddle of mutton garnished / fresh lobster sauce remoulade / seyr. Capaun / Salat.- Compot / Eis Prinz Pückler / Fruit / Butter and cheese. Other menu cards of a similar size have survived.
While in the beginning there was a more relaxed atmosphere, as the illustrated lyrics from 1860 shows, later more ritualized sequences came to the fore. Toasts in a given order with a fixed table and dress order were brought out and bands were hired to provide musical accompaniment, their repertoire reaching as far as Wagner .
The price of the menu was always paid by the participants themselves.
Beyond Leipzig
Although a yellow soup feast was also held in other Saxon cities, Leipzig can be regarded as the origin because of the oldest evidence. In Dresden , the feast was apparently first celebrated on other dates, from 1888 onwards as a year-end event. In 1890 the Dresden city archivist remarked: "At the year-end meeting in 1890, the council members also took part in the meal, which was now called 'Yellow Soup' according to the Leipzig model". The Dresden tradition lasted until 1927, the Chemnitz until 1922. Similar events are also recorded for Freiberg , Mittweida and Plauen .
literature
- Andreas Schneider: The feast of the “Yellow Soup” - a (large) bourgeois custom in Leipzig's democratic culture before the First World War. In: Leipziger Almanach 2011/2012. Leipziger Universitätsverlag, Leipzig 2012, ISBN 978-3-86583-631-1 , pp. 251-276.
- Mathias Orbeck: Secret about the "yellow soup". Who knows the recipe? In: Leipziger Volkszeitung from May 31, 2016 ( online )
- Annemarie Niering: "Yellow Soup" - The annual closing dinner of the Dresden city council and the Dresden council In: Josef Matzerath , Annemarie Niering (ed.): Table culture. Dresden around 1900 (= Land of culinary tradition. Food history in Saxony , Series A. Tradition for the future , Volume 3) Thorbecke Jan Verlag, Ostfildern 2013, pp. 162–181, ISBN 978-3-799-50519-2
Web links
- Andreas Schneider: The feast of the “yellow soup” in Saxony in the 19th century. In: Saxony reading. Retrieved August 22, 2017 .
Individual evidence
- ↑ Andreas Schneider: The feast of the "yellow soup" - ... , p. 253
- ↑ Andreas Schneider: The feast of the "yellow soup" - ... , p. 256
- ↑ Andreas Schneider: The feast of the "Yellow Soup" - ... , p. 268
- ↑ Robert Riemann: Chapter 15: Homecoming and Farewell, p. 8. In: Stupidity and insight in eighty years of life (1877-1957). Retrieved August 27, 2017 .
- ↑ Jacob and Wilhelm Grimm: German Dictionary , Volume 20, Soup 5) b), Column 1226 (online)
- ↑ Andreas Schneider: The feast of the "yellow soup" - ... , p. 266
- ↑ Andreas Schneider: The feast of the "yellow soup" - ... , p. 269
- ^ Adolph Renner: On the yellow soup on February 15, 1868. In: SLUB, Saxonica Collection. Retrieved September 8, 2017 .
- ^ Otto Richter: History of the City of Dresden in the Years 1871 to 1902, Dresden 1903, p. 94
- ↑ Andreas Schneider: The feast of the "Yellow Soup" - ... , p. 257