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Horror! Hitler liked baked trout!

A Letter from a Bavarian Trout Fancier

To the Central Jewish Committee of Germany

From: Reinhard Heuschneider
Dösingerried 19
94259 Kirchberg bei Regen (Bayerischer Wald)
Bayern (Bavaria)

To: Frau Charlotte Knobloch
President of the Central Jewish Committee of Germany
"Leo-Baeck-Haus"
Tucholskystraße 9
10117 Berlin - Mitte

December 2, 2008

Grüß Gott, Frau Knobloch!

As a passionate Bavarian fancier of baked trout, I beg your assistance in finding a solution to a slippery question that could be decisive for my physical, psychical and political well being.

Perhaps you, as president of the most powerful Jewish organization in Germany, are asking yourself: "What could the subject of baked trout possibly have to do with me?‰

The answer is: quite a lot.

Baked trout has become a historical controversy of the first water,
an issue with which the historiography of a twelve year epoch in our national history must stand or fall.

Perhaps you are now asking: what could have triggered such a controversy?

It has to do with Belgian television.

In a popular VRT (Flemish Broadcasting System) program, TV chef Jeroen Meus describes and prepares favorite dishes of well-known persons past and present.

As he was preparing a feature on "Trout in Butter Sauce," a favorite dish of Adolf Hitler at his former "Eagle‚s Nest" near Berchtestegaden, however, he was prohibited from doing so by Jewish protesters.

According to the Jewish magazine Joods Actueel, mentioning the fact that that Hitler liked baked trout would tend to "depict the dictator Hitler as an ordinary person and understate his evil nature."

As if having his TV feature cancelled were not enough, the famous chef had travelled all the way to Bavaria to catch an authentic trout from the authentic stream.

All his effort and expense for naught!

Until recently I, like most Bavarians, subscribed to the official version of history (even without the input of the Jewish Central Committee) to the effect that Hitler‚s favorite dish was chewing the carpet, without butter sauce.

Now I am thankful to have been instructed otherwise by the revisionist culinary insight of Mr. Jeroen Meus.

As I admitted at the beginning of this letter, I too love trout in butter sauce, specifically racially pure Bavarian rainbow trout, as must be obvious since I am Bavarian myself.

Furthermore I have always believed the butter in the butter sauce should be the better Bavarian butter.

Now, against the ever-darkening historical background, am I still allowed to prefer such culinary delights?

And (in case this remark should somehow get past the culinary censors) am I allowed to brown the butter sauce to a truly brown and nutty colour, or would it be more correct politically to terminate the browning before the brown-butter sauce is quite brown?

What is your advice on this burning issue?

It is no secret that our all-purpose Section 130 of the Penal Code allows for no margin of error in protecting us from the consequences of incorrect political and politico-culinary tendencies.

That is the reason why I am addressing myself to you, in the strictest confidence.

I had considered addressing my letter to Frau Zypries, the Minister of Justice, but then I said to myself: "Why waste time beating around the bush? Why not go directly to the highest political authority in Germany?"

In impatient anticipation of your highly esteemed response,

I remain, most respectfully yours,

Reinhard Heuschneider