BEETHOVEN 200 YEARS AGO TODAY: Monday, August 14, 1820 (approximately)

Beethoven makes a note of a baked good he liked: Pressburger curved poppy-seed rolls. Although the proper term is “Mohnbeugel,” he refers to them as “Magenbeugel.” This appears to be a pun; the curved shape of this sweet poppyseed-filled pastry might have struck him as looking like a stomach (“Magen”), or he may have considered them particularly satisfying. Pressburg was the German name for Bratislava, so these were Slovakian treats.