Wolfram Siebeck was born in Duisburg in 1928. Memories of home cooking in the Siebeck household are terrible; his mother and grandmother are terrible cooks. Plagued by inedible roux and tasteless stews due to years of scarcity, his desire for delicious foods increases, which he will only encounter later in life. In France Siebeck discovers his personal land of milk and honey and the destination of his dreams. Here you feel understood, where there is greater social attention to good food and good wine and where culinary pleasure is sacred. Siebeck’s career began as a sign painter, then became a print illustrator for “WAZ” before finding he was more interested in writing.
From journalistic illustrator to critic
He travels to France to document the Annecy and Cannes film festivals and visits starred restaurants for the first time, which shows him how poor the food is compared to German food. Eventually he was commissioned by “Twen” magazine to write his first cooking columns. From then on, the humorous elements of his drawing style – bite, sarcasm and self-deprecation – flow into his writings. This was followed by works for “Feinschmecker”, “Stern” and “Die Zeit”. With the latter he negotiated that his wife Barbara, a former model and then gallery owner of David Hockney, a lover of gardens and herself the author of several books, would always accompany him on his culinary travels. Until his death in 2016, Siebeck wrote reviews and recipes for “Zeit” and “Zeit Magazin”, traveled the world and reported on famous chefs and cuisines. Until 2015 he also talked about his culinary travels on his blog “Wo is(s)t Siebeck”.
The left-wing intellectual food critic was an advocate of high-quality ingredients. He coined the term “Plumpsküche” to describe Germany’s dumpling and cabbage culture and campaigned to bring premium ingredients into German restaurant kitchens, where until then people still cooked with ready-made soups and canned goods. In the meantime, he organized a transport service with several star chefs who went to Paris early in the morning, did their shopping at the wholesale market and delivered to restaurants in Munich at lunchtime. Siebeck’s goal, however, was not only to bring valuable ingredients and unknown methods to Germany, but also to make ingredients frowned upon by Germans, such as tripe and offal, socially acceptable again – an idea that is always current and is now a prospect , very sustainable.
The tone of the picky eater was polarizing from the start. The author Günter Herburger wrote the poem “For the Improvement of Characteristics” in 1975, in which he wanted Siebeck’s cooking columns to be banned. There was a lot of curiosity about Siebeck’s recipes. When he suggested a dish with the then unknown Puy lentils in a Christmas menu for “Zeit Magazine” in 1981 and suggested that perhaps the rare legume could be found in health food shops, he received numerous letters from shopkeepers asking him to try the Puy lentils next Recipe to notify the points of sale in advance so that they can stock the shelves. Today in German supermarkets you can find red, brown, yellow, green, flat and beluga lentils.