Kitchen Orchestra, Italy 1955

This charming kitchen orchestra is from an Italian menu cover dated 1955.
It features a chef, standing on a crate of vegetables, conducting various animals to make sweet music together. He uses a ladle as a baton.
There’s a goose playing a pot that doubles as a cello, a rabbit using a fork-violin, a lobster playing a funnel-trumpet and a chicken, sitting on a toadstool, using pot lids as cymbals and drumming on a metal casserole dish.
On either side of the chef is a turkey playing a grill-harp and a duck, sitting on a tomato, playing a xylophone made from wine bottles and spoons.
All seven are working in harmony for the benefit of the lucky diners who patronized this unnamed restaurant. The menu cover is from a private dinner held by an unnamed Italian football club celebrating the Feast of San Silvestro on December 31, hence the in-jokes about missed goals and inferior playing.
There are lobsters from Sardinia for (translation) those who don’t score goals; mixed meats for (translation) players who know how to score goals and those who, unfortunately , don’t; ice cream for (translation) after the defeat and wine for (translation) those who want to feel better. There is also lasagna as a starter.
We don’t completely understand the jokes but we think the illustration is exquisite.

Courtesy Private Collection.

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