Transcript Angela_Albu_Presentation

TRADITION AND INNOVATION
IN ROMANIAN CUISINE
- a short approach -
• A part of the cultural heritage of a nation is
the variety of traditional food, kept
unchanged for generation to generation.
• Romania has some traditional ways to
prepare food, characteristic for each
region of the country and the tourists who
tried once a traditional dish will come
again to taste it.
• Every historical regions of Romania have
its own specific in culture and customs,
reflected in the folk music, the architecture
of the houses, the traditional costumes
and, of course, in local cuisine.
• Traveling across Romania the tourist can
meet a mix from old and new elements
which represent the charm of the country.
• Romanian cuisine is diverse, blending the
dishes of several traditions which it came into
contact with, as well as maintaining its own
character.
• Romania's cuisine was somewhat influenced by
the other peoples that lived on its territory such
as the ethnic Hungarians and Germans that are
still living in the middle and western parts of
Romania.
• Also, some Greek, Slavic, Turkish and French
influences are felt. But the oldest influence
comes from the Dacian-Roman era.
• The truth is that Romanians like to eat,
and they eat a lot and well. They do not
think of cholesterol or low fat diets unless
they are dying.
• An existential Romanian question is: We
eat to live, or live to eat?
• A great number of proverbs and sayings
have developed around the activity of
eating:
• The innocent child's thank you:
Thank you for the meal
it was good and tasty
and the cook was fat
• Some simple saying:
– Love passes through the stomach or
– Appetite comes while eating or
– Hunger is the best cook
• The sarcastic proverb:
– Ate well, drank well, in the morning woke up
dead
• Half true, half joke:
– The best fish is always the pork
• Recipes bear the same influences as the rest of
Romanian culture:
– from Roman times there still exists the simple pie
called plăcintă,
– the Turks have brought meat balls (mititei - fried
meatballs or perişoare in a meatballs soup),
– from the Greeks there is the musaca,
– from the Bulgarians there are a wide variety of
vegetable dishes like zacusca,
– from the austrians there is the snitel and the list could
continue.
Specific character of cuisine in
Muntenia region
• The Muntenia region stretches along the
Danube, over the Romanian Plain up to
the Carpathian Mountains.
• This region’s cuisine is influenced by the
French gastronomy, but we can meet
dishes of Mid-Eastern origin.
• Some particular dishes from Muntenia are:
– dried prune stew or prune with meat stew
– pumpkin pie (notably during winter)
– duck with olives
– goose jelly or pork jelly
• In the region are notable wineries.
Specific character of cuisine in
Oltenia region
• The province of Oltenia is laid in the south
of Romania.
• These usually hurried people are very
attached to their specific dishes and are
especially fond of spicy, peppery meals.
The usually simple Oltenian cuisine is
always lavishly seasoned with horse
radish, pepper, and chilli pepper.
• Oltenian sausages are famous:
• They are made from equal amounts of
beef and pork chopped finely with a knife
and mixed with garlic, pepper and salt, the
paste being then stuffed into sheep guts.
Then the sausages are smoked for two
hours.
Cuisine from Transilvania
• Transylvania is a province inside the arch of
the Carpathian Mountains.
• For a foreigner to realize what the typical
Transylvanian likes to eat, he should think of the
taste of a piece of smoked lard or bacon eaten
with an onion and bread fresh from the oven,
together with a glass of strong prune brandy.
• Such food would do good even to someone
exploring the North Pole !!
• Pork is by far the favorite meat in Transylvanian
cuisine. Locals don’t usually eat fish, since the
province is crossed by quick rivers where fishing
is not possible. In exchange, vegetables are
enjoyed as much as meat is.
• Cabbage a la Cluj is a dish as famous as the
Moldavian sarmale or the Oltenian sausages.
Chopped cabbage is alternated with mince in a
dish and baked in the oven, after which it is
served with sour cream.
• The Transilvania region is rich in wineries
and large surfaces with plum trees, apples
trees and pear trees.
• From this fruits the local peoples prepare a
very good and strong brandy.
• The most known is the plum brandy
named palinca (almost 50 alcholic
degrees);
Specific character of cuisine in
Dobrogea region
• Dobrogea is the region stretching between the
Danube and the Black Sea, where the gourmet
is tempted by a mix of flavors and tastes
belonging to the Romanian cuisine with Greek,
Turkish, Tartar and Bulgarian influences.
• Tourists coming to this region will long
remember the delicious tripe soup, noted for its
nutritional value as well as for the fact that it is
said to be a “medicine” after bacchic excesses.
• Other dishes from Dobrogea’s cuisine that might
tempt the traveler are plachia de crap (carp
cooked with onions and oil), spitted lamb and
various sorts of fish prepared in a very simple
manner and served with garlic sauce.
• The turkish influence is seen in the specific
cakes with walnuts and syrup called baclava
and sarailie and in the turkish coffe, with a
strong flavor.
The region of Moldavia with its
northern part – Bucovina
• During the last 10 – 12 years Moldavia
and especially Bucovina becomes the
region with the biggest number of rural
pensions and motels where cultural and
historical tourism is mixing in a perfect way
with culinary tourism.
• Moldavian cuisine is said to be the most refined
of all.
• The cakes made in this part of the country are
so many and diverse one loses count.
Weddings, baptisms, winter and spring holidays
and even funerals are as many occasions for
each Moldavian woman to show off her culinary
art.
• The tourists can taste the famous poale-n brau
- small pies filled with sweet cheese.
• The specific of this area is the using of the sour
cream at “almost everything”.
• The sour cream may be the base ingredient for
some tasty sauces and cakes, as well as a very
important element who complete the final taste
and aspect of some dishes.
• Is added in the delicious chicken soup, is served
with fresh cheese and polenta, or near the
“sarmale”.
• Polenta always
accompanies Moldavian
sarmale (meat rolls in
cabbage leaves), a famous
dish served in Romanian
restaurants around the
world. These meatballs
rolled in cabbage or vine
leaves are made from
minced pork, beef or both
types of meat, mixed with
rice, salt, pepper, chopped
dill and parsley as well as
chopped onion; small
portions of this mixture are
then rolled in sauerkraut or
vine leaves and boiled.
• The region has big areas covered by
forests were are a lot of good mushrooms.
• The most tasty is Edible boletus. It is
cooked in a specific manner with a cream
sauce and little pieces of garlic and is
served with hot polenta.
• Another particular dishes are using the
trout form the mountain waters:
– Fried trout with polenta and garlic sauce
– Trout in cream sauce
– Smoked trout
• Moldavian tochitura differs from the same
dish made elsewhere in Romania. It is
made from pig’s liver and kidneys chopped
finely, mixed with pieces of lard and fried.
When this mixture is fried, a glass of wine,
pepper and garlic are added and the
whole is simmered for a few minutes. This
dish is never served without polenta.
• Moldavian wines have been
known for five centuries.
There are vineyards that
can be visited by the tourist
which can taste wines
awarded with prizes at
international wine
competitions.
• Every year during autumn
the restaurants organize
days for tasting must - the
fermented grape juice, new
wine offered with smokedried salt sheep meat.
INNOVATION IN FOOD PRODUCTS
• From the point of view of innovation, the
Romanian food products or the Romania
cuisine has “borrowed” the methods used
at international level.
• The major innovation in this area is the
using of food additives.
• The food additives are substances added
during the preparation of the foods in order
to improve the nutritional value and the
sensorial properties.
• All over the world are known aprox. 3000
food additives.
• In Romania are used aprox. 200 food
additives.
• All the additives are classified in Codex
Alimentarius, every one has E letter followed by
a 3 or 4 digit number.
• The using of additives was considered an
important innovation for diversification of the
food products.
• But the food industry exaggerates in using this
substances or used some one incomplete tested
from the point of view of theirs secondary effects
on the human health.
Benefits of using food additives
• In our modern way of life, the time for cooking is
reduced, so we need food products wit a short
time of preparation.
• The food additives have some important roles:
– Contribute to the assurance of the hygienic value of
the foods
– Improve the sensorial qualities
– Preserve or improve the nutritional value of the food
product
– Facilitate the obtaining of products for peoples with
medical problem (sweets for diabetic diet).
• The food additives can be used only in
good, fresh products.
• They can not “cure” a food if it is already
tainted or of a low quality.
• It is not allowed to use additives if the
same effect can be obtain another way (by
technology or by using natural products).
• More often, food additives are used at:
– Cakes, sweets, chewing gum, ice cream,
puddings, non alcoholic dinks
– Meet products
– Canned food
– Fast – foods
– Dressings
– Mayonnaise produced by food industry
Problems in using the food
additives
• The most of the food additives are slowly
accumulate in the human body (process of bioaccumulation)
• If a person use to eat often a food with additives,
it is very sure that the concentration of the
additive will increase till a limit; under the limit
the additive is not dangerous, but over the limit it
becomes toxic.
• That means we have to control ours food
habitude and not exaggerate with the
consumption of some specific foods.
• Another concerning reason is the toxicity
of some additives.
• To determine the level of toxicity, every
additive is tested for a long period. Even
the allowed additives are tested again
after 3 – 5 years with new methods, more
exact.
• The using of the food additives is a reality
of our life.
• We are knowing about their benefits (a
little) and we are very interested about
their potential risk.
• If it is possible, let’s use more and more
ecological foods for our health and for the
earth health.
• And, of course, turn again at traditional
recipes with all their tasty and old flavor
specific!