Fried Cauliflower

Wash a cauliflower, let it dry, cut the cauliflower as it is a finger and a half thick.
Make a liquid dough as for pancakes: salt, pepper, thyme, other spices and herbs optional (dried dill), eggs, water and flour. You have to decide for yourself how much from each of the ingredients you should put (around 3 eggs would be a good base but make sure the eggs don't come from some fatory type of farm).
Put the cauliflower in flour and than in the pancake mixture and fry in a oiled pan.

No need to boil the cauliflower for this recipe.

Salad a la Russe (a la "my mum")

A serving for 4 people includes:
-cleaned and boiled than cut in small cubes:
2 carrots
1 big celeriac
1 parsnip
5 potatoes
2 or 3 parsley roots

- 200 to 400g peas boiled separately because it boils different from the other ingredients

- 400g broccoli boiled for just 2 minutes at the end

- a jar of pickled cucumbers raw cut (400g)

The mayonnaise:
2 or 3 eggs
not to use so much oil you can use more mustard (200g)
oil depending on how thick it should be
pepper
lemon depending on how thick the mayonnaise is at the end

Mix mayonnaise with vegetables and voila... c'est ca!

Unpicked grapes

For as long as I can remember living in this city I remember that the grapes in front of my aunt's apartment block where always picked by the people living in that building. I mean that's why they're there for, planted by people for them to give them fruit. But now the fruit went unpicked and I wonder how long will it take for the vine to get cut off and replaced by lawn just because the falling grapes dirty the cement walkway to the entrance? Sad times. I guess we've reached that point where buying either the grapes or wine uses less individual energy than climbing up a ladder to pick the fruit growing in front of one's house. Very strange twist...

Photo taken today the 25th Dec 2010.

Vegetarian Moussaka (no eggplant either)

For six large servings you will need:
2 kilos of potatoes that you peel, wash and boil.
Peal two onions, chop them finely and boil with a bit of oil and water.
300 or 200g spinach washed and finely chopped
When the potatoes are almost boiled (they should still be hard) take them out and let them cool, cut them into slices and mix with the cooked onions, the spinach, 5 or 6 eggs with some 200g of cream and 300-400g of white salty cow cheese (Romanian telemea). Also add some salt and pepper..

Pour in a oven pan greased with butter and place in oven. Bake until it forms a crust on top.

*note: the more liquid the cream and the cheese are the more liquid the moussaka will be as well so it's good to use thick cream and dry cheese.

Vegetable Hotchpotch

Have other things to put in place so I will leave this one for tomorrow, but don't expect me to explain the difference between a hotchpotch and a stew... cus I won't.:)

LOVE

Shopping day

All of Romania is in turmoil these days! Food Day is coming! Everyone has to buy as much and cook as much for the Food Day in which we celebrate the invention of mass commerce.
Both me and my mum went out to stock for the holiday which we mostly see as a time for the family to get together.
I took the following photos (more like snapshots) from my favourite market in Constanta where the supermarket feeling hasn't reached yet and people are still quite different from the rest of the McWorld:

"WE ARE ECO"
Black humour if you ask me.

Original Romanian Traditional Food!

Guacamole

Hehe, on top of the climatic conditions that don't allow avocados, the main ingredient of guacamole, to grow in Romania there is also the matter of the quite recent limited transport of this vegan Holy Grail to Romania that make it anything BUT traditional Romanian. But with more and more Romanians and Europeans in general using it how long does it take for a food to become "traditional"? It's an interesting question seeing that most of the recipes I will be writing here are 100% Romanian but at the same time 100% Turkish or 100% Greek or Arabic. People in the countryside of current day Romania will swear on that they are 100% Romanian and that's it! And they are being honest because they truly believe that. As well as the Turkish, Greek, Bulgarian, etc. peasants that hold on to their percentages like AXA insurances holds on to it's money (I've been told;P). So here follows what I would like to make myself believe is a ORIGINAL ROMANIAN TRADITIONAL FOOD; GUACAMOLE.

For two ripe (soft and blackened) avocados you will need two tomatoes, a small onion, a lime (or half a lemon), a spoonful of olive oil and salt as you feel plus tortillas to serve with (if you feel like it you can also add in a clove or two of garlic).

Cut the avocados in two, take out the pit and mash the interior that you've taken out with a spoon into a paste. You can either use a fork or a blender but the avocado should be soft enough to be easily mashed by fork with no effort. Add in the tomatoes cut in very small cubes, finely sliced onion, the juice from the lime/half lemon, salt and olive oil and serve in a bowl in which you can dip your tortilla.

We had it today but without the garlic and it felt like something was missing so maybe you should try with.

Poftă bună! (Romanian for Bon Appetit)