When you travel to unknown lands, there are a lot of new things for you to discover. And what surprises me the most is the fact that small daily tasks can become rather big challenges.
Imagine that you have to feed three growing dragons (to help your imagination: slim and tall, medium, and shorter plus chubby). Of course, they are boys. And, surely, they don’t eat the same dish two days in a row. No doubt they want meat. Or bacon. (I separate bacon because it’s a superior kind of meat. Picture the evolution of Pichu to Picachu and you’ll get the idea.) Such a super-cook challenge is a sufficient reason to look for the solutions in different cuisines. And so it begins…
– What are we eating today?
– Food.
– Sounds good. What is it called?
– Pilaf.
– Haven’t heard of it. Is it a soup?
– No.
– Hmmm. When did you say the soup is ready?
And so on and so far. Funnily enough, to find the idea for a dish is not the hardest part. The most complicated thing is to try to explain what the dish is called in another language if there is no translation. And, of course, the most important part – why? (I bet you don’t know what “pilaf” is, do you?) All these struggles bring me back to the years of my language studies and makes me regret that I didn’t choose to write my bachelor theses on the names of Greek and Lithuanian dishes.
Nevertheless, it is even funnier when the names of the traditional dishes are translated to other languages but in the original language they are named somewhat differently. If I told you that today you’ll get to eat “cabbage rolls” you‘d be totally fine. (Well, guys would ask if it has some meat inside but that’s another story.) Now imagine that I come to you and say: today for dinner we are having little doves with potatoes. (There is no doubt that some meat is included but would you still be hungry?) Despite all the confusion, it’s one and the same dish. For unknown reasons several eastern European countries call it “dovies”, and more distant regions use a descriptive translation.
Here you go – it took me a while to find all the information about the origins of the dish and the translation. Of course, I don’t want to cook anymore but I surely can share the recipe.
Ingredients:
1 cabbage,
500 g mince (pork/beef),
2 medium carrots,
1 capsicum,
200 g rice,
some tomato sauce,
sour cream,
parsley, salt and pepper.
Side dish: potatoes.
Process: Put the cabbage in a pot with boiling water and boil for 10 minutes. Then close the pot and leave it for a while. Rinse the rice and mix it with the mince, pepper and salt. Rinse the cabbage with cold water and cut off the leaves. Wrap the meat in the leaves so that they cover all the meat. The form should be rectangular. Fry the wraps in a pan for 10 minutes. (It might seem not necessary but it actually adds some good flavor. :))
Grate the carrots, chop the capsicum and put half of them in a pot. Put some tomato sauce and sour cream in and mix everything. Then put the wraps in the pot and pour a couple of cups of the water left after boiling the cabbage. Put the rest of the carrots, capsicum, some more tomato sauce and sour cream on the top. Pour some warm water so that it covers the wraps. Add some salt – the amount depends on your personal taste. When it starts boiling, lower the heat and leave for 1 hour. (No, that’s not too long, it might even be too short. :)) During that time you can cook the potatoes, read a book about different cuisines or have a nap.
P. s. I almost skipped it!
Puzzle No 2. The forgotten ingredient
A couple of days ago I went shopping. I needed several things but I totally forgot to get one of them. Here is a list of the goods I needed and the description of the forgotten item. Can you guess what I didn’t get?
The list:
5 carrots,
1 bag of chia seeds,
1 bottle of olive oil,
2 packages of rice cakes,
1 avocado,
3 peaches,
400 g salmon,
two cans of tuna,
2 bars of dark chocolate.
The description of the item: Quite fat but really healthy. Believed to have originated from Mexico and Central America.