Romanian cuisine () is the traditional cuisine of Romania, shaped by the country's varied geography, pastoral traditions, and agricultural heritage. Rooted in the landscapes of the Carpathian Mountains, it combines locally developed dishes with culinary influences acquired through centuries of cultural contact. Its foundations reflect the culinary practices of the region since antiquity, including the legacy of the Roman period, with influences from Balkan, Central European, Ottoman and French cuisines.
Romanian cuisine includes numerous holiday dishes arranged according to the mentioned season and holiday since the country has its religious roots in Eastern Orthodoxy. Romanian dishes consist of vegetables, cereals, fruits, honey, milk, dairy products, meat and game.
Various kinds of dishes are available, which are sometimes included under a generic term; for example, the category ciorbă includes a wide range of soups with a characteristic sour taste. Variations include meat and vegetable soup, tripe (ciorbă de burtă) and calf foot soup, or fish soup, all of which are soured by lemon juice, sauerkraut juice (), vinegar, or borș (traditionally made from bran). The category țuică (plum brandy) is a name for a strong alcoholic spirit in Romania.
With the cuisine of Romania being shared by another country, namely Moldova, there are similarities between the cuisines of the two Romanian-speaking countries.
History
In the history of Romanian culinary literature, Costache Negruzzi and Mihail Kogălniceanu were the compilers of a cookbook 200 Proven Recipes for Dishes, Pastries and Other Household Works (), printed in 1841. Also, Negruzzi writes in "Alexandru Lăpușneanu", "In Moldavia, at this time, fine food wasn't fashioned. The greatest feast only offered a few types of dishes. After the borș, Greek dishes would follow, boiled with herbs floating in butter, and finally cosmopolitan steaks"."Lumea" nr 17,1946,p 1,Art:O carte de bucate, G. Călinescu
Cheese has been a part of Romanian cuisine since the beginning of its history. Brânză is the generic term for cheese in Romanian.
Maize and potatoes became staples of Romanian cuisine after their introduction to Europe. Maize, in particular, contributed to health and nutrition improvements of Romanians in the 16th and 17th centuries, resulting in a population boom.
For about three centuries, Wallachia and Moldavia, two of the three medieval Romanian principalities, were mildly influenced by their various neighbors, like the Ottoman Empire. Ottoman cuisine changed the Romanian table with appetizers made from various vegetables, such as eggplant and bell peppers, as well as various meat preparations, such as chiftele (deep-fried meatballs, a variation of kofta). The various kinds of ciorbă and meat-and-vegetable stews, such as iahnie de fasole (beans), ardei umpluți (stuffed peppers), and sarmale (stuffed cabbage) are influenced by Turkish cuisine.
Description Romanian recipes bear the same influences as the rest of Romanian culture. The Turks brought meatballs (perișoare in a meatball soup), from the Greeks there is musaca, from the Austrians there is the șnițel, and the list continues. The Romanians share many foods with the Balkan area and former Austria-Hungary. Some others are original or can be traced to the Romans, as well as other ancient civilizations. The lack of written sources in Eastern Europe makes it impossible to determine today the exact origin for most of them.
One of the most common meals is the mămăligă (polenta), served on its own or as an accompaniment. Pork is the main meat used in Romanian cuisine, but beef is also consumed, along with mutton and fish.
Before Christmas, on December 20 (Ignat's Day or Ignatul in Romanian), a pig is traditionally slaughtered by every rural family.Christmas customs in Romania : "pig's ritual sacrifice" A variety of foods for Christmas are prepared from the slaughtered pig, such as: Cârnați – garlicky pork sausages, which may be smoked or dry-cured; Lebăr – an emulsified sausage based on liver with the consistency of the filling ranging from fine (pâté) to coarse; Sângerete (black pudding) – an emulsified sausage obtained from a mixture of pig's blood with fat and meat, breadcrumbs or other grains, and spices; Tobă (head cheese) – based on pig's feet, ears, and meat from the head suspended in aspic and stuffed in the pig's stomach; Tochitură – a stew made with pork, smoked and fresh sausage simmered in a tomato sauce and served with mămăligă and wine ("so that the pork can swim"). There are many variations of this stew throughout Romania, with some versions combining different meats, including chicken, lamb, beef, pork and sometimes even offal; Pomana porcului—pan-fried cubed pork served right after the pig's sacrifice to thank the relatives and friends who helped with the process; Piftie/răcitură – inferior parts of the pig, mainly the tail, feet, and ears, spiced with garlic and served in aspic; Jumări – dried pork remaining from rendering of the fat and tumbled through various spices
The Christmas meal is sweetened with the traditional cozonac, a sweet bread made with nuts, poppy seeds, or rahat (Turkish delight).
At Easter, lamb is served: the main dishes are borș de miel (lamb sour soup), roast lamb, and drob de miel – a Romanian dish similar to haggis made from minced offal (heart, liver, lungs), lamb meat and spring onions with spices, wrapped in a caul and roasted.Making lamb drobTraditional recipe for drob de miel , with step-by-step photos The traditional Easter cake is pască, a pie made from yeast dough with a sweet cottage cheese filling at the center.A photo of pasca
Romanian pancakes, called clătite, are thin (like the French crêpe) and can be prepared with savory or sweet fillings: ground meat, cheese, or jam. Different recipes are prepared depending on the season or the occasion.
Wine is the preferred drink, and Romanian wine has a tradition of over three millennia. Romania is currently the world's ninth largest wine producer, and recently the export market has started to grow. Romania produces a wide selection of domestic varieties (Fetească, Grasă, Tămâioasă, Busuioacă, and Băbească), as well as varieties from across the world (Italian Riesling, Merlot, Sauvignon blanc, Cabernet Sauvignon, Chardonnay, and Muscat Ottonel). Beer is also highly regarded, generally blonde pilsener beer, made with German influences. There are also Romanian breweries with a long tradition.
According to the 2009 data of FAOSTAT, Romania is the world's second largest plum producer (after the United States), and as much as 75% of Romania's plum production is processed into the famous țuică, a plum brandy obtained through one or more distillation steps.
Vegetarianism and veganism Followers of the Romanian Orthodox Church fast during several periods throughout the ecclesiastical calendar amounting to a majority of the year. In the Romanian Orthodox tradition, devotees keep to a diet without any animal products during these times. As a result, vegan foods are abundant in stores and restaurants; however, Romanians may not be familiar with a vegan or vegetarian diet as a full-time lifestyle choice. Many recipes below have vegan versions, and the vegetables section below contains many common fasting foods.
List of dishes
Soups
Borș is fermented wheat bran, a souring agent for ciorbă. Borș is also used today as a synonym for ciorbă, but in the past, a distinction was made between borș and ciorbă (acritură), the souring agent for the latter being the juice of unripe fruits, such as grapes, mirabelle, or wood sorrel leaves. Borș de burechiușe Ciorbă is the traditional Romanian sour soup Ciorbă de burtă (tripe soup), with sour cream, egg yolks, garlic and soured with vinegar Ciorbă de perișoare (meatball soup) Ciorbă de fasole cu afumătură (bean and smoked meat soup) Ciorbă de legume (vegetable soup) Ciorbă de pește "ca-n Deltă" (fish soup prepared in the style of the Danube Delta; traditionally water directly from the Danube River is used) Ciorbă de praz is a leek soup Ciorbă de pui is a chicken soup Ciorbă de lobodă is a red orach soup Ciorbă de salată cu afumătură (green lettuce and smoked meat soup) with sour milk Ciorbă de sfeclă, also called borș de sfeclă or borș rusesc (similar to borscht) Ciorbă de urechiușe, wild mushroom sour soup Ciorbă moldovenească de găină is a hen sour soup Ciorbă țărănească (peasant soup), made from a variety of vegetables and any kind of meat (beef, pork, mutton, chicken, fish) Storceag, fish soup with sour cream and egg, soured with vinegar or lemon juice. Supă (generic name for sweet (usually clear) soups, made from vegetables alone or combined with poultry and beef). The difference between supă and ciorbă is that the meat and most of the vegetables are removed, the resulting liquid being served with dumplings or noodles. There are also a number of sour soups which use lemon juice as a souring agent, called supe a la grec (Greek soups). Supă (de pui) cu găluște (clear dumpling soup with chicken broth) Supă (de pui) cu tăiței (clear noodle soup with chicken broth)
Meat
Caltaboș / chișcă - a cooked sausage made from minced pork organs mainly liver, rice, onions, herbs (parsley, dill) and spices, stuffed in a pig's bowel casing Cârnați - a garlicky sausage, mostly smoked, stuffed in clean, blanched small bowel as in Fasole cu cârnați Cevapcici - grilled dish of minced meat eaten in areas populated by Serbian minority, mostly in the Romanian part of Banat Chiftele - a type of small meatball made of ground pork, beef, lamb mixed with breadcrumbs and egg, onions, garlic and parsley. Ciulama de vițel - veal ciulama white thick flour and sour cream sauce Ciulama de pui - chicken ciulama Drob de miel - a lamb haggis made from minced organs wrapped in a caul and roasted like a meatloaf; a traditional Easter dish, usually with encased boiled eggs Frigărui - Romanian-style shish-kebab, made with pork or a mixture of ground pork and chicken , similar to the Iranian kubideh, but with different herbs and spices. - cow tongue with olives Mititei (mici) - grilled minced meat rolls, traditionally made from lamb meat, or from mixed meats (pork, veal, lamb) with lots of spices (garlic, thyme, pepper, paprika, and others) Grătar (usually made together with "mici") - grilled pork/beef, thinly sliced with condiments Musaca - an eggplant, potato, and meat pie Ostropel - method of cooking chicken or duck or any meat. It is a slow-cooked fried meat in tomato sauce. Papricaș - Chicken paprikash made with bell pepper and paprika, originating from Hungary Gulaș - Goulash, a stew made with potato and beef, originating from Hungary Jumări - kind of pork cracklings, with fat thermally extracted from the lard Pastramă - a food originating from Romania usually made from beef brisket, or from lamb, pork, chicken or turkey. The raw meat is brined, partially dried, seasoned with herbs and spices, then smoked and steamed. Like corned beef, pastrami was originally created as a way to preserve meat before the invention of refrigeration. Pârjoale - a type of meatball bigger than chiftele, originating in Moldova, with breadcrumbs and parsley Piftie - the preparation of this dish is similar to the French demi-glace. Pork stock is reduced by simmering, which is placed in containers, and spiced with garlic and sweet paprika powder. The boiled pork meat is then added, and left to cool. The cooled liquid has a gelatinous consistency, salty, garlicky and peppery. It is eaten cold. Plescavița - hamburger type meat consisted of spiced minced pork, beef and lamb meat, originating from Serbia Pleșcoi sausages - registered as a Romanian protected geographical indication (PGI) product in the European UnionCârnații de Pleșcoi, al șaselea produs românesc recunoscut și protejat în UE