Lard

Another kind of thick sausages. Take flesh of turkey, hen, or veal, suckling to the cow, one part each, then chop well and mix well with a little (pork) lard without skin, well chopped. Then add whole pepper, salt as necessary, a little caraway and whole coriander, some crushed laurel leaves and mix all well together, and take a thick gut from a cow and fill firmly, then let air in the wind 3-4 days. Then boil in water, but better in white wine, adding a little lemon rind or orange rind, cut in morsels, for the scent. After boiling well, let cool in wine and afterwards drain and keep, to be eaten cold, will keep for a week and for another.

This is the translation of a seventeenth century Romanian cookbook, entitled “The Book where I write dishes of fish, crayfish, oysters, snails, vegetables, salads and other dishes for fast and non-fast days. In their serving order.” The manuscript, originally written in Slavonic script, was translated to the modern roman alphabet by Ioana Constantinescu and published in a book called O lume intr-o carte de bucate: Manuscris din epoca brancoveneasca by the Romanian Cultural Foundation Editions (ISBN 9735770903). The translation made for the second half of this book, while the first half was an introductory study by Matei Cazaccu. This study was also published in English under the title “The Story of Romanian Gastronomy” but alas, the recipes themselves were not included.

Cookbooks from the Early Modern period are rare in Eastern Europe. Elena Cartaleanu did a thorough revision of the English translation, and added quite a few useful notes regarding traditional Romanian cookery.

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