New Year vies with Easter as the most important celebration in the Romanian calendar, the latter being the most important religious celebration of course. New Year’s Eve, Revelion, is an important date in our home as it is Petronela’s birthday – so ‘open house’ in accord with Romanian tradition. All are an ‘excuse’ for a magnificent feast which would please any Yorkshireman. Our tiny flat was stuffed, as were our bellies, with traditional Romanian New Year dance and celebration music as a background (see video clips links at the end of this post).
Carp (crap in Romanian) is one important New Year’s Eve dish and, as I reported in an earlier post, I was delighted to find one in Leeds Kirkgate market. This, at 1.5kg, simply baked in the oven for 1 hour at 180degC (in foil) with a couple of garlic cloves inside, was reserved for dinner with Romanian guests who stayed overnight for Revelion – New Year’s Eve, hogmany – celebrations. It is eaten with mujdei – mashed garlic which might be in oil, milk or water to make a sauce. Delicious – see picture!
Birthday ‘open house’ spread

Romanian food and wine for ‘open house’ on Petronela’s birthday – the part of the spread which would fit on the table. Romanians will no doubt recognise things but there’s an explanation in the text
While Petronela made two other important dishes the day before – salata de bouef (despite the name, no beef but piept de pui – chicken breast, cartofi – potatoes, morcovi – carrots, pastarnac – parsnip, castraveti murati – pickled cucumbers, mazare – peas, all in maioneza (mayonaise, real home-made mayonaise of course), and parjoale (Romanian meat balls), I was back to Leeds Kirkgate market to Marinela’s Romanian shop for other authentic Romanian food.
I found kaiser (cured pork), carnati taranesc (‘peasant’ sausages), salam Victoria (a salami with whole pieces of ham in a kind of firm pate), salam de Sibiu (Romania’s most famous salami from the town of Sibiu – really delicious), gogosari in otet (red bell peppers pickled in a sweet vinegar), gogonele (green tomatoes – again pickled). Also on the table are pufuleti (puffy corn bites beloved of children – like me), covrigi de Buzau – twisted bread sticks from the city of Buzau, brezel – little salted pretzels, fursecuri – there are many types of these little sweet pastries but these are cones with Turkish delight inside, nucsoare – little walnut-shaped sweet pastries filled with a nut, cocoa and rum essence mixture, and two renowned Romanian wines, the rose Busuioaca de Bohotin (which our English guests were crazy about) and Grasa de Cotnar (again much appreciated by those of our English guests who prefer a sweet wine). Also on the table, one of our favourite Romanian red wines, 3 Hectare, and home-made (in Romania) cas – sheep’s cheese, from our freezer.
Dinner
Apart from baking the carp, my contribution to the New Year’s Eve dinner was ciorba de burta – it translates literally as ‘stomach soup’ and if that doesn’t sound very appetising then ‘tripe soup’ won’t sound much better to most people. Even many Romanians (including one of our guests) won’t eat it. It’s delicious: briefly, ox marrow bones and pig’s trotters are boiled up with some onion, garlic and root vegetables for a couple of hours; the cleaned tripe, cut into thin short strips, is simmered in the resulting liquid for an hour or so till it’s tender, then vinegar (preferably from pickled vegetables) is added. It’s finished with egg yolks and sour cream beaten together and added before serving. The best I ever ate was – would you believe it? – in the railway station at Gura Humorului in the Bucovina – but mine was pretty good. One course is friptura (grilled or fried meat); ours were chicken legs, marinaded in wine, oil, garlic and herb and spices then cooked in the oven.
Our Romanian guests brought piftie (or racituri) – basically pieces of tender cooked meat in jelly, another favourite of mine, and sarmalute (stuffed pickled cabbage leaves).
LA MULTI ANI !
Two video clips of Romanian New Year traditions (click the picture):
My goat is very proud
Hi little horses – let’s gallop
November 13, 2015 at 5:31 pm
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January 23, 2015 at 1:50 pm
Romanians certainly know how to enjoy themselves! The feast you laid on sounds wonderful. My husband’s a Yorkshireman, so I know all about Yorkshire appetites!. It’s a little late to wish you Happy New Yer / Revelion – but I’ll do it anyway. .
January 27, 2015 at 7:30 am
Many thanks Millie. Sorry for the late acknowledgement – recovering (well – no small thanks to the Romanian doctor who happened to be on duty on the day) from surgery last Friday. I hope 2015 is a great year for you (and your ‘tyke’ too!).
January 2, 2015 at 10:07 pm
I’m hungry!
January 3, 2015 at 6:42 am
Hi Eddy. Happy New Year to you all. If I manage to make the intended trip to Romania in the camper this coming summer we can maybe call in on you on the way, or the way back. I don’t need to tell you that it was the Poles who introduced us in this part of the world to what we call the ‘delicatessen’. Good luck with the buckets!
January 3, 2015 at 9:17 am
You will be more than welcome, it would be great to meet you both in person, having come so close on my last visit to the UK. I’d imagine it would be a good spot to break up the long journey and we can always find you a bed if the camper is feeling claustrophobic 🙂
January 2, 2015 at 7:15 pm
Reading this brings back lovely memories of that tasty spread and delicious wine! Best birthday spread ive seen and had chance to eat too for a while 🙂
January 3, 2015 at 6:30 am
Thank you Stephanie. We’re glad you enjoyed it. Suggestion: put a visit to Romania on your bucket list!
January 2, 2015 at 4:04 pm
Happy New Year!!!! 🙂
January 2, 2015 at 5:25 pm
Thank you Adeena. We hope you and yours have a great 2015. I’m sure you “know how to live each moment”. I’m learning – from Romanians!