Under the balcony in my first home place in Shipka is huge fig tree. The one with which leaves Adam & Eve covered... There first time in life I tasted this odd looking fruit - fig.
 |
| For my northerner tongue the edible chestnuts tasted just like potatoes, but a bit sweeter. |
Walnuts. In Bulgaria walnut trees ar as common as maple trees in Latvia. In many places of Shipka they are growing over the roads. As I went to do my volunteering work I always end up with pockets full of nuts collected from streets.
During the stay in Hristos house I tried many Bulgarian meals, which main ingredient was sweet pepper. This vegetable, loaded with vitamin C, is really common in Bulgaria. All the pepper meals in this house were cooked with special pepper cooking thing called chushkopeck.
Bulgarians act like eating soup with bread is theirs thing. So it seems for me. Everyplace where I have been hosted by Bulgarian and have had a soup or other meal with similar consistency I always was offered to eat bread in someway like this: " Do you want to eat bread with it? Well, I don't know about you, but we Bulgarians always eat it that way..." It's nothing extraordinary in Latvia to eat just bare bread with other meals, as it has countless bakeries and huge diversity of bread... As well none ever highlights that it is possible to eat soup with bread, because it seems so self-evident to eat bread on top of it to get full up faster.
While on the subject of soups and heated meals generally, one thing that I find a bit annoying is that people here often wait for soups and hot drinks to cool down until medium, warmish heat before they eat//drink them. For me there is nothing worse than eating cold soup. Okey, I am exaggerating, but anyway for me it is not logical to heat food and eat it cold afterwards. Certainly only for me the meals seem to be cold and I am just used to eating them already from kettle and drinking tea while it still steams.
There are many products I struggle to find in shops. And if I find them there is just one choice. For example:
-buckwheat (in Bulgarian Elda)
There is never more than 2 choices of buckwheat. Yet I have never seen buckwheat in such packages as in my homeland, when there are many small bags which can be put straight into kettle and boiled.
-rye bread
Still haven't found rye bread which would satisfy me. Loafs of bread which are in picture are the only ones which from the looks are something similar to ones in my country. But didn't buy them, because they seemed too hard and out of date.
One other hand, they have full shelves of dried bread, which, I suppose, is meant to eat with honey.
-coconut milk
I have found in some shops plant-based milks, but nowhere coconut milk in cans.
-porridge
Only quick-cooking porridges I have seen are in little packages with added sugar. Something similar is also in bigger packages (without sugar), but the consistency is not so mild and I ought to soak them overnight. Everyday in Latvia I used to make myself different kind of porridges in the breakfast as it is very easy and delicious. Now I miss a bit this 'luxurious' meal.
-semolina
Found in one shop, but it looked too rude.
-not salted nuts in decent packaging and price
Meanwhile shops are full of refined food aka pastries, chips, sweets, snacks and roasted&salted nuts. No doubt that demand creates its own supply and because of Kamenitza drinkers there is no diversity among nuts with no added salt or spices. And If there are some normal nuts, the packages are so small and the price for me seems too salty.
Even though I almost never eat spiced nuts,I couldn't resist to try such combination - peanuts, almonds and olives. Also I gave a try to roasted chickpeas, rice crackers, corn and soya.
While the prices for many things are a bit cheaper, some products like: (mentioned) nuts, potatoes, oranges and bananas I still find a bit too expensive.
But despite all of that, I have unlimited access to fresh spring water. :)
No comments:
Post a Comment