Cooking

THE NATIONAL KITCHEN

The national Serbian kitchen had been influenced by the Russian, Austrian, Ottoman kitchens through the history of the country. It's thus a kitchen very rich on dishes and scents. You will find there the sauce dishes rich in calories for the winter time, as well as the lighter Mediterranean preparations.

Generally, it is a seasoned enough kitchen with many ingredients. The grilled meat makes the base of the meals in restaurants, but the fish is also utilised along the Danube and on the Montenegro coast. Especially do not finish a meal without these sugared desserts with the fruit, being the specialty of the country.

The types of restoration

The working days beginning at dawn, the meals have been consequently organized. The breakfast is copious enough in the German way, and in hotels you will have a choice between the European formula and the Serbian breakfast proposing many kinds of cheese and sausages. The main meal has been the breakfast, and as the office hour have been extensive you will find the majority of restaurants open from 10 a.m. o 11 p.m. without interruption. You may eat the burek sold at weight or the pljeskavice in very many snack bars.

In addition to different types of Italian or Chinese restaurants there being in all great centres. The most interesting have been the people’s restaurants.

Typical dishes

The traditional dishes eaten any time during the day are:

- The gibanica, paste sheets slightly baked mixed with the cheese and eggs. It becomes burek if hacked meat and onions had been added, zeljanica with spinach, and finally krompirusa with potatoes.

- the cevapcici, little beef meat rolls baked on the wood fire and served with the onions. The same presentation has been done with pljeskavice, the national hamburger, made of the beef and pork.

- The sarme, thin vine leaves or cabbage leaves containing beef and rice. The punjene paprike are accompanying them being the paprikas stuffed with the hacked meat

- The corbe, vegetable soups seasoned enough and rich in meat pieces (lamb, poultry or pork, according to the region).

- The baklavas, sheets with nuts and oil, but less sugared than in North Africa.

The meals in Serbia-Montenegro

The meals are often a chance to make feasts and they could last a long time, especially if a new friendship were beginning, and it is not infrequent that many friends had joined at the table to exchange ideas, or more often to sing together the ancient melodies, entirely from the heart.

This could b improvised at home in a very simple manner with the maize bread, the proja decorated with the kajmak, the cottage sheep cheese found at each hearth. More generally, on unexpected occasions during the day srpska zakuska had been organized. On the table two or three types of pork sausages are waiting for you among which being the cajna kobasica always with paprika, onions and boiled eggs, and you could not leave the household without having tasted the slatko, a traditional natural sweetmeat of the housewife. Take care not to refuse!

The meals in the family or in the restaurant are copious enough and don’t order just one dish, because the waiter would no turn his head to you. This is customary enough. As an entrée the various kinds of soup or: “gibanica” have been proposed in winter time the soup and “sarme” have been preferred, while in summer time the fresh cabbage salads or the green salad or the tomatoes have been proposed. The most fresh has been the sopska salata with tomatoes, cabbage and cheese. The main dish has often been the grilled meat. In most typical dishes you would find the pecenje, the pork grilled on the wood fire or also the vesalice. Fish had not been left alone with the carp, perch and the trout from the rivers of Serbia. Finally the dessert. The nut cakes orasnice or the apple or strawberry pita would make happiness complete.