This month's Kitchen Trotter box has arrived and it will be introducing us to the cuisine of Serbia, a country I know very little about, in terms of cookery. I don't know what I expect really - lots of foraged foods like wild mushrooms and berries, woodland meats like venison and wild boar maybe? Probably totally wrong so let's go and see what's in the box !
The enclosed guide box explains that Serbian cuisine is similar to that of Austria and Hungary, but the Ottomans passed through and added a touch of Eastern exoticism, and there are also Mediterranean influences, bringing in flavours of Greece, Turkey or Bulgaria.
The first item that I pulled out of the box was a huge wafer biscuit, which will presumably be cut up to make dessert.
Munchmallows look very similar to Wagon Wheel/teacake type biscuits and are apparently very popular in Serbia - there will be no complaints from the kids, although they don't seem overly exotic to me, apart from the Serbian writing on the pack ! The jar on the left is Ajvar, a classic Serbian ingredient, made with roasted peppers; in the middle is Slatko, a cherry jam (which can be made with other fruits) which looks very runny; and on the right is a tin of paprika.
There is also a pouch of walnuts and dried cranberries, some mandarin and verbena herbal tea and a sachet of vegetable spice powder which is used as widely as salt in Serbian cooking.
On to the recipes ...
The starter is Ajvar Baskets, pastry tartlets filled with roast pepper spread and topped with sesame seeds.
The main meal is Swiss chard rolls, stuffed with rice, mushrooms, walnuts and, optionally, minced beef.
The first dessert is baked apples stuffed with slatko.
And finally, another sweet treat, Oblande, using the wafer biscuit.
I'll be back to update when I've tried out the recipes.
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Looking forward to seeing what you make with these ingredients.
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