A gastronomy of synthesis, with all that it entails – this is the best way to describe the gastronomy of today’s Romania. This is what we aim to promote through this website and through the events we will organise and announce here. We are Romania, and you are welcome! Ask us, visit us, get to know us and you will leave enriched – at least spiritually. And it’s not just about gastronomy, we’re just getting started 😉
A showroom of gastronomies from THREE empires and many smaller cultures
Romania is an area of permanent and intimate historical contact between civilisations, which has resulted in a truly unique showroom of flavours and joie de vivre, and which is also very accessible in every respect: you can get here relatively easily from anywhere and generally at a convenient cost, you can easily perceive the different local specificities, you can easily get along with the local people (foreign languages are studied in schools from an early age).
It all comes together here in Romania: rich, local production of plant and animal foods, facilitated by the generous geography and climate; integration of ingredients and spices from numerous foreign sources; culinary recipes taken from three great empires (Ottoman, Tsarist, Austro-Hungarian) and refined over centuries, as well as some taken from smaller Balkan, North-Carpathian or Eastern Black Sea communities (Aromanians, Serbs, Greeks, Jews, Ukrainians, Tatars); a remarkable diversity of wines (from different areas, varieties – some of them unique in the world – and styles) and traditional soft drinks and spirits (horinca, palinca, fruit brandies, liqueurs, beers); mineral waters that have been stored and purified for thousands of years deep in the mountains. In general, intense but digestible tastes that will leave you with a memory that will keep you coming back.
A zest for life like you’ll rarely find anywhere else in the world
And, above all, a cheerful (even self-ironical) generous Romanian spirit, an inclusive local culture, strongly connected to Western European values, with an emphasis on the rule of law, individual freedom and security, hospitality.
Apart from gastronomy, Romania offers a fascinating spectacle in other ways too: geographically (sea, mountains, deltas – one of them just 4 km from the centre of the capital); architecturally (from the ancient traditional architecture of cottage houses to palaces and castles, churches and monasteries or communist and post-communist buildings); here trains may run slower, but the fastest internet in Europe is widely available; we have welcoming rituals with hosts in folk costumes, who welcome you with bread and salt, but also world-class festivals such as the GEORGE ENESCU classical music festival or youth music festivals like UNTOLD or NEVERSEA; there are sophisticated cocktail bars here, as well as delicious street food; burgers and craft beers, but also sushi and regional borschts (by the way, did you know that New York Pastrami is deeply rooted in this area?) and molecular cuisine.
(Cezar Ioan – publisher vinul.ro)
Photo credit:  Romanian Food © Lenutaidi | Dreamstime.com
