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  • Bulgarian foods glossary and food terms

    GLOSSARY OF FOODS AND FOOD TERMS

    Banitsa or Banitza: Bulgarian national dish made with phyllo pastry filled with cheese, spinach, pump-kin, meat or fish mixtures. May be shaped as square or round pies, or small twisted shapes. For New Year’s Day it contains small charms.

    Bulgur Pilaf: dish made from rice browned in butter with onion and chopped calf’s liver. Broth is poured over to complete the cooking.

    Guivech: an oven-baked stew.

    Selska Tchorba: slightly sour soup made with lamb broth, rice, and celeriac.

    Sharan Sawrehi: festive Bulgarian New Year’s dish and eaten on festive “meatless” days; a whole baked carp stuffed with rice and ground nuts, well seasoned, or with raisins, walnuts, and onions.

    Shopska Salata: simple salad of layers of fresh greens and sliced tomatoes and cucumbers (or other fresh vegetables) sprinkled with walnuts and grated sirene cheese.

    Sirene: fresh white goat’s cheese, similar to the Greek feta.

    Slivovka, Slivova or Slivovitsa or Slivovitza: potent plum brandy.

    Soupa: soup.

    Tarator: Middle Eastern chilled soup of cucumbers and yogurt.

    Taskebap: stew similar to a goulash, made of veal, tomatoes, and seasonings.

    Tchorba or Chorba: sour soup made of any greens cooked in water and finished with a delicate sauce ofegg yolks and cream (or yogurt), flavored lightly with onion, garlic, salt, and pepper. The sourness is achieved with the addition of lemon juice, vinegar, or yogurt or sometimes sauerkraut juice added to taste.

    Tokfozelek: delicious dish of strips of summer squash lightly cooked with butter, a little water, vinegar, sugar, and dill. Just before serving, the dish is blended with sour cream. Other vegetables and yogurt may be prepared in the same way.

    Turlu Guivetch: basically a dish of stewed lamb to which a number of fresh cubed or sliced vegetables are added. The dish may be baked in the oven. Frequently served in soup plates with rice or pilaf.

    Zelen Haiver: typical Middle Eastern appetizer of cooked, seasoned (much garlic and pepper) and pureed eggplant, which is spread flat on a large plate and eaten by dipping bread into it.

  • Special Occasions and Foods Commonly Used in Bulgaria

    SPECIAL OCCASIONS

    Although the more than 8 million Bulgarians include a variety of ethnic groups, almost 90 percent of them belong to the Bulgarian Orthodox Church, a branch of the Eastern Orthodox Church; about 9 percent are of the Muslim faith, and these include the Turks and the Pomaks (the name given to Bulgarian converts to Islam), and a part of the remaining l percent are of the Jewish faith.

    When possible, Christmas is celebrated with a roasted suckling pig, while a young roasted lamb forms the highlight of the Easter dinner. Fish is especially important in festive menus for “meatless” days: the traditional baked carp, sharan sawrehi, stuffed with a rice and nut filling, or with raisins, walnuts, and onions.

    Weddings often occur in civil ceremonies, but with the bride and groom in full traditional dress. A merry time with singing and dancing the circular horo or the famed couples’ dance ruchenitsa, accompanied by heaped platters and full glasses – especially of Slivovka – complete the festivities. The wedding feast itself usually centers around a guivech (an oven-baked stew) of cubed lamb and succulent vegetables (an everyday guivech would be of seasoned vegetables only) to be followed by salads, condiments, and pickles, and a display of selected fruits in season, baklava, semolina puddings with rosewater, and finally Turkish coffee.

    FOODS COMMONLY USED

    The Bulgarian cuisine is mainly adapted from Turkey and Greece but many native dishes can be traced readily to each of the neigh-boring countries. The staple and plentiful vegetables, dried white beans, peas and lentils plus yogurt, though seemingly simple foods, are used with such ingenuity that they become a variety of hearty and nutritious dishes: guivech, dolmas, pilafs, tchorbas, musaka (made with potatoes or the more traditional eggplant). And though onions and garlic are very much favored, Bulgarian dishes are not highly seasoned, but seasonings and natural herbs are used with a deft hand to bring out the inherent flavors of the food. As well as a love for pickles, olives, and peppers as condiments, Bulgarians enjoy tartly sour dish-es, and in these the acid from lemon juice, natural yogurt, or sauerkraut add tang. Names of dishes vary slightly from one area to another, but the largest percentage of meals is based simply on wholegrain cereals, vegetables, cheeses, and yogurt.

  • Domestic Life, Meals and Customs in Bulgaria

    DOMESTIC LIFE

    The traditional Bulgarian kitchen is bright with homespun and hand-embroidered table linens and curtains, hand-painted pottery dishes, and carved wooden mugs. Strings of peppers and mushrooms of many varieties add color and aroma as they hang drying from the rafters. In country or city, the eating area is the heart of the home; hospitality centers around food and people and the sincere enjoyment of both.

    In general, the present standard of living, though rising, is still low. The general housing shortage often means that two families live in a one-family residence. Average salaries provide for the necessities of life. Food shortages are common and kitchen facilities and dining areas meager. Food storage is not a problem since most foods are purchased on a day-to-day basis; and with most women working outside the home, there is little time for preserving and pick-ling, though Bulgarians are very fond of pickles and thick, sweet preserves.

    MEALS AND CUSTOMS

    Most Bulgarian meals are simple, hearty, and nourishing. Breakfast is usually bread with coffee; occasionally cheese and fruit may be added. Lunch would be a salad of chopped or sliced fresh vegetables mixed with nuts and cheese or lightly dressed with oil and lemon juice, followed, if available, by a meat or fish dish, and then by a dessert made with milk and cereal (e.g., rice pudding) or fruit and yogurt. A dinner may begin with an aperitif of Slivovka, black olives, and cheeses, a tchorba (stew of meat and vegetables), a side dish of cold dressed beans or lentils, all accompanied with wine and followed by fruits and Turkish coffee. The main difference between urban and rural meals would be the variety of foods presented and the presence of meat.

  • Bulgarian Foods

    FOODS FROM BULGARIA

    DAIRY PRODUCTS

    Sheep’s and goat’s milk are made into many types of cheeses or used as sour cream, milk, or yogurt. Yogurt itself may be used as a cooling refreshment or as a drink either plain or diluted with cold water. It is also used in soups, vegetable dishes, and served with cooked wholegrain, meats, and fish. Sometimes yogurt is used in desserts or served with fruits. Whatever the form of the dish, Bulgarians enjoy dairy products at every meal.

    FRUITS AND VEGETABLES

    Fruits and vegetables are also an important part of daily menus. Many main dishes are thick vegetable stews, sometimes including legumes, and sometimes served with cooked grains or hearty wholegrain breads. A meal is considered incomplete without at least one side dish of fresh greens, sliced onions, pickles, radishes, cucumbers, or tomatoes; in win-ter, olives and many types of pickles may be used instead. A usual dessert is fresh fruit or a compote of fruits cooked in a syrup.

    There is wide variety and excellent quality in apples, plums, cherries, peaches, melons, watermelons, apricots, figs, and pears. The grapes are so famous that much of their crop is exported. Fruits may be eaten fresh, as jams or jellies, or as very thick spoon sweets to be served with glasses of cold water or Turkish coffee, made into fruit compotes, and occasionally into fruit drinks or fruit soups.

    When it is necessary to export much of the fresh vegetable produce, the Bulgarian staples become beans, onions, potatoes, and rice. But fresh salad vegetables are eagerly enjoyed when available, and fresh seasonal vegetables become the center of the meal: eggplant, okra, squash, pumpkin, onions, potatoes, cabbage (sauerkraut is prepared and used widely). When possible, many vegetables are pre-served with garlic and brine to create many interesting pickles for condiments, hot peppers being a great favorite.

    MEATS AND ALTERNATES

    Arguably, Bulgarians are mostly vegetarian by necessity rather than by choice, but if available, lamb and mutton are enjoyed. Pork and veal are seldom used, though pork may be part of a special occasion meal. Fish is mostly consumed near its source: the Black Sea and Bulgaria’s rivers. Varieties include turbot, carp, shad, sturgeon, crayfish, mussels, and snails. Eggs are generally in poor supply but are used often as a custard to bake over the top of a vegetable casserole. Legumes are an important part of the diet in good times and had: small white beans, yellow, red and brown lentils, other beans, and peas eaten fresh and dried. Very occasionally game may be enjoyed roasted or in casseroles with other vegetables: hare, duck, venison, partridge, pheasant, and quail. Nuts of all kinds are an important source of protein. They are chopped or crushed or ground to a fine powder and may be used in soups, salads, meat and fish dishes, with vegetables or with desserts. Locally grown nuts include: green and ripe walnuts, hazelnuts, and almonds.

    BREADS AND GRAINS

    Many breads are made with white wheat flour, whole-wheat flour, rye flour, and cornmeal. Rice may he cooked into soups, mounded into pilafs, sweetened and made into desserts. Crushed wholewheat bulgur and kasha (buckwheat) may be cooked as a base for vegetables or as a side dish. The type of cereal or flour preferred depends on the area; nearer Romania, cornmeal prepared as a baked pudding or as a coarse bread can be as much a staple food as the Romanian mamaliga. Grains are also used to stretch the meaty flavor of rarely used meats (in the same way that meats and vegetables are often combined), especially in meatballs and many types of vegetables stuffed with ground meat and grain filling, then slowly simmered for deep flavor.

    FATS

    The most-used cooking oil is sunflower seed oil. Olive oil is also widely used both in cooking and as a dressing with garlic, onions, and lemon juice to add zest to crisp fresh salad vegetables. Cold cooked legumes may also be dressed this way and served as a side dish. Butter may be melted and used to prepare the sugary, nut-filled layers of phyllo pastry in many forms for rich desserts, and butter may also be eaten with vegetables, but breads are often just broken and eaten plain or with cheeses.

    SWEETS AND SNACKS

    Bulgarians love to nibble on seeds of all kinds that have been toasted and/or lightly salted, as well as nuts of all kinds. Sweets are very much enjoyed, from a spoonful of fresh honey to thick sweetly preserved fruits with a glass of cold water or a tiny cup of strong Turkish coffee. Special occasions demand the presence of these rich sweets as well as the full range of delectable crisp and sweet nut-filled Middle Eastern pastries based on phyllo dough.

    SEASONINGS

    Onions, garlic, and oil are found in almost all dish-es except desserts. Fresh herbs are used abundantly and often just munched out of hand as they are plucked from the fields. Mint, dill, savory, and a native tarragon called ciubritsa are all used generously. In fact, a combination of salt and pepper with freshly chopped ciubritsa is used as a dip for bread instead of butter.

    BEVERAGES

    Plain yogurt or yogurt diluted with cold water is the favored drink with meals, or is enjoyed as a between-meals refresher. Wine may be used with meals on special occasions. Mastika, a grape brandy, and Slivovka (plum brandy) are taken as a potent aperitif with a variety of meze (appetizers) before dinner or for special occasions. Turkish coffee, brewed in a special pot and served in tiny cups, is taken at the end of a meat or served frequently as a refreshment for guests.

  • Bulgarian Foods and Culture

    Foods and Culture of Bulgaria

    Famous for its exports of fine fruits and attar of roses (used in perfume blending), Bulgaria is probably most renowned for the legendary vigorous health and longevity of its inhabitants. The Bulgarians themselves modestly attribute their health and long life to the properties of yogurt, which they claim was invented in Bulgaria. But a closer examination of their general dietary pattern shows it to be one of the healthiest in Europe, basically consisting of varied wholegrain, legumes, cheeses, yogurt, and fresh fruits and vegetables. Whether this diet is due to tastes, tradition, or to the almost “semi-permanent shortage of meats and meat fats” is difficult to assess.

    Bulgaria is located in the heart of the Balkans bounded by Romania, Turkey, Greece, the former Yugoslavia, and the Black Sea. Bulgarian is the official language. Differing ethnocultural groups such as the Gypsies and Macedonians speak Turkish and several other languages. Bulgarian Christian Orthodox is the traditional church of Bulgaria, engaging more than 85 percent of the population, with smaller groups of Muslims (13 percent), Jewish (0.8 percent) and others (1.1 percent).

    A continental climate of cold winters and hot summers prevails over the mostly hilly and mountainous terrain, but the fertile areas of the Dambian Tablelands and the Thracian Plains produce rich harvests of wheat, rye, corn, rice, and legumes, as well as orchards and vineyards famed for their quality fruits.

    Bulgar means “man of the plow,” and the predominantly agricultural people who call themselves Bulgarian are actually a blend of many ethnic groups: tribes from the Asiatic Steppes, and early Slays who later melded with smaller groups of Turks, Greeks, Macedonians, Romanians, Serbs, Jews, Gypsies, Armenians, and Russians. In fact, most of the Bulgarians who came to North America before the Second World War were peasants and laborers of Macedonian origin from the Balkan Mountains. Later immigrants (after the Second World War) were mostly urban professionals and intellectuals who found themselves dispersed throughout Europe and were unwilling to return to their homeland because of Communist domination.

    The long history of Bulgaria included acceptance of Christianity by King Boris I in the mid-800s, which led to the development of the first written Slavic in the form of church liturgy and the birth of the Cyrillic alphabet, also used by the Russians. Subsequent wars fought by the Russians and Serbs all left their mark, but it was mostly the 500-year domination by the Ottoman Empire that left Bulgaria with a Turkish imprint on its traditions and food customs.

  • Belgian Foods Glossary

    GLOSSARY OF FOODS AND FOOD TERMS

    A la Flamande: “in the Flemish style,” i.e., rich with smooth egg and cream sauces.

    Amuse-geules: small cocktail tidbits.

    Biftek: used to describe any trimmed, boneless piece of meat whether beef, veal, pork, or horsemeat.

    Botermelk met Mavermout: buttermilk soup thickened with oatmeal, enjoyed on meatless Fridays in Catholic Flanders.

    Boudin: sausage.

    Boudin Blanc: mild-flavored sausage. Boudin Noir: blood sausage.

    Boulangeries: bakeshops specializing in “everyday” breads, rolls, cakes, and pies.

    Carbonnades Flamandes: famous Belgian dish of stewed beef and onions simmered in beer.

    Chicoon: French name for the variety of chicory from which the Belgian endive was first developed.

    Confiseries: fancy bakeshops featuring party cakes and pastries.

    La Cramique or Rosynenbrood: a loaf rich with raisins and eggs, served thickly sliced and buttered, with coffee. The favorite coffeebread of Belgium.

    Creme Fraiche: slightly thick and flavorful cream available in both France and Belgium, widely used for fruits and desserts and in cooking.

    Crevettes: tiny shrimp.

    Elixir d’Anvers: one of the national liqueurs of Belgium, somewhat similar to Benedictine.

    Elixir de Spa: Belgian liqueur with a taste of pine. Estaminets: beer taverns.

    Fondu Bruxelloise: a favorite appetizer of chilled thick cheese sauce, poured into a pan then cut in squares, breaded, and deep-fried.

    Fraises des Bois: strawberries. Frites: french-fried potatoes. Fritures: any deep-fried food. Hutespot: the Flemish pot-au-feu. Keppebouillon: chicken soup.

    Kervelsoip: light buttery soup, flavored with fresh chervil

    Marcassin: wild boar. Moules: mussels.

    Padstools: a delightful appetizer of salmon-stuffed eggs arranged on end with tops of tomatoes to resemble mushrooms.

    Patisseries: fancy bakeshops featuring party cakes and pastries.

    Pistolets: traditional rolls for late Sunday breakfast. Preisop: smooth pureed leek and potato soup. Preskop: headcheese.

    Rijspap: Flemish rice pudding made with milk, rice, and raisins, flavored with saffron and cooked in a large flat dish.

    Speculaas: molded spiced breads and cookies. Sprats: small herrings.

    Tomates aux Crevettes: the favorite Belgian appetizer, tomato halves heaped with tiny shrimp in mayonnaise.

    Walzin: Belgian liqueur with a flavor similar to Benedictine.

    Waterzooi: between a soup and a stew, made with fish or chicken, its rich broth fortified with an egg and cream sauce. Served in a soup plate, it is accompanied by buttered bread or potatoes. The fish or chicken is usually served as a separate course.

    Whitloof: Flemish name for the variety of chicory from which the famed Belgian endive was developed.

  • Meals and Customs in Belgium

    MEALS AND CUSTOMS

    Belgians are noted for their politeness, which is evident in business and at home. No dinner guest would ever be late, nor would a guest arrive without a bouquet of flowers or a beautifully wrapped box of candies. A short aperitif hour is customary, followed by a leisurely dinner with wine and likely one of Belgium’s famed liqueurs with the after-dinner coffee: elixir de spa (pine-flavored), or walzin or elixir d’Anvers, both of which are similar to Benedictine, the liqueur prepared by the French Benedictine monks.

    The usual Belgian day begins with a light break-fast of bread or rolls with jam, unsalted butter, and cafe au lait. A midmorning break of coffee and waffles or cookies is likely for the women and children, while men will enjoy a beer or two.

    Traditionally, the noon meal is the main meal of the day: businessmen take a two-hour break and most children come home from school. This is the meal that begins with soup or hors d’oeuvres, then a hearty meat or fish dish with potatoes, followed by a separate course of salad or cooked vegetables. Frequently the meat is carved in the kitchen and the platter garnished with seasonal vegetables. It is interesting to note that vegetables and salads are almost a social status symbol – the higher the level, the more vegetables and salads are used. For most families, however, potatoes are the only vegetable requirement. A dessert for dinner would be fruit and cheese, a tart or pudding. Wine or beer is usually served as well.

    Throughout the day, snacks of waffles, coffee, and cookies or frites to order, dunked in mayonnaise, are generously indulged in. The evening meal is usually a light supper of leftovers or simple egg, cheese, or fish dishes.

    As in other countries in the western world, Belgian city dwellers are finding that the pressures of urban life make it increasingly difficult to enjoy that leisurely noon meal.

    Sunday is a quiet day devoted to family and friends and often features a specially prepared dinner. For some families, Sunday is the day for dinner out, and in Belgium this is a delightful prospect, for all restaurants strive to achieve a high level of renown, especially since many gastronomic societies keep watchful eyes on the menus and specialties of these establishments.

     

    FOODS COMMONLY USED

    “Coffee is a passion” and frites are so popular at home and as snacks everywhere that coffee and fried potatoes may be labeled Belgian staples. Belgium’s national dish is biftek, frites, salade – also the usual lunch for almost everyone. Biftek is not a steak per se but is the general term used to describe any well-trimmed boneless piece of meat, whether it is beef, veal, pork, or horsemeat. The frites are usually eaten with varieties of mayonnaise, such as tartar sauce, Russian dressing or bearnaise sauce, accompanied with pickles or pickled onions. In fact, mayonnaise seems to appear almost everywhere in one form or another. Fish and seafood are loved, deep-fried foods and potato-based soups enjoyed. The famed waterzooi is somewhere between a soup and a stew, made from fish or chicken in a well-simmered broth that is lightly thickened with eggs and cream and served in a soup plate accompanied with potatoes or buttered bread. As it sounds, it is a meal in itself. Sometimes the broth may be served first with the fish or chicken and the simmered vegetables served as a separate course.

  • Belgian Domestic Life and Special Occasions

    DOMESTIC LIFE

    Most Belgian kitchens, though tiny by western standards, are well equipped, people commonly own freezers and dishwashers. Because there is still a strong preference for the use of fresh, seasonal foods, large storage areas and complicated equipment are really not a necessity. Family meals are often eaten in the home, but entertaining may often occur in restaurants, further obviating the need for complex preparation or large storage areas.

    SPECIAL OCCASIONS

    Belgians, with few exceptions, are Roman Catholic, the Flemish being more religious than the Walloons. A specialty of Catholic Flanders’ Friday menu is botermelk met mavermout, a meatless soup of buttermilk thickened with oatmeal.

    Christmas is celebrated with no special menu, but with the best that each home has to offer. For many this may be a rich game dinner, for others pork or beef, but almost all will climax their Christmas dinner with a buche de Noel, a log of chocolate cake, trimmed to look like a fallen log, sometimes complete with mushrooms created of egg meringue.

    Whitsun is a spring holiday welcomed after the long winter because it heralds spring’s tender young vegetables and wild strawberries.

    Family christenings are celebrated with afternoon tea or coffee; small packages of candied almonds are often sent to friends as a memento of the occasion. First communions, engagements, and weddings are often celebrated as formal occasions with elegant buffets and dances.

  • Foods from Belgium

    BELGIAN FOODS

    DAIRY PRODUCTS

    Fresh milk as a beverage is not too popular; even children prefer to drink cafe au lait. Much fresh cream and whole milk are used in the preparation of soups, custards, and many sauces. Cheeses are often eaten with breads for breakfast. Creme fraiche, a thick and slightly tangy cream, is used both in France and Belgium for cooking, with fruits and in desserts.

    FRUITS AND VEGETABLES

    Fresh seasonal fruits are preferred and good variety and excellent quality are to he had in supermarkets, specialty stores, and open markets. A typical Belgian touch is to add dried fruits to many meat dishes, especially in the winter when vegetables are scarce and more costly.

    Vegetables are of great importance in the Belgian diet and seldom served without distinction; they are usually served as a separate course, appropriately sauced and garnished, but often overcooked. Potatoes are a part of almost every lunch and dinner, especially when meat or fish is served. Cabbage, turnips, and potatoes are winter staples. Especially favored vegetables include cabbage, escarole, Belgian endive, cauliflower, brussels sprouts, cressonette (water-cress), leeks, hop sprouts, and, of course, the ever-present potato, especially in the form of frites, served with some variety of mayonnaise.

    MEATS AND ALTERNATES

    Walloon cookery is noted for an extensive use of pork, but to all Belgians meat is an important part of dinner, followed by fish or seafood, which are also much enjoyed. But whether the main dish is meat or fish, the omnipresent side dish of some form of potatoes always makes the meal filling. Favored meats: pork, beef, veal, horsemeat; no lamb or mutton. Game meats are very popular and Belgians love to hunt: marcassin (wild boar), hare, rabbit, roe-buck, wild deer, wild duck, grouse, snipe, quail, partridge, and thrush. Favored fish: salmon, mullet, trout, turbot, skate, flounder, pike, carp, whitefish, dourade, mackerel, lotte, cod, herring. All seafood and shellfish are savored, especially mussels, which are called “the poor man’s oysters.” Other seafoods enjoyed are: eels, scallops, clams, crayfish, small crevettes, and large shrimp, oysters, and lobsters.

    Eggs are consumed mostly as part of other dishes: rich egg and cream sauces, mayonnaise, etc. Occasionally eggs may be part of light supper dish-es. Nuts and legumes are not an important part of the Belgian diet.

    BREADS AND GRAINS

    Dry breakfast cereals or hot cooked porridges are seldom used. Crusty white bread is preferred either as the “Belgian family loaf” or as crusty small rolls called pistolets, which are a favorite late Sunday breakfast treat.

    FATS

    Unquestionably, the Belgians consume a consider-able amount of fat in the form of dressings and sauces, mayonnaise accompaniments, fried foods, and but-ter, which is used lavishly. Butter preferences are as individual as wine preferences and the particular butter is selected by the name of the producer and the area it comes from, but whoever produced it or wherever it came from, the true Belgian will choose unsalted butter as having the superior taste. Both butter and lard are used in cooking and baking.

    SWEETS AND SNACKS

    The object of desire – sweets to satisfy the Belgian sweet tooth – are everywhere in evidence. And of course, Belgian chocolate and Belgian waffles (with strawberries and whipped cream) are legendary. Boulangeries, patisseries, and confiseries are never too far away. For any occasion, gifts of exquisitely pack-aged candies are appropriate and customary. A typical popular snack is the readily available Belgian waffles, served with butter and sugar or whipped cream and sometimes fresh fruit. Belgians also manage to consume, with ease, great quantities of crisp dry cookies (achieved by using ammonium carbonate instead of an equal amount of baking powder). The frequent cup of coffee is seldom served alone; usually it too is accompanied by a sweet baked product. Late afternoon ladies’ gatherings also enjoy “cakes and gossip.”

    SEASONINGS

    There is only a subtle use of onions and garlic in Belgian cookery and fresh herbs of all kinds are preferred. The favorite herb is chervil, while the favorite spice is nutmeg. The richness of butter, cream, and eggs stands alone as the flavoring in many dishes.

    BEVERAGES

    Estaminets are the popular beer taverns where businessmen are said to down unbelievable quantities of beer. Coffee is served to all ages at all meals and often between meals as well. Belgians are very knowledgeable about wine selection and usually purchase their wine with their groceries. Wine is frequently served with dinner.

  • Belgian Food and Culture

    Food and Culture in Belgium

    In 1830, Belgium, a small heavily populated country bordering on France, Germany, and Luxembourg, detached itself from the Netherlands and became an independent nation. Its history is a long story of other nations marching over Belgian soil, each leaving an imprint upon the people and their traditions: Romans, Franks, Spaniards, Austrians, Dutch, and especially the French.

    Belgium is made up of two main groups: the Flemings in the north, a Teutonic people who speak Flemish (a dialect of Dutch related to German), and the Walloons in the south who are primarily a Celtic people who speak a dialect of French. It is said that Antwerp, the northern Flemish business city, represents its people’s character: “salty, stubborn and proudly provincial,” while Brussels, located in the heart of Belgium, and about four-fifths French-speaking, seems to represent the more emotional and flamboyant Walloons.

    But wherever one goes in Belgium, North or South, despite the differences, some things are universal. Almost everywhere, except in remote rural areas, English is spoken and understood; Belgian husbands become emotional on the subject of food and argue about whose wife is the better cook; and Belgians like their food in ample quantity and of good quality. But although good food well prepared is a priority, Belgians are not adventurous cooks. They have little interest in experimenting with “foreign” dishes, remaining happily confident that the best is Belgian home cooking and the best of restaurant food is none other than the haute cuisine of France. And although the Flemish favor foods masked with velvety sauces of cream and eggs, and the Walloons make extensive use of pork in their dishes, the overall tone of Belgian cookery is definitively French.

    The meticulous care with which Belgian cooks select their foods can best be illustrated by a walk through a Belgian supermarket, where even every-day items like butter and cream are carefully labeled with the proud producer’s name, where an incredible array of exquisitely garnished cold meats, pates, sausages, salads, and prepared appetizers delight the eye, and where varieties of canned, packaged, and bottled goods line up in colorful profusion unparalleled elsewhere. Advertisements proudly proclaim:

    “Butter from Namur” … “Asparagus from Malines” … “Pork and pork products from Pietron” … “Walnuts from Bastogne” … “Strawberries from Wepion.”

    The tremendous Belgian sweet tooth is not gratified in simply one bakeshop alone. A distinction is carefully made between the daily baked goods, which may be purchased from a boulangerie, and party specialties, which are selected from a patisserie. Candies and confections are so important they are sold in specialty stores called confiseries, where even a wan-ton glance seems to add pounds.

    But gradually, as is happening in other parts of the world, some of the high standards of daily shop-ping and food preparation must be lowered to accommodate the modern lifestyle: the realities of traffic snarls, working mothers, and a shared inter-national desire to narrow the waistline.