Top 10 Romanian Traditional Food

Coming to Romania? Don’t miss this Romanian traditional food you must try for a delicious vacation! Actually, it’s not just one, but 10. Let’s take it step by step and see how you can have a really traditional Romanian feast!

For starters you should try salata de vinete (eggplant salad) or/and zacusca (roasted eggplant with tomato sauce and roasted peppers); a little bit of slanina (smoked pork lard) with smashed onion; and a wide variety of cheese like telemea, urda, branza de burduf, branza in coaja de brad (cheese in fir bark). You can taste most of them at the traditional Romanian restaurants if you order a traditional plateau. The last type of cheese, the one in fir bark is specific to Bran area, so if you visit Dracula Castle for sure you can taste it at the restaurants nearby.

Let’s move on to the main dish. Actually, it’s main dishes: ciorba and main dish. There is no lunch without ciorba – a kind of soup with lots a chopped vegetables and some kind of meat. Although ciorba can be found in some other countries, there are some that are specific for Romania:

• ciorba de burta (tripe soup) I understand it could sound strange, but it’s actually delicious

• ciorba de perisoare (Romanian meatball soup)
  
  

• ciorba de fasole cu ciolan in paine – bean soup served in bread – you have to try it if you don’t feel so adventurous to try the tripe soup

• supa de pui cu galuste (Romanian Chicken soup with dumplings)
  

Enough with ciorba, let’s move on to real main dish and maybe the best-known Romanian food: Sarmale (cabbage rolls) cu mamaliga (polenta); You could also have polenta as main dish served with cheese and sour cream (perfect for dinner) or under the form of bulz (a grilled polenta ball staffed with burduf cheese);

Another traditional food you have to try is Mititei cu mustar (minced meet rolls with mustard). When you will feel the aroma in the air, you will ask for another portion.

For dessert, try papanasi. There are some kinds of doughnuts, made with sweet cheese and served with sour cream and jam. Delicious! If you arrive in Romania for Easter, try cozonac cu nuca (sweet bread filled with nuts) and pasca.

Also, drob de miel is a specific Romanian traditional food for Easter, served as an appetizer.

Since we are on the holidays part, you must know there are also some traditional dishes for Christmas, too. Most of them connected to the pig which is sacrificed in Romania for Christmas. Sarmale is on every Romanian table, piftie and cozonac. Also you must try sorici which is grilled pork skin. Trust me it tastes better than it sounds. It’s my favorite from the Christmas delights. If you decide to book a winter vacation at a guesthouse in Maramures or Transylvania, for sure your host will arrange for such a feast where you could taste them all.

If you want something quick while visiting a touristic attractions, try merdenea (salty cheese pie) or a covrig (prezel) with poppy seeds. You can buy it on street food bakeries. If you want something fancier, enter in a cofetarie and have a savarina (a cake with cream), amandina (chocolate cake) or a diplomat (cream and fruits cake).

So why don’t you come over to try all these delicious Romanian traditional foods?