[Cz-L] Mamaliga

When you have mamaliga mit schmetten, don't forget the Brinza de Braila.  In North America they lump it with Greek Feta (same thing - ewe's milk cheese)  Occasionally you can switch to Kashkaval which is also from sheep's milk but has a different taste - not as easy to find. 

In California I kept a large garden and was plagued by snails and slugs.  Someone told me to "harvest" them and put them in a box with corn meal. In a few days they were good to eat as Escargot. The snails ate the  cornmeal and it cleaned them out which then made them safe to eat. Not for me, though.  However, the idea of corn meal (Mamaliga) cleaning us out was an inspiring thought which prompted me to have mamaliga much more often.   

I visited Romania in 1994 - the first visit since leaving in '39 - and stayed with a Romanian filmmaker in Bucuresti. "Now that I'm here," I said, "we have to have some Mamaliga!"  "Ah, Mamaliga," said he as if I had referred to a long forgotten, deceased relative. He hadn't had it in years. I tried half a dozen shops before I found one that actually had a little bit in a sack. And it was in very poor shape.  We had to sieve it over and over again to clean it out.  I suspect that in his effort to distance the country from its peasant image, Ceausescu discouraged peasant food which is what Mamaliga was.

Italy's version, Polenta, is now available in a plastic casing in many food stores. It looks like a yellow sausage in that form.  It's ready to slice and heat up or fry.  But I still like to make it from scratch. It's more heymish that way.

Before the war, little Romania grew more corn than all of Canada but I'm afraid that today a lot of Romanian youngsters never heard of the heavenly food called Mamaliga.
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Received on 2009-10-05 02:43:07