Romania has had influence from both invaders and neighbors where its traditional cuisine is concerned. Romania's traditional food sees touches of Turkish, Hungarian, Austrian, and other cuisines, but over the years, these dishes have become just as traditional as the oldest Romanian traditional foods.
Romanian traditional foods heavily feature meat. Cabbage rolls, sausages, and stews (like tocanita) are popular main dishes. Muschi poiana consists of mushroom- and bacon-stuffed beef in a puree of vegetables and tomato sauce. You can also sample traditional Romanian fish dishes, like the salty, grilled carp called saramura.
Romanian Traditional Foods - Soups and Appetizers and Side Dishes in Romania:
Soups - made with or without meat, or made with fish - are usually offered on menus at Romanian restaurants. Zama is a green bean soup with chicken, parsley, and dill. You may also encounter pilaf and moussaka, vegetables prepared in various ways (including stuffed peppers), and polenta.
Romanian Traditional Foods - Desserts of Romanian Cuisine:
Traditional Romanian desserts may resemble baklava. Other pastries may best be described as danishes (pastries with cheese filling). Crepes with various fillings and toppings may also be on the typical Romanian dessert menu.
Romanian cuisine is diverse. It blends different dishes from several traditions with which it has come into contact, but it also maintains its own character. It has been greatly influenced by Ottoman cuisine while it also includes influences from the cuisines of other neighbours, such as Germans, Serbians, and Hungarians. Quite different types of dishes are sometimes included under a generic term ; for example, the category ciorbă includes a wide range of soups with a characteristic sour taste. These may be meat and vegetable soups, tripe and calf foot soups (shkembe chorba or iskembe), or fish soups, all of which are soured by lemon juice, sauerkraut juice, vinegar, or traditionally borş (fermented wheat bran). The category ţuică is a generic name for a strong alcoholic spirit in Romania, while in other countries every flavour has a different name.
Romanian recipes bear the same influences as the rest of Romanian culture. The Turks have brought meatballs (perişoare in a meatball soup), from the Greeks there is musaca, from the Bulgarians there are a wide variety of vegetable dishes like ghiveci and zacuscă, from the Austrians there is the şniţel and the list could continue.
One of the most common dishes is mămăliga, a cornmeal mush served on its own or as an accompaniment. Pork is the preferred meat, but beef, lamb, and fish are also popular.
Before Christmas, on December 20 (Ignat's Day or Ignatul in Romanian),a pig is traditionally slaughtered by every rural family. A wide variety of foods for Christmas are prepared from the slaughtered pig, including cârnaţi (or cărnaţi) – spicy sausages, caltaboşi (or cartaboşi) – sausages made with liver and other offal, tobă and piftie – dishes using pig's feet, head and ears suspended in aspic, and also tocătură or tochitură – pan-fried pork served with mămăligă and wine ("so that the pork can swim"). The Christmas meal is sweetened with the traditional cozonac (sweet bread with nuts) or rahat (Turkish delight) for dessert. At Easter, lamb is served: the main dishes are roast lamb and drob de miel – a Romanian lamb haggis made of minced organs (heart, liver, lungs) wrapped and roasted in a caul.The traditional Easter cake is pască – a pie made of yeast dough with a sweet cottage cheese filling at the center.
Romanian pancakes, called clătită, are thin (like French crêpes) and can be prepared with savory or sweet fillings: ground meat, white cheese, or jam. Different recipes are prepared depending on the season or the occasions
