Moravian cuisine

Moravian cuisine (Czech: Moravská kuchyně, German: Mährische Küche, Polish: Kuchnia morawska) encompasses the cooking styles, traditions and recipes associated with Moravia, a region of the Czech Republic (eastern part) and historically belongs to the Moravia, former historical country in Central Europe. Today, it is often perceived as an integral part of Czech cuisine, to which it has over the last century been artificially accommodated and mixed. Nevertheless, there is a large list of dishes, drinks and customs that are original only for Moravia.

Moravian cuisine includes many pork and poultry meat and knödel dishes (koláčky, gulivary, pěry), and often uses flour, in the south many vegetables and fruits such as plums.

Character

Moravian cuisine makes much use of pork meat (in Moravian Wallachia also lamb), goose and duck meat and wild game (hares, partridges and pheasants). Lard (sádlo), goose fat (husí sádlo) and duck fat (kachní sádlo), beechnut oil and grape oil were mainly used as dish grease; butter was historically expensive and rare, and olive oil was imported. Especially in the south, there was an abundance of vegetables, particularly white cabbage, red cabbage, peppers (paprika), Savoy cabbage, cucumbers, beans, peas, cauliflower, rutabaga, celeriac, beetroot, kale, lentils, and pumpkin. In the southern part of Moravia there are vineyards, and wine and related products are used in the kitchen: grape oil, wine jelly, jam and powidl (prune butter), wine vinegar, raisins, and brandy. Moravia has more fruit orchards than Bohemia. Its most abundant fruits are apricots, peaches, plums and almonds. In southern Moravia there are also watermelons, figs and mulberries.

Spices and herbs

The dominant spices are caraway, marjoram, onion (the local variety), garlic (the local variety), and to a lesser extent also thyme, parsley, rosemary, saffron, ramson/wild garlic/bear's garlic, satureja, garden cress, mugwort, and chives, which have been planted and cultivated for many centuries (they were originally Mediterranean herbs).

History

Street markets played an important role in the development of Moravian cuisine, for example the cabbage market (Zelný trh) in Brno, which has existed for 850 years.