Magyar News, 1998. szeptember-1999. augusztus (9. évfolyam, 1-12. szám)
1999-05-01 / 9. szám
Since on TV and on the front pages of the newspapers day after day we learn something new every day, I figured that everybody knows what Y1K stands for. Then my wife enlightened me to the fact that most of our readers really don’t give a hoot about it. To explain what it is all about, first I have to deal with Y2K. It may come as a shock but it stands for Year 2(two) Kiio(thousand). This new language was invented by the computer people. Based on this, something that happened a thousand years ago would be Y1K, Year-l-thousand. We are going to learn about the dinner our ancestors could have had when the Hungarian state was established. Éva Márton, a reporter for the Hungarian Radio, visited the College of Commerce and Restaurant in Budapest. There she had an interesting interview with one of the lecturers, the chief chef István Pálvölgyi. here are some subjects they discussed. At Y1K they didn’t have written recordings. Cookbooks came into the gastronomical world much later so the researchers had to go by the archeological finds. Also they had comparisons with, for example mongolian tribes, who’s lifestyle resembles the nomad Hungarian’s of that time. Then they examined the local food supplies. The Carpathian basin was very rich in herbs. Other spices were rare or nonexistent. We know that the Hungarians were familiar with black pepper but the paprika and others entered the cooking much later. The young hunters were challenged to shoot the fast flying birds. Naturally these were on the menu. There could be hardboiled eggs with sheep cheese and fresh lentil made sweet and sour. The edible lentil grew wild on the land and was available for consumption all year long. Honey was at hand, all one had to do is fight the bees. Exploring areas of settlements they found noodles in many variations, also a variety of breads. For meat, besides the birds and the animals they hunted, they had sheep, cattle, the white ones with the very long horns. Interesting though, they loved their horses but at the same time they sacralized them in rituals. It was really the blood that was the contribution to the sacrifice because they ate the meat of these horses. Robert Cey-Bert, gastronomer spent many years in the orient and searched the culinary traditions and the religious practices of peoples who in some way are related to the Hungarians. He came to the conclusion that the food those people, and probably the ancient Hungarians, used as a sacrifice was cooked. The philosophy behind this is that with cooking the different food blend together in harmony. The animal products come together with the vegetation. There are five basic components that has to be satisfied. They are: sweet, salty, bitter, sour and spicy hot. He shows a difference to the European culture where the criteria was only four, the spicy hot was missing. Also he notes that they preferred baking to cooking, that is to better one thing, disregarding an other. It was not to blend in a harmony but to exclude others. His conclusion was that the ancient Hungarians were familiar with both trends. They also had something made out of horse milk. This is called KUMISZ. The taste of it is lightly sour with a spicy bite to it. Today it is not one of the staples because there isn’t enough horsemilk and probably the idea that it come from a horse does not sit well with our culinary culture. But don’t give up on it. If you visit Hungary you might look up Dr. Gábor Magyar, the only person who makes kumisz. The archeological explorations brought to light many object that were related to preparing food. For bacon roasting on the fire we still use the spit. They had a great variety of earthenware. This type of cooking is in use in the villages. The food is put into the vessel, covered with a lid that is seal off with mud, or now-a-days with lekvár, just leaving a slight little hole for he steam to escape. Some of these vessels were enforced with some kind of a metal wrapping. Today they use wire to make a net around it. Joseph F. Balogh Pottery made of clay and used to hold or cook food. On the left is a pythos. The shoulder is decorated with triangle lines then lower it is scratched with a comb. It was found in Edelény. Below is a cauldron from Lébény. To the right, also from Lébény is a large storage jar. The opening of it is around a foot in diameter. Page 1
