Cooking, Baking and Eating: Life in Macedonia

So when you hear the name Macedonia what comes to mind? Well for most people, very few things come to mind because most people have no idea where this place is! After explaining to people that it's above Greece, they instantly think I am living in Greece. Macedonia is very different from Greece in so many ways. You may assume that I am eating food similar to Greek food, but this is far from true.

A Macedonian dinner I was served at my site visit: potatoes, rice and olives with cheese and more olives  on the side 

Greek yogurt can only be found in the capital, contrary to the fact that Greece is our next door neighbor. I have only seen Doner Kebabs (lamb that sits under heat lamps and then served in pita) in one city and the cheese here is not Feta and the people get offended if you try to call their cheese (or сирење as they call it here) feta. This post is to show things that I have eaten while here or things I have made. Of course being a vegetarian, I don't eat a lot of the traditional dishes but I have tried a lot of new dishes. My host mom has altered some of the recipes to exclude meat.

  
I never realized as Americans, how privileged we are that we can go to any store and buy all the ingredients we need for a recipe. Being in Macedonia, almost everything is made from scratch. My host mom still can't get over the fact that I have to look up recipes on the internet when I have to make something!

Cherries used to make juice and also a nice snack

If there is one food dish from Macedonia you should know about, it's Ajvar. It is a spread like relish or salsa made from roasted red bell peppers and garlic. It takes an extremely long time (anywhere from 9 hours to 2 days) to make and is very labor intensive. Each peppers must be peeled and roasted over an open flame. Macedonians eat this with bread, cheese or even plain. I love to put it on eggs in the morning since I try and stay away from the bread. Macedonians use around 60-70 pounds of peppers to make this in the Fall. They store it in jars so that it can last they throughout the long winter months.

Ajvar with сирење 

Some things I really miss that are staples in an American kitchen: vanilla extract (they have vanilla sugar here instead), PAM or some kind of cooking spray, chocolate chips (they don't exist here), evaporated or condensed milk, nutmeg, marshmallows, graham crackers, caramel, easy access to a multitude of cheeses for a small price (anything but сирење is expensive here so no parmesan or mozzarella), vegetable stock, maple syrup, Italian seasoning, taco seasoning/Mexican spices


Now my list could probably go on but for now those are the main things I miss when looking for recipes and attempting to bake and cook. I am learning to improvise and experiment which doesn't always go so well but it's a great experience!

Made brownies with my host mom last night (delicious but didn't taste like American brownies!)

Baking with my host mother has been an incredible joy. This Sunday I was in my room writing a blog post and she said "Paige, come. I am making Palacinke." This is the Macedonian pancake that is more like a crepe. I told her last week that I recently ate this at a friend's house and that I loved them. The one I had was filled with the Macedonian version of nutella (called Alpico and tastes more like a s'more spread then nutella) and it had bananas. Yum! I was so excited to have the opportunity to see how these are made. 

She only used eggs, flour and milk for the recipe 

Earlier that morning, I had attempted to make "healthy simple pancakes" that only use 2 eggs and a banana and they didn't turn out so well. I was excited to see and try her version of pancakes. I sure hope that she doesn't think that those "healthy pancakes" are the actual pancakes in America! 

She is an expert flipper, not a single one hit the floor!

Sweet success: yes those are filled with Alpico and bananas! I was so touched

While we were sitting by the stove and waiting for the Palacinke to cook, we began talking about different things we like to make. I asked her if she knew how to make homemade bread and she said yes. Little did I know that she was going to make me some! Soon after the pancakes were done, she got out the ingredients and began making the bread. I couldn't believe it. 

You have to let the dough sit for a while after making it. We had dinner and let the dough sit and after dinner it was ready to go in the oven. She sent my host father to the store for some jam so that we could have warm bread and jam as a snack. I feel spoiled and so deeply touched. I didn't mean to imply that I wanted her to make the bread today. I was just curious if she knew how to make it. 

Just after coming out of the oven 

The second loaf still looks beautiful the next day

Now my host father was feeling a little left out, in a joking way. He wanted me to take some pictures of the salads he makes for me. Yes every single night, my host father makes me these beautiful salads! 

Now before coming to Macedonia, if you asked me what my least favorite vegetables are, I would say beets and radishes. Well people change and apparently taste buds change because here I am eating these veggies and they are delicious! I sure was missing out at home. Although how we eat beets in America is gross. Here they used a cheese grater and they are very fresh. There are no beets in a can. 

The eggplant parmesan

2 weekends ago, I went over my Macedonian friend's house to make a new recipe. We made eggplant parmesan were able to find parmesan cheese, I can't believe it. The eggplant was very salty but it was still good. Next time I will be sure to use less salt. Apparently I was the expert in this recipe and having never made this, it was a challenge. This took forever to make because unlike America, you can't just buy crushed tomatoes in a can so I had to make this from scratch. Also the main oven is broken so we had to use this portable oven and it could only fit one small pan for all of the eggplant. I was happy that I was able to make this recipe under the circumstances! 

Last but not least, in case you are wondering what cakes look like in Macedonia, here is a picture from a birthday party we threw last week for 2 volunteers and one volunteer's host sister. One of the host sisters of a fellow volunteer had a connection with a bakery had these cakes made! They were so incredibly reasonable in price. These would be extremely expensive back home. What a fun birthday party with delicious cake! 

Steve loves beer (the popular and super cheap beer here is called Skopsko), Sydney loves ballet and Teadora is a huge Harry Potter (Ravenclaw) fan

Yes that's 4 layers of cake, 2 chocolate chip, 2 chocolate with chocolate and vanilla icing in the middle