Traditional cuisine from Bucovina – Câmpulung Moldovenesc

Who doesn't love the Bucovina cheese pies? An enchanted recipe, full of magic flavours, just like the entire cuisine in Bucovina.

Here, on the banks of the Moldova river, the culinary culture is influenced by Romanian traditions, but also traditions of the Polish and Slavic minorities. The diverse cultural elements create a fascinating culinary mosaic. Here you will experience not only traditional dishes, but also cultural authenticity and an outstanding hospitality. The Bucovina inhabitants preserve local traditions and celebrate social and religious events with old recipes and as occasions for cooking in the family.

At the heart of Bucovinei, Câmpulung Moldovenesc, this town renowned for hill and mountain landscapes of a beauty that is rare, with surroundings as if entering a fairy tale, boasts with a long tradition in animal husbandry and orcharding. The dishes made of animal products are real culinary delights. Fresh sour cream, pork products, mountain trout - these are only a few examples of the main ingredients for traditional dishes. Forest mushrooms crown them with an authentic taste. This is how, from the charm of the place and the magic of culture, there emerges a taste that floods all senses: stews (“tochituri”, “tocane”), meat rolls (“sarmale”), soups and sour soups (with home-made borsch or yoghurt). 

Tree fruits and orchards complete the rich culinary pallet.

Bucovina greets you with a feast of divine flavours, full of tasteful dishes. Besides the beautiful monasteries in the area, there is also a wide variety of traditional dishes and products: the vegetable sausage from Putna, fresh cheese meat rolls from Sucevița or the mushroom pie. The delights continue with potato knedeli and caraway potatoes and they promise a memorable culinary experience.

Bucovina: a place where each plate tells an authentic story. A gastronomic journey full of magic and flavour, with unmistakable dishes of an enchanting region.

The Izvorul Alb hard cheese: a unique product due to long-term maturation and manual processing. Its unmistakable flavour and taste will conquer you and the airy texture will be a delicacy for the senses. An authentic experience in every bite.

The traditional meat specialities at the Baciu House: will enchant your senses with cinnamon and clove flavouring. “Chișca” (Hog's Pudding), most certainly the most authentic product in the area, a delicacy that will conquer you with its slightly sweet taste, inviting you on a culinary journey to the authentic cuisine of the past; the “outlaw's sirloin”, a product whose taste stands out due to the novel processing by smoking and drying; the “boyar's sausages”, which will certainly conquer you from the first bite; the “piept hituit” (bacon) and the embers baked sirloin will delight you with their unique flavour; the traditional ham, a perfect combination of smoking and maturation; and the “toba” ( pig's stomach, stuffed with pork jelly, liver and skin in aspic), whose distinct taste is fixed by the variety of spices that combine harmoniously with the aroma of garlic: all these delights are prepared manually from the most delicious products and promise to mesmerise you with their unmistakable flavour.

Bucovina mushroom stew

Cut the mushrooms in small cubes and fry them in hot butter, mixing carefully. Add some water from time to time until the mushrooms are very tender. Beat the eggs separately, add the sour cream, salt, dill and, at the end - the fried mushrooms. Put the entire composition in the oven for 15 minutes until brown. Serve the stew warm, with polenta.

Cut the meat in cubes and fry it in a cast iron pan, together with bacon. Add some water and boil the meat mix at low fire. When boiled, add the wine, garlic, thin slices of sausages (also fried beforehand). Make the polenta separately.

Serve the stew on a plate, with the polenta on which you put cheese and fried eggs.

It is a mushroom sour soup flavoured with sour cream. Polyporus squamosus – dryad's saddle – is a mushroom that grows on living trees - walnut trees, maple trees, hardwood or fruit trees, starting from spring until October. For 5 portions: 700 g of mushrooms, egg, finely cut veggies depending on the desired density: peppers, tomatoes, carrots, onions and parsley, 800 g of sour cream, fat whey or sour borsch, salt, lovage and cow parsley. Boil the dryad's saddle mushrooms, take away the foam, then add the vegetables. When the veggies are boiled, add the fat whey - it is more tasty than the one made with wheat borsch. Depending on the desired taste, you leave it on the stove to boil once or twice and then stop the fire. Mix the sour cream with the egg and pour it into the sour soup. Spread some lovage and cow parsley on top. Serve it cold, as it is a real culinary delight in the summer.

For these delicious rolls, slightly dried and flavoured by the deep aroma of the mushrooms, we need simple ingredients and a clay pot. Let the mushrooms soak and then mince them at the mincing machine. Add pepper, thyme, rice, fired onions, pot herbs and tomato sauce. Roll the rolls and boil them. When done, serve them with sour cream. They go well with polenta.

Chișca is one of the flagship dishes in the area. It has various forms:

This dish goes well with one or several side dishes: polenta with sour milk, potatoes with pickles, beetroot and horseradish salad, red onions with vinegar or mustard.

Cheese is one of the stars in Bucovina cuisine, especially because it is used for desserts, too. And not just for the famous “poale-n brâu” cheese pie, but for many other cake recipies. For a pan of alivancă: 1 kg of “chișleag” (sour milk), wheat flour – 200 g, cornmeal – 400 g, 4 eggs, sugar to taste – approx. 300 g, cow cheese or sheep hard cheese – 400 g, baking soda, pot herbs: onion stalks and dill, lemon essence, salt, sour cream – 300 g. Mix the yolks with the sugar, then add the rest of the ingredients, pour the composition in the pan previously smeared with lard. Before going into the oven: make a composition of 2 spoons of wheat flour, one egg and 2 spoons of sugar and pour it on top. Leave in the oven until it passes the toothpick test. Mix the sour cream with the sugar, to taste, and pour it onto the “alivancă”.