I'll take some of those with a side of fried liver! Speaking of which, does fried liver qualify? Sometimes I feel like I'm the only one carnivorous enough to actually like it.
I love livers! And not just fried, but also in various dishes
Speaking of which, let me describe you a Romanian custom regarding the sacrifice of pigs at Christmas
This is for real and I advise that those sensible to
not read the following.
The text is a translation of a Romanian blog
article, which I found around 2006 or so. I'll translate this one, in order to not forget something important. I participated at this process many times before, but it's possible to forget some details, therefore I'm following that article. It is written in a sort of funny manner, but please remember that all the following procedures are true.
"The letter of a Romanian living in US
As I was feeling melancholic and I was missing home, it crossed my mind to kill a pig on Christmas, as it was the custom at my village back at home. Actually, my parents didn't sacrifice it on Christmas, but on St. Andrew (Nov. 30th) as we couldn't wait anymore because we usually didn't have too much food anymore at those times, thus we couldn't spare the pig until Christmas.
After I sharpened my knives on the floor tiles from the bathroom, I bought two straw roles (ornamental ones), which were left forgotten by a neighbor in front of his house from Halloween, then I started to look for a pig. At first, I posted on Internet that I'm looking for buying a medium sized pig (max 150 kg) in order to sacrifice it, but nobody replied, excepting a mental disoriented guy, which told me that he likes my ideas and if I'm interested, we can sacrifice many more together!
I think all the lunatics ran away from mental institutions and hid on the Internet! But that's offtopic now!
When I asked the colleagues from work where I could find a living pig, they became very curious - what do I want to do with it... some said it's too big for a pet, that it makes a lot of mess etc.
When I told them I want to kill it, their eyes popped out of their heads and they asked me why I would do that. To eat it, that's why!, but at that moment I saw gone from their looks all the rests of empathy, tolerance and understanding. How can you kiill an animal and eat it like a barbarian?
Well, when I saw they were almost calling the Animals Protection, I started to describe in detail all the specific operations, emphasizing on cutting the jugular and collecting the blood inside a bowl, eventually one which has its varnish broken, as I used to do back at my mom's home, in order to have the ingredients for preparing the blood sausage (
sângerete) and a (literally) bloody pudding (
borândău). I didn't know how to tell translate for them
borândău in English, as I didn't know very well even in Romanian what it actually is, but I explained them it is a sort of polenta prepared from corn flour and with blood instead of water.
At this point, I believe that 3 of my colleagues, maybe more sensible than others, went to the bathroom. The rest of them (as now the entire department was around me) were looking at me with mercy, but also with disgust. Afterwards, I continued, we burn the pig's skin with the straws, if we live at a house, or with a gas tank, if we live in an apartments building, and we cut the animal's ears and we're eating them on the spot, with some salt placed on them.
That was it, I sent two more of them to the bathroom, but I went on, being aware that I'll never have any other such chance, to be listened so carefully by all my colleagues. So after we shave the animal using the fire, I continued, we cut it open with an axe or a hatchet, whatever comes at hand, and we take the organs out, then we boil them, together with its head, in order to prepare the
caltaboș - a sort of thick chorizo. You all know, I believe - I told them nonchalantly - that for caltaboș the large intestine is used, optionally washed, and boiled in water with onion for masking the natural stink.
After this phrase, an entire group left the premises. And there we were, I and three others, which were less sensible and which had a less sensible stomachs. Actually, there were just two, as the third one was a Korean which didn't understand English at all, staying all day long with headphones over his ears, but which was joining any group, nodding at any discussion.
With what's left of the meat, I continued, we make sausages, barbeque and
sarmale (n.r. a sort of meat rolls covered in cabbage), and if the deceased was fat, we can prepare also some greaves, for our appetite, as they go hand in hand with the booze.
In the end, I think my colleagues should be thankful, because if I would have explained them how hot dogs and the thick, rosy sausages are prepared - the stuff they eat at lunch - maybe the entire company would have to go to a hospital afterwards.
Long live the globalization!"
