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Cooking After the Flood in Bijelinja Bosnia August 2014

August 11, 2014 by Valerie Lugonja 5 Comments

The Outdoor Kitchen (Smoke House) and Serbian Musaka

Sunka and a Serbian Breakfast

There is a kitchen in the house that Pava only used on rainy days, and through the Winter. In the Summer, she always cooked in the smokehouse since they were displaced after the Bosnian War. Before that, she had two gorgeous homes: one lovely apartment in the city and a country house a little bit away for relaxation and family. The second home in the country is a Serbo-Croat-Bosnian tradition. But, as a child, she lost everything in WWII, so this industrious woman knew how to live with “it all” and “with nothing”. She sat on the little stool and used the bench as her table. There she worked in the cooler early morning to prepare the meal for the day. Petar and Pava are very small people. She was under 5 feet. He is probably 5 feet.

2 Serbian Musaka

Vanja and I come every year (I missed the last two, due to caring for dad) and I love to cook for them both. I use the inside kitchen. It is still a very rustic cooking experience, but manageable.

3 Cooking After the Flood

This year, the inside kitchen has been “out of commission” since our arrival. I have had to resort to “Pava’s style” of cooking: in the smokehouse, on the tiny little stool, using the bench as my counter. It takes a while for me to fold myself onto the stool and even longer to unfold myself each time I rise up.

4 Cooking After the Flood 2014

So much is gone. The wooden spoons. The potato peeler. Trashed, I assume. So, today is Serbian Musaka Day. (You can find my recipe for this dish here.) Yesterday, I made a simple pasta dinner. Of course, they never eat pasta unless we are visiting. I really enjoy stopping by the butcher with Vanja, picking out the exact kind of meat for the meal, and having it freshly ground while waiting. Do you see the square covered with bricks on the floor, above? I am in the Smoke House, remember? That is the pit where the fire is built each December for smoking the pig. Right now, I head them rooting next door, as it is about lunch time for them. They are housed in the little pig house built about 5 meters from the smoke house…. right between the cracks.

5 Cooking in the Smoke House 2014

Of course, we only buy and grind beef. Petar raises pigs every year (Spring through Fall), takes them to the slaughter house, and then brings the hung animal back home and butchers it himself. Grinds it how he likes. Makes sausages. Wraps it up and freezes it – smokes probably half of it, including the sausage. The rods and hooks to hang the meat are holding the pots for the summer and this little house always smells pretty good.

6 Smoke House Kitchen 2014

It is the same with the chickens. The pig house is sanitized in the late fall when the pigs are butchered, and early Spring he buys 50 chicken and raises them for a couple of months. Then, there is a man with a special machine that defeathers the birds who comes to the house with the equipment on his truck. Pava and Petar would slaughter the birds and put them through the “machine” for defeathering. They said it worked like a charm. Usually, Igor and Lori would plan to be there to help that weekend each year. After all, one pig and half the chickens are for them. They freeze the chickens like this: legs and thighs attached, breast meat, wings, soup meat. They have so much chicken in their freezer, I cannot imagine how they go through it all, but they do. Remember – this is a family of carnivores!

7 Cooking After the Flood 2014

The chickens are thawed for celebratory occasions as Petar is famous for his char-grilled roasted chicken, or rostilj, as it is called here. The legs and thighs are everyone’s favourite parts.

8 Cooking After the Flood 2014

I peeled the potatoes, cleaned and sliced the onions, minced the garlic, made the salad, then sliced the potatoes before rising from the stool that seemed to have become a permanent fixture on my lower anatomy.

9 Serbian Musaka

The onion, garlic and meat was fried and seasoned. While I am doing this, I sip on my morning coffee. Here it is either Turkish coffee, or “cooked coffee” (I call it sludge), or Nes. You heard me right. “Nes”. Boy! Has that company got the corner on the market here. They have Nes Classic, Nes Strong, Nes Mild, 2 in 1 Nes and 3 in 1 Nes. The latter two are sold in single serving pouches. Just add hot water and enjoy a thick sweet processed cup ‘o something resembling “joe”…. but, anyway, after being here for a while, it is actually tasty. It is expensive, so it is a luxury item and sought after by the masses of poor that still live here. There is money here, now, as well, but the disparity between the rich and the poor is significant. More than significant.

10 Nes 2014 11 Serbian Musaka

The sliced and soaked potatoes were layered in the pan, sprinkled with Vegeta, topped with a sparse layer of the cooked meat mixture and the Serbian Musaka grew into a giant meal: four layers of potatoes and three layers of meat.

12 Serbian Musaka 13 Serbian Musaka 14a Serbian Musaka 14b Serbian Musaka 15 Serbian Musaka

Into the oven it went at 10:30 am and by 11:30 am was cooked. Four eggs and some rich milk were beaten together and poured over the top. Back into the oven for 15 more minutes, and voila! (Dishes in the summer are always washed in the outdoor sink. Everyone has one, and in this town, they all look just like this. Design is not a strong point, here. It is all about function.)

16 Cooking After the Flood 2014 17 Tomato Onion Pepper Salata 2014

Ring the lunch bell! I finally understand the Mediterranean Tomato and Onion Salad. If we had tomatoes that tasted like this in Canada, this would be the salad of choice at home, too. Revealingly, the Serbian word for tomato (my favourite food on the planet) is Paradise (not spelled that way, but pronounced that way. Very fitting.)

18 Serbian Musaka

Meanwhile, Vanja and Petar moved the freezer, cleaned and moved the fridge, washed the floors in the utility room and set it all up ready to go! One morning with a great deal accomplished before 11 am.

19 Serbian Musaka

Lunch was devoured with relish. Few manners employed. Bread dipped into the meat juices. Great conversation and laughter with mouths full. Dishes were washed before an eye could be blinked and we were off to “The Park” to answer and read our e-mail by 1pm.

20 Serbian Musaka

And in the afternoon? Usually a nap. It has been known to be 52 degrees Celsius here on one of my stays. It is hot. There is no air conditioning. Everyone naps for a couple of hours if they can get to sleep in the stifling heat.

21 Serbian Musaka

Today was cool, so we ran errands; we ordered kitchen cabinets, looked at tables, and bought a front hall closet and shoe cupboard. All in all: productive.

22 Srpski Fried Chicken and Oven Roasted Potatoes

A couple of days later, thighs and legs were defrosted. Petar almost lost them in the flood. The chickens, I mean. He had to move 50 chickens three times, but says these are the best, ever!

 

23 Srpski Fried Chicken and Oven Roasted Potatoes

I fried them and attempted to make oven roasted potatoes in the little oven in the smokehouse. Finally, I place the chicken on top of them to finish cooking. Everything was delicious – not as initially imagined, but under the circumstances, I was impressed at my “Cooking After the Flood” prowess and the men were delighted and elbow deep into their chicken legs! Lip smackin’ yum.

25 Srpski Fried Chicken and Oven Roasted Potatoes

Well nourished, even in the direst of circumstances – and I guess “the direst of circumstances” would be having no food at all. Whatever the tragedy one endures, there is always something worse that “could have” happened. But, I don’t appreciate hearing those stories. I think that Vanja’s father, under these circumstances has triumphed past my imagination. I didn’t think he could or would live long without Pava. He has. And his body is strong, and healthy. His mind is forgetful and scattered. His emotions are thread bare, but he is most definitely a survivor.

24 Srpski Fried Chicken and Oven Roasted Potatoes

Why is it, though, that one person must endure so very much in his life to prove to himself over and over and over again that he can survive this, too?

26 Srpski Fried Chicken and Oven Roasted Potatoes

Surely, he need not prove this to his God, for his God would know? I am not one who believes in the old adage “One is only given what one can handle.” Or this one: “There must be an unknown lesson one needed to learn.” Sh$t happens. It just does. And to the best people.

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Filed Under: Bosnia, Personal Stories Tagged With: Bijeljina, Petar Lugonja

About Valerie Lugonja

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Educator, Writer, Gardener and Traveler who believes in buying and eating locally, and most importantly cooking at home! As a brand new Gramsy, so be prepared to hear a lot about this new role in her life!
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« Pava Lugonja: Sest Meseci Pomen
Sunka and a Serbian Breakfast »

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Bijeljina 2015: Petar Lugonja’s Sunka
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Comments

  1. Ragan says

    August 16, 2014 at 11:18 pm

    Mom this is truly a tale of survival and adaptation. It moves me and touches me to see that he is doing well and that you are helping him. I love this.

    Reply
  2. Danka says

    January 26, 2020 at 7:21 am

    Just a first generation Serbian girl in Australia who has come across your blog trying to learn Serbian recipes without my perfectionist mum being involved. (Side note – I changed it a bit but made musaka from your recipe, it turned out better than hers and she won’t admit it haha). We came to Sydney as refugees from the 90s war as we’re originally from Bosna too.

    Decided to comment because of the wonderful descriptions of the Balkans that make me cry and feel like I’m visiting myself. As you would know, we get a lot of bad press so to read things like this from a visitor is wonderful.

    Sorry for the loss of your wonderful mother-in-law.

    Also I’ve gone on to read a few other posts – my mum is from Kupres too, like your father in law. Her family is all around Novi Sad since the war.

    Reply
    • Valerie Lugonja says

      January 27, 2020 at 9:07 pm

      DANKA
      What a lovely message. I read it to Vanja immediately – and that was the same day you sent it. Sorry I didn’t reply. You had us laughing and crying. What was your mom’s maiden name? Kupres is so small, the Lugonja’s must know your mom’s family. I was there. It was …. beautiful – as you saw… and sad.
      Big hug to you!
      Valerie

      Reply

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