Zacusca

Zacusca

Last weekend Nancy and I traveled out to the small village of Leonint in Alba county to the house of Moga Yanci. Yanci is of Hungarian ethnicity so his first name is last. He and his wife Irma are the parents of Yanci who is married to Nancy’s counterpart Anastasia. Anastasia is Moldova Romanian so I wonder if she prefers Anastasia Moga or vice versa. In any case we had a fine time visiting the village and enjoyed the welcoming hospitality of the Mogas and we worked hard making Zacusca.

Zacusca is for Romanians what canned tomatoes and canned beans are to country folks in the United States. They are a rite of harvest and no way does the store bought product match up to the home made. The ingredients for Zacusca are ardei, sweet peppers – round red ones -, morcovi, carrots, ceapa, onions and vinete, eggplant. All of these ingredients Yanci grows on his land. The peppers and eggplant we picked the morning of the cooking of the concoction, the carrots and onions were picked the day before, so everything was extremely fresh.

Zacusca is made over a hot fire. It was my job to feed the old wood stove corn cobs to keep it hot. The onions and carrots were diced and sautéed in a large pot, then the peppers, lots of peppers were diced and placed in a pot of their own to cook. The secret to Zacusca is scorching the eggplant. Twenty of these were placed on the metal of the hot stove to scorch the purple skin and bake the meaty insides. It was also my job to watch the eggplant as I fed the fire.

Once the carrots and onions had most of their moisture burn away they were mixed in with the peppers. The eggplant, once fully scorched on all sides were taken out and the skin peeled away, the insides left to dry in the sun. We added a cheesecloth full of eggplant to the pepper, carrot onion mixture – now in a very large pan and placed it on the top of the stove. Two bottles of home made tomato juice was added. It was my job to stir the pot until most of the remaining moisture was steamed away. After an hour or two of stirring the mixture a few bay leaves were added as was some salt. The mix was soon ready to be put into jars.

I was asked how I was doing during the stir process. I replied, “Fine, but I only wish that we were making ice cream instead.” Nancy is a big fan of Zacusca as are nearly every Romanian no matter if they prefer first name last or the other way ‘round. It’s used as a spread on bread, almost like peanut butter. But if you notice from the recipe the only thing sweet that was added was the sweet of the pepper. My tastes are enough male American to prefer a little sweetness on my spreads. I think we have about thirty jars. Be sure and stop by if you’d like a taste.

Longer than the zacusca will last, which will be a long while, we'll remember the hospitality of our weekend adventure. We came away with a couple of small bottles of the national drink, tsuica that Yanci gave us and we came away with many good memories to go along with those jars of zacusca.