Moldovan whey-vegetable soup

Polish: cebulka dymka
Thai: ต้นหอม
Romanian: ceapă verde
Catalan: calçot
Malay: daun bawang
Korean: 파
German: Frühlingszwiebeln
Cebuano: sibuyas dahunan
Bulgarian: пресен лук
Dutch: bosuitjes

Scallions / spring onions are an inportant ingredient of many spring and summer dishes, especially soups, egg dishes and of course salads, probably more common in Asia than anywhere else. Some people tend to choose scalions instead of onions cause it is much nicer to chop scallions than onions, that's sure :) They are one of the main ingredients of this Moldovan summer vegetable-whey soup, sîrbuşca

see also: Polish whey-horseradish soup
see also: Polish whey-millet soup

2 medium potatoes
2 medium carrots
2 spring onions (scallions)
2 cups whey
1 tablespoon cornmeal
2 tablespoons butter (or more), the best would be clarified one
salt, pepper

1. Clean, peel and dice potatoes. Cook them in whey until soft.

2. Fry chopped scallions and grated carrots with (clarified) butter, until carrots are golden-orange and scallions smell.





3. Add fried vegetables to the saucepan with cooking soup. After boiling, add cornmeal and cook about 5 minutes more.

Moldovan aubergine pancakes

Polish: bakłażan
Sranan: bulansyey
Malagasy: baranjely
Kashmiri: वाँगुन्
Tagalog: talóng
Bahasa Melayu: terung
Swahili: mbilingani
Papiamento: berehein
Tonga: paingani
Tajik: Боқлаҷон

Back to the discussion what should be called fruit and what should be called vegetable... How about aubergine? Actually, it should be denominated a fruit, cause from biological point of view it is a true berry, together with plantain, guava or grape. Let's see: there are several dishes from aubergine in the world cuisines that are sweet: Indonesian sweet aubergine stew semur terong, breaded eggplants dipped in honey (also Asian delicacy), Turkish eggplant marmalade (is it really sweet?) and Japanese eggplant... ice cream! (about the last one I am absolutely unsure of its sweetness, since Japanese produce and... consume... crab, eel, cheese or potato ice cream...). Aubergines are something new in Poland, my grandmum for instance never cooked them. I like them a lot, that is why regularily I browse the net in search of some new aubergine recipes, since there are no original Polish aubergine recipes. Lately I visited www.moldova.org and I found a nice collection of Moldovan recipes. First I tried eggplant pancakes, placinta cu vinete, something really, really tasty!

1 big eggplant
1 egg
3-4 tablespoons flour*
salt, pepper

1. Bake eggplant in the oven until its skin becomes dark. Peel, take the seeds off if they are big. Drain and chop.

2. Whisk the egg, add flour* (the recipe speaks about 1 tablespoon but I had to add more cause with only one I couldn't fry the pancakes), chopped eggplant, salt and pepper to taste.

3. Fry! What a great alternative for Polish potato pancakes! Serve with salads or pickles.