From the Wedding Tree: Kalina Berries

Thanks to Peace Corps Volunteer Barb Trecker for soliciting another contribution to the Pickle Project.  Kalina berries are a vital part of Ukrainian traditions, and here's a short article and recipe by text by Larisa Malykh of Kiliya, Ukraine, above photo by Viacheslav Malykh, and translation by Barbara Trecker.

 

From ancient times, viburnum (kalina) was a favorite tree in Ukraine, loved by all people for the beauty she gives. In spring, viburnum blossoms are little snow-white umbrellas that look like the headdress of a fiancée. In autumn, viburnum makes the eye happy with its bushes and blood-red berries, which hang on through the frosts. Kalina was the traditional symbol of love and beauty, so wedding tables were decorated with these branches – and  thus the name “wedding tree.” But viburnum was not only admired for its beautiful attributes. This is also a remarkable medicinal plant! The viburnum plant contains ascorbic acid, tannins and glycosides, and for health maintenance, has enough vitamins to exceed the exotic lemon! In antiquity, the bark of viburnum was used as a styptic agent, and as a sedative for cramps. 

Kalina berries are very delicious, especially after frosts. From recipes dating back to olden times, remarkable pies can be prepared, as well as cheesecakes, jams, fruit jellies, and pastries. All these sweets were easily accessible, and favorite for any family.  

Viburnum also has applications in cosmetics and dermatology: the extract of viburnum flowers is a treatment for allergic skin reactions, and viburnum juice is a treatment for blemishes.

Babushka's  Recipe 

Try it – it’s delicious! 

To prepare a delicious and nourishing drink, the best thing to do is collect viburnum berries in winter, and grab them right after a frost. Pour boiling water over the frozen berries, and immediately pour the water back off. Then mash the berries, and again inundate them with boiling water. This will be ready to drink in 10-15 minutes. For better taste, add a globule of honey and a splash of lemon. 

 

  

Second photo:  Kalina berries in a house at Pyrohiv,  the outdoor museum;  bottom:  dried kalina berries for sale at a market,  April, 2011

It's a Wedding!

Barb Wieser, a Peace Corps Volunteer in Crimea continues to share her experiences living--and eating--  in a Crimean Tatar settlement outside Simferopol.  You can read about a pre-wedding feast here, but below, the wedding! 

In the Crimean Tatar tradition, there are two weddings—one given by the bride’s family for her family and friends and one by the groom’s family for his family and friends, and even the bride and groom’s parents don’t go to both. These aren’t wedding ceremonies, but rather lavish parties which take place one night apart. And these two parties happen even if they all live in the same neighborhood. And somewhere in there is the actual ceremony and registration, the registration taking place at a “registration house” which we might call a wedding chapel, and the religious ceremony in this case at the mosque in the Khan’s Palace in Bakchseray. And even both families don’t attend these events—at least I know Maia and Server (my neighbors, the groom’s parents) didn’t.

... I spent almost the whole day at the neighbors, helping them prepare food for the wedding celebration that night where 250 people were expected. It was to be held at a restaurant, but the restaurant was only providing the meat dishes, and we all prepared the salads, cold cuts, etc. There were at least fifteen women or more working away at Maia’s—relatives, friends, and neighbors. I was on the backyard crew as we first sliced mounds of eggplant which were then fried in a large wok type pan over an open fire.

Later they were smeared with fresh garlic and mayonnaise and rolled up with chopped tomatoes inside and a sprig of parsley sticking out (top picture).  Quite lovely and very tasty. Went on to chopping artificial crab, cucumbers, peppers, olives, cheese for salads, and slicing huge chunks of cheese and sausages, taking a few breaks for beer and coffee (not combined!), and of course, talking and laughing the whole time. I really couldn’t follow the conversations, and as least some of them were in Crimean Tatar, but I loved being with everyone anyhow, participating in the work of the wedding.

We finally finished after about five hours, and all the food was hauled over to the wedding place. So much of the wedding was like wedding receptions we know in the States—food, drinking, music, dancing—all the basics. And here is what was different, what it made it a uniquely Crimean Tatar wedding:

For one thing, the food. There was soooo much of it, not enough room on the tables, and it kept coming all night. Many different salads, plates of cheeses and sausages and some kind of traditional meal jelly, chunks of bread, platters of camca (pastries stuffed with meat), chunks of mutton with potatoes, and a sort of breaded and fried ground meat that I forgot the name of. Also, each table had bottles of vodka, wine, juice, and water.

And then there was the music. I had heard about Crimean Tatar wedding music, indeed preserving its traditions is one of the missions of the NGO I have worked with, but apart from the music drifting out of the wedding tents in Ak Mechet, I had never really listened to it or seen it performed. I think it is what we would recognize as Turkish music but with a kind of joyousness to it. And the musicians were just fabulous—a violinist, saxophonist, accordion player, drummer, trumpet player, and maybe one more. I kept thinking that to hire a band like that for a wedding in the States would be a fortune. And that is the really interesting part of it all—the musicians are paid by people dancing with members of the wedding party. First, the sister and brother of the groom—people lined up to dance with them for a few minutes and give them some cash. Later, a pair of elderly twin aunts in identical dresses, two young men, and then finally the bride and groom. In between this dancing, there was general dancing that everyone joined in. Crimean Tatars do love to dance!

A Family Feast in Crimea

Barb Wieser is a Peace Corps volunteer at the Gasprinsky Library in Simferopol and lives outside the city in a Crimean Tatar settlement.  Crimean Tatars have a long history on the Crimea Peninsula but, in a stunning display of ethnic cleansing, Stalin deported the entire Crimean Tatar population on a single day in 1944, sending hundreds of thousands to Uzbekistan and other distant Soviet republics, with as many as half the population dying en route and in the following months.  But the end of the Soviet Union meant the opportunity for Crimean Tatars to return to their homeland, now a part of Ukraine, and the Crimean Tatar population in Crimea now numbers more than 250,000.  Despite deportation and cultural repression, the Crimean Tatars preserved many of their own traditions.  Barb was generous enough to share her experience preparing for a pre-wedding Crimean Tatar feast. 

Abdul, the oldest son of my landlords, Server and Maia, is getting married September 18th. There has been much talk and preparations for the wedding for quite some time. I am invited, of course, and I have been looking forward to attending my first time to a Crimean Tatar wedding! By all accounts, they are quite the event, and include all night eating, dancing, and toasting. Despite the fact that Crimean Tatars are Muslims, they still do a lot of drinking, kind of like the Turks. The joke is that there is nothing in the Koran about not drinking vodka.  Two weekends ago there was a large gathering at Maia and Server's house, a traditional part of the pre-wedding ritual where the two families exchange presents, and the imam comes and blesses the couple. 45 guests were expected: relatives, neighbors, friends and many of the relatives showed up the night before and spent the weekend.

Earlier in the week I had offered to help with the cooking, so I spent much of Friday next door in the kitchen with Maia and her sisters, daughter, and mother, chopping vegetables and meat, getting ready for the early morning feast preparation the next day.  One of the traditions in Muslim culture for a large ritual gathering such as this is to slaughter a goat, or in the case of the Crimean Tatars, a sheep, to provide meat for all the dishes. Maia had told me that her brother-in-law was bringing a sheep to slaughter on Friday, but somehow the reality of that hadn't sunk in until I came home from work Friday afternoon and glanced into the back yard, and there was a sheep, laying under the tree, staring at me with his woeful (or so I felt) eyes. I really didn't want to be present for the actual slaughter, so I disappeared into my house for awhile. When I came out later, the brother-in-law and nephew were hacking away at the sheep carcass. Two cooking fires had been started and large wok-looking pans were placed on them to cook the food needed for the feast. Later that evening, a delicious mutton soup was made for the neighbors and relatives who had gathered to help with food preparations.

After watching them for awhile, I went inside and started helping the sisters chop and peel vegetables--mounds of carrots, onions, potatoes, garlic--taking out time to have coffee and green tea and of course, talk.   One of my other jobs that evening was grinding of sheep meat to be used to make dolmades (stuffed peppers) the following day. As I was chopping up chunks of meat to be fed into the grinder, I thought of that living creature whose eyes I had looked into not so long ago, and whose body I now held in my hands and was making preparations to eat. Not since I was a child on my grandparents farm and watched the caged up chickens before their slaughter (one of which I let loose and got into big trouble) have I been so close to the connection between animal life and the meat I eat. Maybe it is the connection with mammal's that is so profound, as I have also frequently caught fish and killed and ate them. I just couldn't and still can't get the vision of that sheep's face from my mind. I tried to thank the sheep for giving its life so I can eat, but somehow, I don't think it is enough. But I continue to eat meat at my neighbors' homes and when I go to Crimean Tatar restaurants. Perhaps this experience will help me to remember what it is I am eating and to be consciously thankful that an animal has given its life for my food.

By the time I went next door, all the food had been prepared and the festivities were in full swing. I tried to help with serving, etc. but I was clearly to be treated as a guest and was escorted upstairs to dine with all the women. I hadn't realized that was going to happen, so I felt way underdressed for the event, but no one but me seemed to mind. Quite a feast was laid on the table. Plates of fruits, olives, cheeses, and sweets. A thick mutton soup was served and then the dolmades along with leposhka, the traditional Crimean Tatar bread. Afterwords, there were platters of cookies, cakes, and candies, and tea and coffee were served. It is the Crimean Tatar tradition to serve first Turkish coffee and then green tea. When I asked about this, someone told me it was because in Crimea before the deportation, people only drank coffee. But in Uzbekistan coffee wasn't available, so they drank green tea. So when people came back to Crimea, they began to serve both!

Finally I went back to my house, enriched by yet another Crimean Tatar experience and full of love for this wonderful culture I have found myself in.

Thanks, Barb, for sharing this.  More posts from Peace Corps Volunteers to come, and of course, all of our Pickle Project readers are invited to share their stories and memories about food traditions in Ukraine.