Culture – Page 27

In America, we have a little bit of every type of food. Italian, Japanese, Thai, Greek, the list goes on. Let me ask you this: have you ever seen a Czech restaurant? Because I never have. So, I wasn’t sure what to expect in the Czech Republic. Czechia is not a place globally known for their food, therefore the food isn’t really a common presence in other countries. So, I’m dedicating this blog to give a very basic breakdown of the food you can find in the Czech Republic.

Overall, there’s a pretty nice variety, but traditional Czech foods are pretty common anywhere you go.

The traditional dishes are all very heavy, and are typically made from lots of hearty plants because of the cold climate here. The most traditional meal is Svíčková, which

is braised beef or pork with dumplings and a sauce. Oh, and cabbage. You can’t forget the cabbage. There are many other meals that are different variations of this- different sauces, either bread or potato dumplings, filled or unfilled dumplings (typically unfilled), different meats, different cabbage, etc. This is typically served as a lunch food because lunch is the biggest meal and it WILL keep you full for the rest of the day.

I’m no food reviewer, but I’ll add that I find this meal delicious. The meat is always cooked so delicately that it pairs well with the dumplings, and then the acidity of the sauce and cabbage cuts the savoriness and helps bring out the flavors of the meat. A very good balance, I highly recommend trying to track some down.

Now, in general, the heartier the plant is, the more common it is. Czechia is a very “meat and potatoes” kind of place for just that reason. Pickled things (especially cabbage) are also common.

To sum it up:

Red meats are more common than white, like sausages, braised beef, roasted pork
The most common vegetables are root vegetables like cabbage, carrots, onions, potatoes, cabbage, celery, and cabbage. Oh, and did I mention cabbage? I never knew there were so many types of cabbage before coming here!
Fruit, as far as I can tell, isn’t very prominent here. Fruit gelato and marmalade, however, is very common. It could be because fruit season has already peaked, but besides cranberries and the occasional banana, I haven’t seen a whole lot of fruit offered in restaurants.
Another interesting thing is that all the bread here is rye bread. Rye has been a traditional crop in Central Europe since the middle ages, so everything made in the stores will have at least 30% rye in it, and caraway seeds are a common addition as well.
Finally, let’s have a chat about cheese. Cheese might as well be its own food group
Artery-Clogging Fried Cheese

here because it is very common and very popular. By a landslide, the most common type of cheese is eidam, which is originally from the Netherlands but was modified (by reducing the fat content and using the German name) and is now a proud Czech specialty. I’ll also add that cheese isn’t so much used as a topping as it is the main dish. We’re talking about fried cheese, people! My goodness is it amazing. I can affirm that you will likely feel your arteries begin to clog as you take each bite, but it is 100% worth it.

Now for my favorite part of any meal: DESSERT!

I absolutely love dessert. Favorite meal of the day, no competition. When I got here, to make the adjustment process easier, I told myself that whenever anything bad or inconvenient happened that I would make it better by getting dessert. So, I’ve had a lot of desserts.

By far the most common dessert products you’ll see will have wafers of some sort.

Wafers have been a Czech specialty since the 1800’s, where the thin, crispy, and slightly sweet wafers were handed out to spa guests. Now they’re in around 75% of the treats here.

If you’re looking for hand-crafted desserts, you find a lot of flour-based creations. So, you see a lot of cakes, pastries, cream-puff looking things, etc. There are so many desserts that I could ramble on about, but I’ll stick with my current favorite: kolache. It’s similar to a Danish in that it’s dough with cream cheese, but it’s the filling that makes the difference. Poppy seed is a very common dessert filling here, and the traditional kolaches will have poppy seeds or jam in the middle.

I can go on and on about all the amazing and unique foods I’ve tried here, but I think the best option is to just come and taste for yourself. I’ll be happy to share!

Hannah Langford

CZECH REPUBLIC – MASARYK UNIVERSITY, 2018 FALL

Hannah Langford is taking a break from studying Integrated Sciences at DU to study history and culture at Masaryk University in Brno, Czech Republic. She’s looking forward to exploring the unique geography and outdoor opportunities in the area and the surrounding countries. She’s also looking forward to eating a lot of chocolate.

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In Denver, one of my favorite things to do is go discover new coffee shops. I’ll order a mocha or a latte and sit down, planning something or other and just observing. It’s a tame form of exploration. I know there’s a good chance of the menu being on a blackboard, the payment being via Square, and the tables being just the right size for a laptop and a notebook. The only unknowns are the baristas, the menu specifics, the decor, and my fellow patrons, and I can manage these unknowns.

I moved to Denver in 2016. Until then, my hometown of 3,000 was my whole world, and it took me until the middle of my sophomore year at DU to feel comfortable crossing the streets. With Denver’s multi-lane streets and its population that seemed to take ignoring each other on the streets to an art form, cafés were one of the few things that made sense there. The culture shock took weeks to wear off.

I caught my first glimpse of Scotland on Wednesday at 6:30 a.m. British Summer Time. Our plane descended through the clouds into the greenest hills I’ve ever seen and took us over the edge of Glasgow. From the air, it seemed picturesque. I could see myself spending the next four months picking up nuggets of culture and storing them in my travel treasure chest.

The plane deposited me onto an alien planet.

Once I stood on the pavement, the picturesque city became entirely too much. They drive on the left side of the street. Sidewalks are asphalt or cobblestone and irregular. The speed limit signs say “twenty’s plenty.” People say “cheers” as they walk out of shops, which line the streets instead of sitting in their own tidy buildings. The phrase “Scottish water” is everywhere from trucks to teabags. There is moss everywhere. The aforementioned shops sit directly under three or four stories of apartment buildings – flats – which all look very old. Every safety poster tells me to have a separate chopping board for meats. Cafés offer lower prices for “take away” items.

I expected that I would find much of Glasgow uncomfortable and unfamiliar, but I did not expect the immediate paucity of familiar things. For the last four days, the things I held on to during my transition to Denver simply have not existed. From the moment I stepped off the airplane, I have been in what the OIE’s Canvas module “Culture Shock” describes as “cultural confrontation.” For my own purposes, I renamed it “EVERYTHING IS WEIRD AND I WANT A NAP.”

This is a normal stage of adjustment, one I saw in international students at DU and see in my fellow adventurers at UofG. They all seem unflappable and are acquiring UK SIM cards and frying pans with great capability. All of the advice I remembered about culture shock was that you should throw yourself into activities and meet people. They all seem to be doing that very well. I am not – I am very much flapped and 90% of my brain is off yelling about pound coins.

My sane remainder realized that I’m suffering from simple overwhelm. I found a notepad and made a grocery list, then dragged my butt out of my comfortable flat to a nearby coffee shop. I ordered a latte (£2.70 and the change came in the form of two coins, a ten pence and a twenty pence) and sat down to watch the cars go by on the wrong side of the street.

Alice Major

SCOTLAND – UNIVERSITY OF GLASGOW, 2018 FALL

Alice Major is studying at the University of Glasgow in Glasgow, Scotland. She is a double major, focusing mostly on music and adding history because history is cool. Study abroad is Alice’s first time out of the country, and she hopes to come home in one piece and with a wicked Scottish accent.

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Category: Culture

All About Czech FOOD

Hannah Langford

CZECH REPUBLIC – MASARYK UNIVERSITY, 2018 FALL

On Culture Shock and Coffee Shops

Alice Major

SCOTLAND – UNIVERSITY OF GLASGOW, 2018 FALL