Romania-

Romanian food doesn't look all that appetizing for the most part. Sour soups, fried potatoes, and a local saying that the best vegetable is pork. Undeterred, I went for fried eggplant and a pound cake for dessert. And yes, I had pork for the main course, although rubbed with spices and grilled - not particularly Romanian.

Vinete si Dovlecei Pane - Fried Eggplant



Washed and sliced the eggplant, soaked the slices in lemon juice, dipped in egg, then flour, then fried in sunflower oil.





The recipe called for garlic sauce - I just used a bit of garlic infused olive oil.



Romanian Marble Cake-



Very easy marble poundcake. And delicious. Even my help thought it was great! Mixed all of the ingredients in a bowl save the cocoa, put 80% of the mix between the two loaf pans, mixed the cocoa into the remaining batter, then topped the loaves:



Crappy cell phone pic, sorry:



The eggplant was delicious. And greasy. The sunflower oil was a nice touch - I'd order this off of a menu in a restaurant. The poundcake is good too. The lemon zest gives it a fairly strong lemon flavor. I made 2 loaves, so one is in the freezer awaiting a rainy day.