Latvian cuisine

Latvian cuisine typically consists of agricultural products, with meat featuring in most main meal dishes. Fish is commonly consumed due to Latvia's location on the east coast of the Baltic Sea.

Latvian cuisine has been influenced by neighboring countries in the Baltic region.^[1] Common ingredients in Latvian recipes are found locally, such as potatoes,^[1] wheat, barley, cabbage, onions, eggs and pork. Latvian food is generally quite fatty, and uses few spices.

Meals

Contemporary Latvians usually eat three meals a day. Breakfast is normally light and usually consists of sandwiches or an omelette, with a drink, often milk. Lunch is eaten from noon to 3 p.m. and tends to be the main meal of the day; as such it can include a variety of foods, and sometimes also soup as an entrée and a dessert. Supper is the last meal of the day, with some choosing to eat another large meal. Consumption of ready-made or frozen meals is now common.^[2]

Common foods and dishes

Latvian cuisine is typical of the Baltic region and, in general, of northern countries. The food is high in butter and fat while staying low in spices except for black pepper, dill or grains/seeds, such as caraway seeds. The Latvian cuisine originated from the peasant culture and is strongly based on crops that grow in Latvian maritime, temperate climate. Rye or wheat, oats, peas, beets, cabbage, pork products and potatoes are the staples. Meat features in most main meal dishes. But fish also is commonly consumed due to Latvia's location on the east coast of the Baltic Sea: smoked and raw fish are quite common. The Latvian cuisine offers plenty of varieties of bread and milk products, which are an important part of the Latvian cuisine.

Most popular alcoholic beverage is beer.^[3] A national liquor is Riga Black Balsam.

Milk products

Caraway cheese is traditionally served on the Latvian festival Jāņi.

Latvia is much richer in milk products than other Western countries. Biezpiens (cottage cheese), skābais krējums (sour cream), rūgušpiens (soured milk) and a lot of varieties cheeses with different flavours. A cheese similar to smoked gouda, but softer, is the cheapest and, arguably, tastiest variety. There are various tastes available for purchase in most grocery stores. A Latvian specialty is the biezpiena sieriņš, which is pressed cottage cheese with a sweet taste (most popular manufacturers of the snack are Kārums and Baltais). A traditional Latvian cheese is Jāņu siers (caraway cheese); this is traditionally served during the celebration of Jāņi or midsummer.

Soups

Soups are commonly made with vegetables and broth or milk. Noodle soup, beet soup, sorrel soup and nettle soup are also consumed by Latvians.^[1]^[4] A traditional Latvian dessert is maizes zupa (literally "bread soup"), which is the sweet soup made from rye bread and fruits.

Breads

Sklandrausis

Rupjmaize is a dark bread made from rye, and is considered a national staple.^[5]

Pīrādziņi are buns filled with bacon and onion. Kliņģeris is a sweet pretzel-shaped bread that is usually served as a dessert on special occasions, such as name day. Sklandrausis (or sklandu rausis) is traditional dish in Latvian cuisine which has a Livonian origin; it's a sweet pie, made of rye dough and filled with potato and carrot paste and seasoned with a caraway.

Gallery

Head cheese
Gingerbreads from Latvia
Cake
Red currant semolina mousse
Curd snack
Riga Black Balsam

References

1 2 3 "Latvian Cuisine." Latvian Institute. Accessed September 2011.
↑ "The Cuisine of Latvia" (PDF). Latvijas Institūts. 2004. Retrieved 26 May 2012.
↑ "Latvijā visvairāk dzer alu un šnabi" (in Latvian). 10 February 2008. Retrieved 12 November 2015.
↑ "Typical Latvian Food and Drink Recipes." Li.lv. Accessed September 2011.
↑ BBC - Eurovision Song Contest - Guide to Latvia, BBC Archived December 24, 2011, at the Wayback Machine.

External links

Wikimedia Commons has media related to Category:Cuisine of Latvia.

Latvia articles

Society

Demographics Education Ethnic groups Illegal immigration Language Public holidays Religion

Culture	Anthem Cinema Coat of arms Cuisine Flag Latvian names Literature Music Mythology Pottery Sport Television

Outline

Category
Portal
WikiProject

European cuisine

Sovereign states	Albania Andorra Armenia Austria Azerbaijan Belarus Belgium Bosnia and Herzegovina Bulgaria Croatia Cyprus Czech Republic Denmark Estonia Finland France Georgia Germany Greece Hungary Iceland Republic of Ireland Italy Kazakhstan Latvia Liechtenstein Lithuania Luxembourg Republic of Macedonia Malta Moldova Monaco Montenegro Netherlands Norway Poland Portugal Romania Russia San Marino Serbia Slovakia Slovenia Spain Sweden Switzerland Turkey Ukraine United Kingdom

States with limited recognition	Abkhazia Kosovo Nagorno-Karabakh Northern Cyprus South Ossetia Transnistria

Dependencies and other territories	Åland Islands Faroe Islands Gibraltar Guernsey Jersey Isle of Man Svalbard and Jan Mayen

Cuisines

Regional	African North West list Americas North South list Asian Central South list Bengal Caribbean Caucasian European Central Eastern list Global Latin American Mediterranean Middle Eastern Levantine Oceanic

National	Afghan Albanian Algerian Angolan Argentine Armenian Australian Austrian Azerbaijani Bahraini Bangladeshi Barbadian Belarusian Belgian Belizean Beninese Bhutanese Bissau-Guinean Bolivian Bosnia and Herzegovina Botswana Brazilian British English Scottish Welsh Cornish Bruneian Bulgarian Burkinabé Burmese Burundian Cambodian Cameroonian Canadian Canadian Chinese Central African Republic Chadian Chilean Chinese Colombian Congolese Croatian Cuban Cypriot Czech Danish Djiboutian Dominican Dominican Republic Dutch Ecuadorian Egyptian Emirati Equatorial Guinean Eritrean Estonian Ethiopian Fijian Filipino Finnish French Occitan Gabonese Gambian Georgian German Ghanaian Greek Guatemalan Guinean Haitian Honduran Hong Kong Hungarian Icelandic Indian Indonesian Iranian Iraqi Irish Israeli Italian Sicilian Ivorian (Côte d'Ivoire) Jamaican Japanese Jordanian Kazakh Kenyan Korean Kosovan Kuwaiti Kyrgyz Lao Latvian Lebanese Lesotho Liberian Libyan Liechtensteiner Lithuanian Luxembourg Macau Macedonian Malagasy Malawian Malaysian Malay Chinese Indian Eurasian Malian Maltese Mauritanian Mauritian Mexican Moldovan Mongolian Moroccan Namibian Nepalese New Zealand Nigerian Nigerien Norwegian Niuean Omani Pakistani Palestinian Panamanian Peruvian Polish Portuguese Qatari Romanian Russian Rwandan Salvadoran Saint Helena Saint Lucian Sammarinese São Tomé and Príncipe Saudi Arabian Senegalese Serbian Seychelles Sierra Leonean Singaporean Slovak Slovenian Somali South African Spanish Andalusian Asturian Basque Catalan Galician Sri Lankan Sudanese Swazi Swedish Swiss Syrian Taiwanese Tajik Tanzanian Thai Tibetan Togolese Tunisian Turkish Trinidadian and Tobagonian Ugandan Ukrainian United States American Chinese New American Uruguayan Uzbek Venezuelan Vietnamese Western Saharan Yemeni Zambian Zimbabwean

Ethnic and religious	Ainu Akan American Chinese Arab Assyrian Balochi Balinese Batak Berber Betawi Buddhist Cajun Cantonese Chinese Indonesian Chinese Islamic Circassian Crimean Tatar Inuit Greek American Italian American Javanese Jewish Sephardic Mizrahi Bukharan Syrian Jewish Komi Kurdish Livonian Louisiana Creole Malay Manado Maharashtrian Mordovian Native American Okinawan Padang Parsi Pashtun Pennsylvania Dutch Peranakan Punjabi Sami Sindhi Sundanese Tatar Udmurt Yamal Zanzibari

Historical	Ancient Egyptian Ancient Greek Ancient Israelite Ancient Roman Aztec Byzantine Early modern European Historical Chinese Historical South Asian History of seafood History of vegetarianism Inca Mayan Medieval Ottoman Peasant Soviet

Styles	Cuisine classique Fast food Fusion Haute Molecular gastronomy Note by Note Nouvelle

Lists	List of cuisines Lists of prepared foods

Food portal Drink portal Category Commons Cookbook WikiProject

This article is issued from Wikipedia - version of the Wednesday, March 16, 2016. The text is available under the Creative Commons Attribution/Share Alike but additional terms may apply for the media files.