Behind the launch of the book Gastronomy in Neamţ Mountain Area was a project started in 2014, documented for four years in a row, after many analyzes and researches conducted, and a lot of fieldwork. The book retains its importance even today, due to the contribution of scientific information and the accurate presentation of the real life of mountain people in Neamt County, as well as the “mountain produce” as an expression of the superior quality given by the richness in mineral salts, vitamins, essential oils and other nutrients – on the one hand, and the fodder base, the clean environment and the well developed system of animal breeding and exploitation – on the other hand.

Essay and scientific study, monography and cookbook, Gastronomy in Neamţ Mountain Area combines the scrupulosity of research with academic rigor, resulting in a particularly valuable work both for the locals and the academic world.

The book is, again, a documented geography, botany, and zoology treaty, and also a wonderful Culinary Corpus, that attracts the reader with a wide range of recipes and delicious local cuisine, specific to the mountain area of ​​Neamț County. Mythology and anthropology are finely inserted within this substantial fabric. Therefore, the book reads very well forwards as well as backwards, as it has a pronounced practical value, introducing its readers to a surprising universe: the household of the mountain peasant with its ineffable beauty, rich flora and fauna, ancient customs in animal and food processing, the yearly holidays cycles, the calendar of the mountain farming works, and much more.

“The mountain people rejoice when the harvest is rich, when the animals are healthy, when they have peace in their hearts.” In Christian hymnology there is a verse that goes like this: “To the mountains, my soul!”. Ancestrally speaking, the mountain people become also people of the mountain, where they meet God and God talks to them, and they, in their turn, talk to Him.

This book transmits the admiration for our fellows. It breathes through every pore the joy of meeting the other. The other person is surrounded by his or her own aura, and does not remain isolated in the egocentrism of the “individual”. Thus, the blooming occurs. The person does not remain in loneliness and isolation, but enters the joy of the community. And so, the communion is produced.

Jesus Christ, Our Lord, shared His joy with the Apostles at the table. During the Last Supper. There, they ate and talked. They enjoyed and shared their moods and feelings through words. The authors of this book invite us to sit at the table. To have dinner together. And share our thoughts and feelings. Learn from one another.

“When will the end of the world come, Father?”. And He replied: “When there will be no paths between people, my son!”

The good thoughts brought along good deeds for a better life in the Romanian Carpathians.

The fragments above are, for the most part, taken from the Preface of the book “Gastronomy in Neamţ Mountain Area – Connections of the traditional mountain food universe of Neamț County”, by authors Doctor Honoris Causa Radu RAY, member of the Academy of Agricultural Sciences and Priest Dorin PLOSCARU, member of the Romanian Writers’ Union.

Gastronomy in Neamţ Mountain Area, a pilot project resulting in the book release, sums up the natural, economic, socio-cultural and spiritual values ​that prevail in Neamț County. The book aims at taking further this quintessence. The book was printed by Neamț Branch of the Romanian Mountain Forum and is available to all people interested in discovering the fascinating mountain universe of Neamț County.

Gastronomy in Neamţ Mountain Area, an initiative of Neamț Branch of the Romanian Mountain Forum, authors Vasile AVĂDĂNEI, Lazăr LATU, and Lidia AVĂDĂNEI, with the financial support of Neamț County Council.

Photo gallery:  A few pictures from inside the book