Taste Lithuania

This handsome book on traditional Lithuanian home cooking supplements its appealing recipes with good cultural information. 

Author Beata Nicholson was born and raised in Lithuania and, after a stint living in the UK where she started a family, is now the host of a popular cooking show in Lithuania. The dishes she has chosen to present are all attractively photographed yet unapologetically unglamorized.  She has no need to slip in slices of avocado, and if a dish is called “fried bread, bean, and cheese salad,” that’s what she calls it, though you’ll find the name in Lithuanian as well.

Those of us who have not traveled or lived in Lithuania may be surprised to learn that there are regional variations of particular dishes, and as proud as Nicholson is of Lithuanian culinary practices, she’s also happy to admit that some dishes are part of a continuum of versions enjoyed across Europe and sometimes into Asia.

All that said, you’ll find much that is distinctive here:

• Berry and dumpling soup (served hot or cold)

• Fish cakes with creamy wine sauce

• Lamb and pork kybynlar (something like a pasty, with a crumbly, slightly flaky crust)

• Grated potato pie with ground meat

• Kūčia, a Christmas porridge of grains, nuts, dried berries, and poppy milk

Well done.

Hardcover. Color photographs throughout