Bliny

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Bliny
filled bliny

Bliny ([ blinɨ ] endbetont, Russian блины , actually plural, singular is blin , блин ? / I ), (west) Europeanized also Blini are, one from Eastern Europe coming type of sponge cake . They are prepared in the form of thin flatbreads , eaten warm and sometimes rolled up with a wide variety of fillings and spreads. The typical spread in Russia is butter. Other common side dishes are curd cheese , minced meat , salted smoked fish ( herring , sprats , sardines , salmon ) or caviar . With tea they are served with sour cream , jam , honey , cheese or sweetened condensed milk . - See also Plinse . Audio file / audio sample

preparation

The dough for real Russian blini is made with yeast , various types of flour or semolina and water and prepared mainly without sweeteners or sweet side dishes or filling. After proofing , cooking oil , hot milk , whipped cream or egg whites can be added to improve the taste , and the dough will then rise a second time. Historical blinies consisted mainly of buckwheat flour .

Pancakes made from dough without yeast, but on a pure milk basis to rise and possibly with sugar and with a sweet filling, on the other hand, are called Блинчики ( blinčiki ).

The pancakes are baked in special small cast iron, handleless biny pans and are only a few millimeters thick. The pan is lightly greased with an onion brush dipped in cooking oil ( half of the onion skewered on a fork) before each new pancake. The dough should be poured into the pan from a portion-sized wooden ladle. The finished blinies are immediately coated with butter and stacked on top of one another. In a traditional Russian meal, blinies are served after the cold sakuski (German: snack or appetizer), before the soup.

Etymology and word usage

“Bliny (plinsen) are among the oldest dishes that were known in Russian cuisine in pagan times before the 9th century. The word “blin” actually means “mlin” (from the verb “molet” -mahlen. .. This is probably the most economical flour dish, for which a minimum of flour with a maximum of liquid (water, milk) is required, as for Bliny a very thin dough is needed. "

- WW Pochljobkin : National cuisines. The culinary art of the Soviet peoples . Verlag MIR, Moscow, and Verlag für die Frau, Leipzig, 2nd edition 1988, p. 52ff, ISBN 3-7304-0053-3

The Russian word блины ( bliný ) is plural of блин ( blin ) and goes back to the Old Russian млинъ / блинъ ( mlin / blin ) " pancake ". The word is probably to be attached to the verb молоть ( molot ) "to grind". Another approach leads it back to a reconstructed trunk * бълинъ "swollen", which could be related to the Germanic word bump . In Ukrainian, pancakes are still called млинці ( mlynci , with the word formation suffix -ec ). The expression “ Plinse ” for pancakes, which is widespread in Germany, was borrowed from the Upper Sorbian plinc before the 16th century .

Outside of Russia, the word binyi is often used for various dishes that are shaped like bliny. The meaning can also be narrowed, for example that only those Russian pancakes are to be used that differ from the local ones. In Russian, however, the word bliny is a general term for any kind of thin and large pancake. Often in the West, the term bliny is incorrectly used for small, thicker pancakes, which are actually called оладьи ( olad'i ) in Russian . In the USA, where they came through Jewish immigrants, they are referred to with the Yiddish word blintz (cf. Yiddish בלינצע blintze ), which goes back to the Upper Sorbian word plinc via the German Plinse .

In Russian is blin also a euphemism originally for a general condemnation curse ( "Crap!") To the vulgar блядь ( bljad to avoid "whore"), comparable to the German Scheibenkleister .

distribution

Bliny supposedly had a certain ritual meaning among the ancient Slavs in pre-Christian times, as they were a sun symbol thanks to their round shape .

Since the Middle Ages , they have been baked in Russia at the end of winter during Maslenitsa ( butter week ) to symbolically celebrate the rebirth of the sun, before the beginning of Lent . They were also offered by street vendors earlier this week. This tradition was adopted by the Russian Orthodox Church and is still maintained today. Other occasions for bliny meals were the ritual memorial days for the dead, which took place three times a year. Bliny was also prepared as a meal for guests at funerals .

Similar dough dishes are common throughout Eastern and Southeastern Europe, but are only occasionally made from buckwheat flour. Polish pancakes are called naleśniki when they are made without yeast and racuchy when they are yeast pancakes. In the Czech Republic they are called Palačinky , in Hungary Palacsinta ( pancakes ). By the Russian (mainly Jewish) immigrants are buckwheat pancakes in the United States known.

Bliny in Russian literature

  • In the story The Stupid French ( Russian Глупый француз ) by Chekhov , the strange, typically Russian trait of a Frenchman is described of devouring a large amount of blini at once.
  • In the story Der Eiserne Wille ( Russian Железная воля ) by Leskow , which describes the tragicomedic adventures of the German Hugo Pektoralis in Russia, the protagonist finally dies by suffocating on a blini.
Lithuanian blynai with typical holes

See also

literature

  • WW Pochljobkin: National cuisines. The culinary art of the Soviet peoples. Mir / Verlag der Frau, Moscow / Leipzig 1984.

Web links

Commons : Bliny  - collection of images, videos and audio files

Individual evidence

  1. Кулинарный словарь . Л.И. Зданович, 2001
  2. Кулинарный словарь . В.В. Похлебкин, 2002
  3. ^ A b c Alan Davidson, The Oxford Companion to Food, Oxford 1999, article Blini
  4. Книга о вкусной и здоровой пище . под редакцией А.А.Покровский, М. 1980, Издательство “Пищевая промышленность”, chapter “Блины”, pp. 279–281, “Оладьи”, p. 282, “Блинчики” и блинчатыгип3, p
  5. Max Vasmer . Russian etymological dictionary. Winter, Heidelberg 1953–1958.
  6. Этимологический словарь славянских языков . Ред .: О. Н. Trubachev. Выпуск 19. Москва: Наука, 1992.
  7. Глупый француз
  8. Железная воля