Today is Peter’s Name’s Day – a huge holiday in the Catholic
countries, even more so than birthdays.
Traditionally, this calls for Palinka for breakfast, but with all the
hubbub about the party, it gets lost in the shuffle. Trust me – it is more than made up for later
in the day.
Lunch this afternoon is at Lajos and Bori’s house. The first of the day’s Palinkas comes
here. Lajos has won several awards for
his stuff, which he sells commercially.
It is a little smoother than the stuff we usually bring home. Of course, we indulge in a couple.
This is followed by the meal. The carnivores are having a stew made of wild
game and stuff. Z tells me it is pretty
good. Hey, whatever floats your
boat. The veg is honored to be delivered
a Capriolo world-class “pizzak” (as they say here ‘bouts). The Vegetable Pizzak is topped with tomatoes,
mushrooms, peppers, green olives, and strangely zucchini and corn. Must be a regional thing. Whatever – it was, as always, pretty swell. As mentioned before, they sent their chef
down to Italy to train to make the stuff.
The crust is thin and chewy, not crisp like a cracker. It is brushed with garlic before it is
topped, so it has that warm, garlicky thing going on. The sauce is mostly tomato, very light, with
just a few spices. You should make a
trip out here just for the pizza.
Of course, the real reason for coming out here (besides
swilling Lajos’ high-class hooch) is to pick up the eggs and meat for Peter and
Vera’s 50th Wedding Anniversary party tomorrow. We are picking up 70 eggs, as well as two
butchered pigs and a lamb. (The pigs
were promptly named by me, through long standing tradition, as “Market” and
“Home." The lamb, of course, was “Roast
Beef.” You can’t carry dead things
around in the car with heads still attached without naming them.) I should mention Market, Home and Roast Beef
were walking around the farm yesterday.
In fact, we should step back a bit at this point. Catering works a little bit differently in
Serbia and Hungary. You pick up the raw
ingredients and then deliver them to the caterer to be assembled. We have been to the local Farmer’s Markets
several times picking up various fruit and vegetables, and then delivering them
to various folk as necessary. The eggs
and various other ingredients get delivered to the cake baker, who is baking
two largish torts – a lemon tort and a dobos tort. The pigs and lamb go to another butcher in
town who will prep them for cooking. The
pigs go this evening to the local bread baker, that Peter has been frequenting
for years, to be baked. One is stuffed
with seasoned sausage; the other is roasted as is. The lamb is reduced to small cubes that will
be cooked tomorrow in the kettle, along with other stuff we have picked up,
into goulash.
6/30
Today is the celebration of Peter and Vera’s 50th
Wedding Anniversary, and things are already a bustle of activity at 5:30 a.m.
when I go for my walk. “Market” and “Home”
have been picked up from the baker, and “Roast Beef” is now a pile of cubes
ready for the goulash kettle.
The day also began with bad news. Close family friend, Angi, who you met
earlier in the entry about Pécs, lost her mother last evening. Her mother, a local, was age 92. The stress of the extreme heat was likely a
contributing factor. They are ringing
the bells on the church for her down the hill.
Dinner will be postponed by an hour so that guests can attend the
graveside ceremony.
Our day begins, after a quick breakfast, with another trip
to Topolya to buy more veggies for lunch for “The Hungarians.” These would be Andras-Bacsi and Ari, the
neighbors from the house on the left of Peter and Vera’s place in
Keszthely. They are coming here for
lunch before going to Lajos and Bori’s to spend the night.
*****
“Impatience” seems to be the word of the day. While waiting to park on the street in front
of the market, and waiting for four cars – two on each side of the street – to pull
out of spaces, the idiot behind me leans on his horn and races around – only to
wait right in front of me for the four cars.
At least the little red lights on the back of our car didn’t make him
angry anymore.
My favorite “impatience” moment, however, came a little
later as we were leaving. I was waiting
for Peter and Z to finish their transaction and was literally elbowed out of
the way by a “little old lady on a mission.”
I’ve seen basketball players do lamer jobs of throwing an elbow that
this lady. The bruise didn’t last too
long. She did, however, convince me to
lumber out of her way.
*****
I always appreciate the kindness of strangers on these trips. Especially those who have learned to speak my
language and are willing to do so (far rarer).
Fear of saying the wrong thing in the wrong way often keep people that I
would love to get to know better silent.
I mean come on – they get to hear my Hungarian!
We are kept company this afternoon by Andras (son of
Andras-Basci) and his girlfriend, Anna.
They took great care of me while everyone else was busy speaking Hungarian. They were great conversationalists, and threw
me the occasional “car!” My thanks!
*****
Things are coming together this afternoon, and we are
beginning to calm down a bit, when Z discovers that not all of “Roast Beef” has
made it to the event site to get in the kettle.
An emergency trip down and he is all back together again.
I, however, am not going to go too near to check – and not
just because I am a vegetarian. They are
keeping the small fire going under the pot with what amounts to a small, controlled
flame-thrower. These jury-rigged “barbecue”
apparatuses are everywhere in this neck of the world. I am amazed that I don’t hear a bomb going
off with regularity.
*****
“It’s Turkish,” is Z’s code that she is not going to give me
milk for my afternoon coffee.
*****
The party is great fun.
It is well attended by about 70 friends and family. It is also miserably hot, but this is keeping
the alcohol consumption down. The food
is great and it is fun to hang with some unorthodox groups and chat.Gabor and Kis-Kazi are here. Both are competitive dancers and very light on their feet. Which is more than Z can say when Kazi drags her on the floor to dance. She spends the rest of the evening running away whenever he comes near.
Peter and Vera requested that I play something, and the band
was nice enough to let me sit in for a couple of tunes. It is always fun to spackle Dixieland over
the top of someone else’s’ hard work, and it was really appreciated that the
fellows would allow me to do so. FYI, “Summertime”
is a universal – I’ve played it in a couple of countries now – but don’t ever
count on getting a blues if you ask for one.
For these guys “blues” meant the vamp from “The Ballad of Irving.” (Don’t know it – go look it up! It’s a Dr Demento Classic!)
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