{282.} Storing and Preserving Raw Materials

We have already spoken about storing raw material (cf pp. 169–174), but most of it must still undergo some processing until it can be used. From the second half of the 19th century, many types of flour were ground in the mills, and this flour was helped to differentiate its uses. In peasant households flour was stored in the pantry for a month or two. Flour bins served this purpose, in some places barrels and jars. Maize flour cannot be kept in this way for an extended period because it sours easily, which is why they usually ground it not at the mill but rather on a home grinder, and grinding only as much as could be used up right away.

Fig. 140. An open construction for drying prunes.
Former Szatmár County. Early 20th century

Some raw materials were preserved in various ways. One of the most important processes is pickling. This is the method for storing cabbages, cucumbers, beets, turnips, and many other plants for a longer time, and sometimes this is a way of making them more enjoyable. The most important among these is sauerkraut, which has always enjoyed great popularity. The cabbage is shredded with a cabbage shredder made especially for this purpose (formerly it was simply chopped up with a knife), then stuffed or stamped into large barrows. It is salted, then pressed down with a board by means of a large stone, more recently with a screw. Complete cabbage-heads are placed in between the layers, because the whole leaves of cabbage are necessary for making cabbage rolls (töltött káposzta). In the northern and western regions of the linguistic territory, beets and turnips are also pickled, and soup is made of them. Cucumbers, soured by different processes, are served with meat as a treat.

Various kinds of fruit are desiccated, especially plums, apples, pears, and less frequently apricots. The simplest method is to lay them out in the sun on a wickerwork tray, but as this requires a great deal of time, drying hearths are often used instead. These are low ovens located in small, separate buildings. Fruit, previously desiccated in the sun, is placed on top of these hearths, on large-sized wicker trays with 2 to 3 cm high edges. The heat penetrates from below and the fruit dries fast. Dried fruit is not only the favourite treat of children, but is also particularly good for cooking fasting soups (böjtös leves). The drying of mushrooms is general in mountain areas where great quantities of different kinds grow.

Storing meat for a longer time caused a great deal of difficulty, since the meat of slaughtered animals could not be eaten all at once either in the herdsmen’s or in the peasant households. The herdsmen of the Great Plain cut up the meat of the sheep or calf into small pieces, salted it, put paprika on it, then cooked it in the kettle without water and, by shaking it from time to time, turned it. When it was thoroughly cooked, they spread it on a mat in a shady place. It desiccated completely in 2 to 3 days and could be poured into a sack. Each morning, the young herdsmen took a handful out of this and as they followed the herd, ate it with bread. If the possibility arose, they threw it into boiling water and prepared it just like raw meat. We can assume that this may have been the food of the wandering Magyars, who could easily carry it with them in their saddle bags. A famous Italian chronicler took note of the Hungarian practice in the 14th century, for according to him, in the course of the Italian military campaign of King Louis I, the Hungarian {283.} warriors fed on dried meat which they kept in the satchels. Sources from the 19th century and earlier alike mention the drying and smoking of fish.

Pork was not desiccated in peasant households, but preserved with salting and smoking. After the feast that followed pig-killing, the meat was kept in brine for several weeks, then dried, and hung in the smoky attic or the upper part of the open chimney, more recently in a separate building built especially for this purpose. Here the smoke slowly penetrated the meat so it could be kept safely in the attic or in a cool pantry till the main work periods of the summer and sometimes until new fresh meat became available. The technique of smoking came to Hungary from the west and spread through the entire Hungarian linguistic region.

Another, newer method of preserving meat, called browning, is known over a relatively large area. The cooked meat is placed into a large-sized earthenware or tin dish and melted lard is poured over it. As it solidifies, the meat is sealed from the air, and so can be kept even until summer.

Drying was also used to preserve the various pastas kneaded for soups, such as the generally known pasta of the Great Plain, lebbencs. Pasta is kneaded out of flour and eggs, stretched thin, and dried until it loses all its moisture. It is then broken up into palm-sized bits and put in white sacks, where it keeps for several months. Tarhonya, which is made of similarly kneaded pasta, is also generally known over the same area. It is first pressed through a leather sieve, then a wire sieve, and finally the few-millimetre-sized crumbs are dried in the shade. This too can be kept for months, even for a year. Soups made with these pastas spread initially as the food of herdsmen, of people working in the fields, of railway workers, and of pick and shovel men. Today, even in city diet, commonly known soups are made with both, but especially with the latter.

Among milk products, cottage cheese (túró) is stored in a sheepskin bag (Székelyland) or perhaps kneaded in dishes made of tree bark, so that it takes on its odour. Butter is preserved by browning and storing for an extended period in clay pots.