Slovene recipe
How to make Buckwheat žganci
ajdovi žganci
Central and Alpine Slovenia
Buckwheat flour cooked in salted water and broken up with a fork into small, crumbly lumps. It was once an everyday farmhouse meal, eaten with milk for breakfast, or with lard and crispy pork cracklings, or beside sauerkraut and meat.
Ingredients
- 400 g buckwheat flour
- 1.2 litres water and 1 teaspoon salt
- 2 tablespoons butter or lard
- To serve: 100 g crispy fried bacon pieces, or a glass of cold milk or yogurt
Method
- Bring the salted water to the boil in a large, wide pan.
- Tip in all the flour at once so that it forms a mound in the water. Do not stir. Use the handle of a wooden spoon to poke a hole down through the middle of the mound.
- Cover and simmer gently for 20 minutes.
- Pour off and keep about half of the water. Break up the flour with a fork, stirring hard, until it forms small, crumbly lumps. Add back a little of the water if it is too dry, cover and leave to stand for 5 to 10 minutes.
- Stir in the butter or lard and fluff it up again with the fork. Serve with bacon pieces on top, or with cold milk or yogurt on the side.
Made it at home? Tick it off and it goes into your kitchen passport.
A 19th-century saying called žganci 'the pedestal of Carniola', because so many people lived on it.
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