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St. Louis Post-Dispatch
St. Louis Post-Dispatch
Lifestyle
Daniel Neman

The food of Bosnia

Bosnia _ now once again part of a country called Bosnia and Herzegovina _ is located in the southern Alps, part of what used to be Yugoslavia. The region prides itself in being where Eastern and Western civilizations met. The country is about half Muslim (as are the vast majority of Bosnians who settled here) and half Christian _ mostly Eastern Orthodox, though a sizable minority are Catholic.

And the food is all Eastern European. It's hearty, stick-to-your-ribs fare, just right for getting you through a hard day's work or a cold winter's night.

"It's mostly comfort food," said Ermina Grbic, chef and co-owner of Grbic Restaurant, one of the best-known Bosnian restaurants in the St. Louis area.

As is the case with every world cuisine, a number of Bosnian dishes stand out as a proud regional specialty. For instance, Grbic said, a Bosnian would not think of having a visitor without offering a plate of pita.

This isn't pita, the familiar round bread from the Middle East. This is a pastry with many thin layers that is stuffed with meat, cheese, potatoes or spinach. It's the "pita" part of the well-known Greek spinach pastry spanikopita.

Pita stuffed with meat is called burek, and that is the variety I decided to make. I like it, and also it is what Grbic's children made on "Guy's Grocery Games" on Food Network to win $10,000.

There is an art to making the dough for pita, one that takes years to perfect. But there is an easy way to cheat. Simply use a few sheets of phyllo dough laid end to end and stacked a few layers high. A thin line of mildly spiced ground beef and potatoes can be rolled up in the dough and twisted into a spiral and then baked for a gorgeous, hearty and wonderfully casual dish.

Cevapi is also a popular Bosnian dish, and it is easy to see why. They are finger-sized grilled sausages made from an unbeatable combination of ground beef and ground lamb, spiced with grated onion, garlic, paprika, salt and pepper. It is the same general idea as a kofta kebab, and can be served by themselves, in lepinja bread (similar to the Middle Eastern pita) or with rice.

I didn't have a grill where I was cooking mine, so I just cooked them on a hot pan with a little oil. They turned out great, and our taste testers devoured them like children grabbing Oreos.

For a side dish, I cooked up some Djuvec Rice, which is the Balkan version of rice pilaf. In Bosnia, they make it with tomatoes, onion, bell pepper, carrots and more.

It's sort of an all-purpose dish that goes with any kind of meat, especially grilled meat. And it's a to-die-for natural with Cevapi.

For dessert, I whipped up a quick batch of Palacinke, which are the Bosnian form of crepes.

These are a bit stronger than the French version; they have more heft while still retaining that pleasant crepe lightness. They are also much faster to make; you don't have to wait a couple of hours for the batter to be at its best. You just mix up a batch and cook them.

Jams are one traditional filling for Palacinke, and so are soft cheeses such as sweetened ricotta or mascarpone.

But I made mine with Nutella, the hazelnut spread. That's how they serve them at Grbic Restaurant, after all, and Nutella is hugely popular throughout Europe.

I dusted mine with powdered sugar for extra sweetness. One bite, and it's like you are in Sarajevo.

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