Cooking With Cultural Appreciation Part One: Tirana-My House

May 09, 2022

Albania is a veritable cornucopia of some of the best food of any country we’ve ever lived in. So we were thrilled to return to Tirana this year to spend the Spring here. Give me the bread, give me the fresh churned butter, give me the beautiful, dirt-covered produce straight from the farm. The meat, the fish, the cheese, the herbs and spices, the fresh fruit and vegetables, are all quite simply some of the highest quality in the world. For someone who loves to cook, it’s an absolute Shangri-La of top quality ingredients.

There are many tenable factors at play in the geopolitical/economic situation in Albania, and, admittedly, I am not equipped with enough of the details required to address these particular complexities. But . . . I can talk about the butter! It is perhaps one of the great delights of living in Albania that one can go into any grocery store, let alone one of the many specialty cheese shops that litter almost every street of the city and, for just a couple of US dollars, purchase a giant ball of neon yellow butter wrapped in plastic wrap with no markings on it except, “Gjalpë i freskët,” which means “fresh butter.” Other than butter freshly churned from the rare Froment du Leon cows in Normandy, I’ve never tasted butter this rich and this pure of flavor and texture. And not only do they have the gjalpë i freskët lope (fresh cow’s butter) but they also have the white, almost translucent gjalpë i freskët dele (fresh sheep’s butter). Both of them (unsalted), when slathered over perfectly toasted Albanian bread and then lightly sprinkled with sea salt, are an absolute gastronomical delight!

Gjalpë i freskët lope (fresh cow’s butter). Photo by Ryan Wildstar

And can we talk about the bread for a second? Not only does the quality of the bread here rival almost any country in Europe, it’s also a part of Albanian hospitality that has its origins in the Kanun, a set of Albanian traditional oral customary laws dating back to the Bronze Age. As the saying goes from the the Kanun of Lekë Dukagjini, the first documented version from the 15th Century: “bukë, kripë e zemër,” or "bread, salt and heart." This meant that no matter how poor you might be, you could always offer a guest some bread and salt (historically, a very precious commodity of the ancient world) and an open heart. Similarly from the Kanun came the concept of besa (translated as “faithful” or “trustworthy” or “to keep the promise”), a code of honor which led Albanian Muslims and Christians alike to take in and hide more than 2,000 Jews from the Nazis during World War II. Below is a photo I took last week of the Holocaust Memorial in Tirana, transcribed in English, Albanian and Hebrew, with an inscription below it from the Talmud that reads, “Whoever saves one life, saves the whole world.”

As the poorest European country, Albania spends more money on bread than any other nation, especially in relation to their income. For this reason, you can’t go more than a few blocks in any direction in Tirana without encountering a bakery (furrë buke) carrying a variety of loaves of freshly baked bread, baguettes and almost always some divine pastries. During the year we lived in Tirana from September 2020 to September 2021, scarcely a day went by without a visit to our local bakery, Tito, in the Xhamlliku neighborhood of the city. With a staff of over 60 bakers, the bakery boasts a selection of 40 different types of bread as well as an abundance of cakes, donuts and pastries that will leave you salivating. Don’t hesitate to take home a couple of pastashu (Albanian éclairs) or sample their trileçe, an Albanian take on tres leches. It’s a sponge cake made with cream and milk from cows, goats and water buffaloes (a breed autochthonous to Albania). Albania was the first country to introduce their take on this South American dessert into the Balkans (supposedly due to the popularity of Brazilian soap operas here). Whatever you order from Tito’s, this place is an absolute gem and not to be missed should one visit Tirana!

And then there is the “Albanian paradox.” With a diet that falls under the category of “Mediterranean,” Albanians consume a large concentration of fruits, nuts, vegetables, legumes, seafood and olive oil. However, they also eat a considerable amount of chicken, lamb, goat, veal and pork, with most of their produce and animals being raised on small independent farms with very little factory farming at play. Thus, despite being the poorest of all the European nations, the quality of food is so exceptional that Albanian life expectancy is extremely high and on par with European countries with double or even triple Albania’s resources. Hence, the Albanian paradox.

The number of beautiful produce markets, butcher shops, bakeries and cheese shops in Tirana is staggering for a city of just over half a million inhabitants. The charming Pazari i Ri (New Bazaar) neighborhood, where we are currently staying as I pen this, hosts a slew of beautiful delis, butcher shops and fishmongers. Here one can find the incomparable qofte (amazing spiced meatballs), as well as that day’s catch of fish or cuts of free-range beef, lamb, pork, chicken and rabbit at prices that are astounding to most visitors.

So, with all this talk of food, you may ask, “What’s on the menu tonight?” Today I headed to my favorite local butcher. They know me there and the owner is a burly, aging mustached man that could easily pass as one of Zorba the Greek’s syrtaki dancers. He consistently offers me whatever is freshest and, today, it was a whole rabbit! So I’ve set my sights on preparing the traditional Albanian dish Lepur çomlek, a lush stew of rabbit and onions slow-cooked for hours.

After obtaining my rabbit, I stepped outside of the butcher shop to be warmly greeted by Lida, my plump, red-headed produce seller who sells her farm’s wares along the Rruga Odhise Paskali along with about 10 other vendors, all of whom offer the most exceptional selection of fruit and vegetables. She has a warm smile and a freckled, vaguely Celtic face that reminds me of my Irish grandmother, so I always come back to Lida’s small but impeccable stand.

As always, Lida yells out in English, “Hello Ryan! How are you?” to which I reply, in Albanian “Mir, si jeni?” (Good, how are you?). And although that’s about the extent of Lida’s English and my Albanian, we still manage to warmly conduct our affairs, with her offering me everything she knows I need for my Lepur çomlek – 2 pounds of onions, 3 ripe tomatoes, bay leaf, a head of garlic, rosemary, thyme and some fresh fruit (for our breakfast, not for the rabbit).

Now for dinner at Tirana-My House! The rabbit has been cleaned, chopped into portions and put into a bowl to marinade in balsamic vinegar for about 2 hours. Afterwards, it is dredged in flour, browned in a frying pan with a giant dollop of gjalpë i freskët dele (fresh sheep’s butter) and put aside. A healthy splash of sumptuous Albanian olive oil goes into the same hot pan and then the onions are fried with the garlic and white wine. Returning the rabbit pieces to the pan, I add Lida’s juicy chopped tomatoes, rosemary, thyme, a cinnamon stick, bay leaves, salt, pepper, some chicken broth and white wine. Once it reaches the boiling point, the contents of the pan are then transferred to a deep casserole dish and into the oven it goes, covered for about 3 to 4 hours until the liquid is almost all gone and the meat is falling off of the bunny’s little bones.

So, with a loaf of warm bread just out of the oven from Tito’s bakery, a couple of bottles of aged Albanian Mavrud from Kantina Bardha (a fantastic independent winery located about 40 minutes outside Tirana) and my creamy, whipped mashed potatoes . . . dinner is served! And, for dessert, some vanilla and chocolate pastashu, perfectly paired with a snifter or two of raki moskat!