How To Cook Peppa From Food For My Cannibals: Readers Like Easy, Quick To Prepare And Affordable Recipes - Recipe

I do not believe that there is a person in Bulgaria who has not entered Pepa's blog at least once and has certainly remembered it. If he was not impressed by the huge variety (if possible), he certainly remembered the name - "Food for my cannibals". The blog has a large set of tried and tested recipes that are close to our taste and familiar products - something that is difficult to find nowadays, when everyone is striving for a modern new world. But let's not forget that the most delicious is when the food carries the memory left over from childhood, and in the family of "cannibals" this memory is certainly filled with the aroma of homemade food.

First of all, introduce yourself, who is behind "Food for my cannibals" and who are your cannibals :)?

Pepa Stoeva - a middle-aged woman who in her spare time loves to cook, travel and admire nature. It is equally reassuring for me to be in the silence of the forest, or in the riches of our native nature, and to fill olives for breading, so to speak. Middle age doesn't stop me from dreaming, being impulsive, and feeling young. A man is as old as he feels, isn't he?

My cannibals (as we joked years ago about meat preferences in our country) are my two children - Nikolai and Juliet and their halves - Gergana and Kaloyan. So I have big boys aged 28 and 2 beautiful young ladies. And all four like to eat meat dishes. At the bottom of my meat food preferences, of course, is my husband - when we got married, he ate meat in the morning, at lunch and at dinner. One of his hobbies - hunting, goes very well with mine - cooking (not just cooking as a duty). Game meat is different from domestic meat and requires more diligence, patience and improvisation in the kitchen. I thought it would be a challenge for me only in the beginning, but it turns out - it still is.

I don't know if you paid attention to the number, but I calculated that your blog has about 1000 recipes (1040 if we have to be precise), which makes it one of the largest in Bulgaria. Where does your inspiration come from?

Yes, according to statistics, the recipes in the blog are already 1041 :). In fact, there are more, as in some publications there are 2 or 3 recipes. Inspiration? Rather, a desire to surprise young people at home with something new, untested - a new product, a new taste. Desire to prepare a dish that we tried somewhere, to achieve the taste, if possible even better, as happened with the most recently read recipe from the blog "biscuit cake with mascarpone and blueberries."

An enticing, appetizing photo can provoke me to prepare a dish from it. A movie, a book, or a field trip also happens to be an occasion to try a recipe. And if you like it - I will definitely share it on the blog.

The food you prepare is very traditional. Do you think that we are still inclined to try new things, or do Bulgarians love our national cuisine?

I think and make sure that the taste is nurtured. Even I took the avocado after the third meeting, broccoli too, a lot of other products that may not have been well prepared. But when you try and try again - you get a taste you like. So much so that I grew broccoli and sweet potatoes, different in type, size and color of tomatoes, and this year I had a harvest of asparagus. In my opinion and observation, the Bulgarian does not like the unknown - even as a product. I am glad that the younger part of the people tend to try new and unfamiliar foods. But most of my acquaintances rely on traditional food and do not even buy an unknown product. As in the restaurants, I see - the same familiar dishes, appetizers and salads are ordered en masse. Perhaps one of the reasons is that in recent years there are new products on the market and in the trade network in our country. However, many fruits and vegetables are of poor appearance and poor quality until they reach the market and people often refuse to buy them. My husband is a traditionalist when it comes to food. If you can say traditionalist for a person who does not like moussaka and does not eat sarmi. It took him 10 years to eat seafood, for example. This does not mean, as expected in the first 3 years of our marriage, that we will eat only meat with potatoes, meat with rice and meat without potatoes, or rice. Now in the blog, along with the traditional food (chicken kavrma, sauerkraut, simple chicken with rice) there are also good recipes with goose liver, red pepper jam, onion, red beet jam, sushi, seafood. If you can say traditionalist for a person who does not like moussaka and does not eat sarmi. It took him 10 years to eat seafood, for example. This does not mean, as expected in the first 3 years of our marriage, that we will eat only meat with potatoes, meat with rice and meat without potatoes, or rice. Now in the blog, along with the traditional food (chicken kavrma, sauerkraut, simple chicken with rice) there are also good recipes with goose liver, red pepper jam, onion, red beet jam, sushi, seafood. If you can say traditionalist for a person who does not like moussaka and does not eat sarmi. It took him 10 years to eat seafood, for example. This does not mean, as expected in the first 3 years of our marriage, that we will eat only meat with potatoes, meat with rice and meat without potatoes, or rice. Now in the blog, along with the traditional food (chicken kavrma, sauerkraut, simple chicken with rice) there are also good recipes with goose liver, red pepper jam, onion, red beet jam, sushi, seafood.

What do your readers like, what is the most read and commented recipe on the blog?

Readers like easy, quick to prepare and affordable recipes - I go back to unfamiliar products, sometimes they stop people from preparing a recipe. And there are regions where some products are really missing. In our dynamic daily lives, people prefer to cook something quickly, or in the oven, instead of spinning around the stove. And the time saved from the kitchen can be spent with loved ones. But it is gratifying that fewer and fewer people are eating semi-finished products and prefer to cook for themselves.

The most sought after and read recipe on the blog is for chicken kavrma - this simple dish to prepare. This proves my above thesis that people are looking for easy recipes. The others are most in demand for potato meatballs, pasta and, more recently, mascarpone biscuit cake. As well as recipes for winter - pickles, canned food…

You say that your blog is not the healthiest, but preparing a balanced menu does not necessarily include modern super foods. Do you try to choose what you serve to your family?

Oh yeah. I try to make the fruit and vegetables seasonal - except for the winter season I succeed. If vegetables are not our home production, I rely on trusted sources in the market - people who are producers and over the years I have made sure of the quality of the goods they offer. The same is true for meat - home-made or from shops with their own farms. For me, this is organic food - produced with the least possible preparations, fertilizers and additives, somewhere within a radius of 100 km, did not fly more than 3000 km. Salads of fresh and fresh vegetables is a must. Everything is useful and healthy when eaten in moderation. Whether pasta, animal, or fried.

Cooking is not for everyone, but almost everyone has to do it. What questions do your readers ask you most often?

Can this product be replaced with another? In my opinion, you can always, but I do not guarantee whether the taste will be the one I described in the recipe. But it can also get better. If I like one spice - another may not like it. Of course, he will change it, as I do. The important thing is to quickly think and improvise. This is how the best recipes are made. But there are recipes that are simply not the same if you change a product - as for the Mediterranean, for example, to change pecorino or parmesan with Bulgarian cheese. Or make pizza with savory. It will work, but it will not be real. It's like putting rosemary and basil on stuffed peppers.

The other most common questions are about home canning, here are the most frequently asked questions. In the blog I have paid a lot of attention to this topic - from pickles, sauerkraut, canned meat or vegetables, lutenitsa, to making homemade cheese, mozzarella, homemade vinegar, syrups…. On the labels of many cans we see part of the Mendelian table, so I often remind people that even if the products are bought from the market, it is still better for them to preserve them at home.

Tell the story of the creation of "Food for my cannibals"? What is the secret to creating a successful culinary blog?

The story is quite simple - before I made the blog, I had my own topics with favorite recipes in a large Bulgarian culinary forum from the time when blogs were not known in Bulgaria. Many of my relatives got confused in the big forum and jokingly created a blog to make it easier to find my recipes. At the same time, my son, a student in Sofia, preferred to cook his own dinner, which is why I created the category "Learning to cook" with easy, very detailed and accessible recipes. Later it turned out to be a well-stocked database of recipes for my daughter, and the feedback from readers - obviously helps a lot - not only young people, in cooking. The secret is simple - the recipes are tested, explained in great detail, successful and almost all have products that are familiar and accessible to people.

What would you like to say to our readers?

Enjoy the food! In any case, we have to cook, at least to do it willingly - from personal experience I say that then the dishes are better. Don't rush to eliminate animal products from your menu just because it's fashionable. Man has been eating animal products since the dawn of time. Choose your products. In the big chains you shop faster, but there are not the freshest and freshest products.