Bulgarian cuisine boasts some delicious, hearty and original foods.

Below is a list of some of the best Bulgarian dishes I have had the pleasure of tasting.

1. Sour cabbage with chicken or pork. aka "Kisialo Zele" similar to Polish Bigos. 

2. Banitsa with Bulgarian cheese. This is the delicious philo dough layered with Bulgarian cheese, butter, some egg batter and yoghurt baked in the oven

3. Lyutenitsa - the delicious tomatoe based paste with grilled peppers, some garlic, aubergine and carrots. Spread on bread and butter it is heavenly and it is 100% vegetarian.

4. Tarator - its a cold soup or drink if u want to call it that is made from yoghurt, cucumber, crushed walnuts, some garlic and dill. Heavenly and revitalizing on a hot summer day.

5. Various kinds of salami like Lukanka, Shpek, Babek, Sujuk... very spicy and aromatic unlike italian, German and Swiss salamis that are bland.

6. Kashkaval - OK its a delicious yellow cheese and if u make a pizza with it, trust me you will fall in love again with Pizza...

7. Printsesa - its toast covered with minced pork meat, spiced with black pepper and cumin, some chopped onion, covered with kashkaval and Rosemary... baked in the oven... it is heavenly...

8. Shkembe Chorba - or Tripe. Delicious topped with vinegar and crushed garlic... on a cold winter day... it is a cure for all kinds of diseases...

9. The all popular kebapche and kuftentse: grilled minced pork with onions and black pepper makes a kuftentse. Grilled minced pork with cumin makes a kebapche.... important that the minced meat is fatty...

10. Shopska Salata!!!! Fresh cut tomatoes, cucumber, onion, peppers topped with Bulgarian white cheese and olive oil... it is heavenly...

11. Tutmanik - delicious bread like dough mixed with white cheese and yoghurt baked in the oven

12. Wild mushroom mix stew... very simply wild mushrooms with meat cooked into a stew... eaten with rice... I had it once when I was a kid and I will never forget how delicious it was...

13. Mastika - a drink very close to Ouzo but to my taste more delicious....

14. Guvech - clay pot filled with veggies and meat or cheese and an egg... baked in the oven. yummy...

15. Pig ears... boiled then grilled, topped with soya sauce and raw chopped onions... delicious...

16. Lamb and rice... delicious the Bulgarian way...

17. Smelianski Fasul - Delicious bean stew from the Rhodope village of Smelian... it is heavenly and 100% vegetarian...

18. Chushki - grilled then fried green/red peppers in sun flower oil... Bulgarian peppers are heavenly....

19. Palnini Chushki with white sauce - stuffed bell peppers with rice and minced meat and spices.... heavenly

20. Mlechna Salata - strained yoghurt mixed with chopped cucumber - heavenly on a summer night...

21. Fried Som, Sharan, Kustur, Tolostolop... fried catfish, carp or perch. Heavenly when the fish is fresh....

22. Kalamara - a delicious Bulgarian dessert that reminds me of my childhood summers in Plovdiv...

23. Krenvirsh or the Bulgarian Hotdog... delicious

24. Sladko Ot Smokini or fig preserve. My grandmother, may she rest in peace, used to make this when i was a child. We had a large fig tree in our garden in Plovdiv. Firm figs are boiled in sugary syrup then preserved with the syrup in glass jars. Eathen in tandem with Bulgarian yoghurt, the taste is heavenly...

Compiled by Rami E. Kremesti M.Sc., CSci, CEnv, CWEM

Last updated August 24, 2021