I had always sustained my point, that the so called “mici” in Romania, or “cevapicici” in Srbija are at the bottom of their provenience with Ottoman root.
This speciality is a grilled dish of minced meat, such as kebab, that can be found nowadays in countries from the southeastern Europe, the so called, Balkan area.
The origins of the cevapi in the Balkan area dates from the Ottoman period, and represents the turkish culture of a speciality similar to the “kofte kebab”.
It is considered a national dish in countries such as: Bosnia and Herzegovina, Serbia, Croatia, Montenegro, Albania, Slovenia, Macedonia, Bulgaria and not the least, Romania where somehow people think that “cevapi/mici” is a dish invented here …
So … this is my point of view … people should read/accept the facts of history and the travel of the dishes during wars which have occurred in the Past.
I think Romania had the chance in the Past to deal with the Ottoman Empire during so many years and so, we had influences regarding the food spectrum as well …
Ottomans brought this recipe … This kind of dishes are originating from the nomadic tribes … even touareg and the berber people were cooking this way, so called “on-go” and the idea of “fast-food” came from the Northern Africa and Middle-East areas … not the western part …
From the middle east culture, beside kebab, we can find some other amazing dishes such as: falafel, dolma, baklava, doner kebab, shawarma, mulukhiyah, yoghurt, hummus.
As we know, the pork is prohibited in both, islam and judaism, so the lamb and mutton have always been the most favored meats in the Middle East area. From here they’ve developed several dishes and kebabs became a famous one, such as the shish kebab, the one with cubed cuts of meat on skewers.
The other one that we’re talking about and has somehow the true connection with our cevapi/mici is the kofta kebab, that was made from ground meat, sometimes being mixed with onions and spices and shaped around the skewer like a sausage and grilled.
Thru this style of fast food this dish became very popular and famous and started to become served as a street food, along with pita/bread, salad. This dish normally it’s not prepared in domestic kitchen, being very famous in the streets of Turkey and other Middle Eastern places.
I’m not influencing anybody to become a big consumer of meat, expecially this kind of heavy recipes, but from time to time when you’ll have the chance to travel to Turkey, Israel … feel free and enjoy this type of recipes.
Even in Romania, they’re cooking the mici/cevapi in a cool way …
Enjoy them too … expecially the ones made in beer …
Bon appetit to you readers :-)
Let’s not forget the origins of this dish named “kebab” from which became the latest serbian “cevapi … cevapici” and in Romania … as “mici” … maybe it ended here in the “smallest” way ( “mici” means “small”)
Tesekurler readers and …
Iyi Istah
Some music would fit as well ... and what else can be proper than some music played on turkish ney?
My Saba Saz Semaisi
https://musicoin.org/track/0x2007d7ac92b3745bc675437b29238f5996760736