Ajvar!!!!

"At the end of September and during the thirty days of October, from nearly every Belgrade dwelling there rises a column of smoke as if tribes of Indians were busy communicating amongst themselves: peppers are roasted for ajvar."

Momo Kapor, A Guide to the Serbian Mentality

Ajvar (Cyrillic: Аjвар оr Айвар; Serbian pronunciation: [ˈajvar]) is relish made principally from red bell peppers, with eggplant, garlic and chili pepper.

Yesterday, we had the pleasure of participating in the annual Serbian ritual of roasting peppers and making Ajvar, the beloved red pepper relish. It was an incredibly labor-intensive, but amazing process. We roasted over 100 pounds of red peppers and eggplant, and after nearly 10 hours and 80 people hours, we ended up with approximately 40 pounds of delicious Ajvar (and got to bring 8 jars home for consumption here in the Richardson household!) We were hosted by Indira Bayer, the wife of an Embassy employee. Indira is from Serbia originally, and her wonderful mother traveled to Belgrade from southern Serbia for the day to teach us the ancient art of ajvar-making.

Here is a photojournal of our day. Enjoy!!

Step 1: Washing and drying the peppers -- all 100+ pounds of them!

Step 2: Roasting the peppers! We had two "stovetops" for our endeavor -- one was a pit that was dug in the ground with a fire underneath, and the other was a wood-burning stove that Indira had borrowed for the day.

Step 3: cutting and cleaning the roasted peppers -- a very tedious and long process

Step 4: chopping garlic (garlic is added to the pot before putting the peppers in the pot -- sauteed in many cups of oil over very hot heat)

Step 5: Grinding the peppers -- another time-consuming step, which I found to be much more enjoyable while drinking rakija, a Serbia brandy made from various fruits -- we enjoyed multiple varieties of rakija throughout the day (below, I can be seen grinding and drinking some blueberry rakija)

Step 6: Cooking the peppers with garlic, eggplant, oil and salt. This step involves mainly stirring and stirring and stirring the pot! We had two huge pots of ajvar that had to be stirred constantly for a VERY long time (we stirred, I believe, for about 4 hours total). Everyone took turns stirring the pot with these huge wooden spoons.

Stirring... (Eli and Indira's Mom)

And stirring... (our friend Regina)

And more stirring (Indira's Mom -- still at it)

Step 7: Bottling. At last, the stirring is over, the Ajvar is done, and the bottling process begins!! You can see that night has fallen here. We started at 9 a.m., so it indeed was a very long day, but well worth the effort!!