Poale'n brâu pie

One of the traditional recipes that make Romania’s name join the list of countries with the best dishes is a specific type of pie called in Romanian: "poale'n brâu". This pie is specific for the area of Moldova (Moldavia). They are usually consumed in any circumstances, not related to holidays or other seasonal practices as in the case of other typical Romanian dishes. Therefore their composition may vary from sweet or salty cheese to fruits or jams.

Ingredients:
500 grams of flour
100 grams of lard (or butter or oil)
4 egg yolks
100 grams of cream
60 g of yeast
half teaspoon of salt
300 ml of milk
100 grams of sugar.

In addition to these in preparing the filling you will also need:
500 grams of cheese (or jam / fruits)
If using cheese, add:
2 eggs
a glass of milk
60 grams of cream
50 grams of sugar.

It’s pretty easy to prepare this pie but it requires a longer period of time as you need the dough to rise. In a larger bowl mix the yeast with the sugar until becomes liquid. Add 2 tablespoons of tepid milk, a little flour and mix well. Cover and let sit in a warm place. Meanwhile prepare egg yolks with sugar and salt and after a while add this composition in the one previously made and mix. Knead this dough while adding warmish lard, and then leave it to rise again. While waiting prepare the filling: mix the cheese with eggs, salt, sugar and other ingredients such as currants and vanilla sugar, depending on what you like. Add salt and knead with flour until the dough comes off your hands and bowl easily. Cover and let rise in a warm place. After the dough has raised, roll into a 1cm sheet and make medium sized squares out of it. Then put the filling in the midst and pull the corners of the squares in the middle of the pie, envelope style. Stick well so that the filling may not come out. Sprinkle flour on the baking sheet, then put the pies in tray, wash with egg, cover with baking paper and leave in the oven about 45 minutes. Serve as you like it, because it is good both warm and cold, with sugar or plain.

Ioan Holender

Ioan Holender (born Johann Hollaender, born 18 July 1935, Timişoara) is a Romanian singer, manager and director of opera. He is the General Manager of the Vienna State Opera.

Holender's family is of Jewish ancestry, and growing up, he spoke 3 languages. His father owned a factory in Timişoara, which was expropriated in 1948. After baccalaureate, Holender studied for three years mechanical engineering at the Technical University in Timişoara, specialty steam machines and successfully completed the first round of the state examination. While in third year of studies, in 1956, he was expelled from the whole Romanian higher education system on political grounds, following his participation at students movements. He worked as a tennis coach and a stage director assistant until he and his family emigrated to Austria, where his mother was residing. He intended to continue his engineering studies, but became interested in singing. After completing his music studies - Canto at Vienna Conservatoire (1959-1962), from 1962 to 1966 he started a career as an operatic baritone and concert singer and sang two seasons at the Klagenfurt Stadttheater.

In 1966, he began to work at the Starka theatrical agency, which he eventually took over and, under the name of Holender Opera Agency, increased the prestige and made it one of the most important German Agencies.

In 1988, Eberhard Waechter named Holender as Secretary-General of the Vienna State Opera, effective as of 1991. There was controversy as this appointment, because of perceived conflicts of interest between this post and his prior association with his theatrical agency. Eventually, Holender dissociated himself from the Starka business. After Waechter's death in February 1992, Holender became Director of the Vienna State Opera on 1 April 1992. He also led the Vienna Volksoper for 4 years simultaneously. Holender's contract was extended three times and his tenure is scheduled to conclude on 31 August 2010. At the conclusion of his tenure, he will have been the longest-serving general director in the history of the Vienna State Opera.

In the years 2002 – 2004 he was artistic consultant of the Deutsche Oper Berlin. Since 2003 he is honorary president and artistic director of the George Enescu Festivals in Bucharest / Romania. In addition he is a guest lecturer at the Vienna University Institute of Theater, Film and Media Sciences and at the Danube University Krems. Further he is a jury member for several international singing-competitions.

He has received five honorary doctorates and is a recipient of the Decoration of Honour in Gold for Services to the Republic of Austria and the Gold Medal for meritorious service to the State of Vienna, the Award in Gold of the State of Vienna as well as the Austrian Cross of Honour for Science and Art I. Class. In 1999 he was appointed "Officier de L’Ordre des Arts et des Lettres" by the French Republic. He is Honorary Member of the Romanian Academy.

Ioan Holender is an Honorary Member of the Vienna State Opera and the Vienna Volksoper. He holds the Clemens Krauss Medal given by the Vienna State Opera chorus, the Golden "Franz Schalk" Medal given by the Vienna Philharmonic Orchestra and has also been awarded the honorary citizenship of his native town Timisoara. During the first tour of Vienna State Opera in Bucharest (George-Enescu-Festival) in September 2001 he has been decorated with the most important Romanian medal. In December 2002 he received the Grand Decoration of Honour in Gold for Services to the Republic of Austria. Further he received the Grand Decoration of Honour in Gold of the Italian Republic in June 2004 and with this has been appointed "Commendatore". In May 2005 he was awarded the „Europäischer Kultur Initiativ Preis“ of the European Foundation for Culture Pro Europa and the Prize for a long life activity dedicated to culture and for the contribution to the assertion of the Romanian values throughout the world, awarded by the Romanian Cultural Foundation.

Ocna Mureş Castle

Ocna Mureş (Hungarian: Marosújvár, German: Miereschhall) is a town in Alba County, Romania, located in the north-eastern corner of the county, near the Mureş River. The town is situated next to a large deposit of salt. The city was attested as a Roman civilian settlement in Dacia (II-III century AD), known for salt exploitation, as Salinae.

The Teleki Castle in Uioara de Sus (Upper Uioara), a district of Ocna Mureş, was first an medieval castle. In a document from 1290, it was named Castrum Novum (New Castle), supporting the existence of an earlier fortification (10th-11th centuries), from which can be seen today portions of a mound with a ditch. This New Castle was built at the end of the 13th century by order of the Hungarian Crown, to protect the neighboring salt mine. It was then attested in documents of 1336 and 1382. During the 14th century the castle became the property of some nobles.

In 1576 it was the property of Báthori Kristóf, who left it in 1581 to Gálfi János. Michael the Brave donated the castle and the Uioara domain to his counselor Mihalcea, Great Ban of Craiova (1599). In 1620 Prince Bethlen Gábor donate the benefits of the castle and town to the orphaned son of Siményfalvi Székely Mózes. Mikes Mihály acquired the castle during the reign of Apafi Mihály I, and his family owned it until the middle of the 19th century. The Latvian count Mikó Imre repaired the castle and converted it in Baroque style.

The castle was partially demolished to permit the construction (between 1850-1860) of an impressive neo-Gothic castle for the Banffy noble family, building which later became the property of Teleki counts. From the medieval castle can still be seen today the ruins of a pentagonal tower, representing an old dungeon.

The building has a square plan, with ground floor and two levels. The residential building is adjacent to annexes for management staff and estate maintenance. In the court there is a wine cellar and a chapel, which was originally equipped with an organ. The Teleki family arranged around the castle a park with paths and trees, including some rare acclimatized species.

The complex includes the ruins of a church, built in Romanesque style around 1300. There are still preserved some brick walls and a bell tower, that has windows with cubic capitals. Over time, it underwent several major changes. The castle is a historical monument.

Fotos from Ocna Mureş Online.

Cetatea de Baltă Castle

Cetatea de Baltă (Hungarian: Küküllővár; Saxon German: Kâkelbrich; German: Kockelburg, Kukelburg, Kuchelburg, Kümelburg) is a village in Alba County with a population of 3235. It is located between Târnăveni (15 km) and Blaj (21 km).

The village was first attested in a Papal register in 1177, as "Villa Cuculiensis Castri". The reformed church towers were built in 1060, and have resisted to the Tatar invasion of 1214. As a reminder of those events, on church walls is painted a big head of a Tatar (late 13th century). According to another document in 1214, during King Stephen I of Hungary here was a wooden fort fortified with embankments of earth, which was destroyed during the Tatar invasion in 1241.

Documents from the early 14th century refers again to a fort, which during 1467-1538 was under the rule of Ştefan the Great and Petru Rareş, ruling princes of Moldavia. In 1565 it was destroyed by the Csaky family, owner of the serf villages to build here a fortified castle. In the late 17th century the domain became the property of Prince Apafi Mihály.

In 1757 was bought by Gábor Bethlen, than the castle than became the property of his brother Miklos Bethlen, who, in 1770 , rebuilt the castle. Instead of the drawbridge he built a stairway, the building got a pointed roof, the outer wall was dismantled, he built a chapel, a boose, and a gate barbican which, in 1972, crumbled down.

After Count Bethlen’s family, the Haller family received it by marriage and moved into the magnificent castle. During the WWII the walls of the castle were damaged (1944). After the war, the castle was used as a granary, office house, and after the 70’s the Jidvei champagne factory used the cellars of the castle for storing. Today the castle is private property and can not be visited. The castle was bought from Count Haller’s grandchild with the condition that it can not be modified. The new owner wants the castle to be placed in the touristic circuit.

The Bethlen-Haller Castle was built in the 16th century in the French Renaissance style and restored in the 17th-18th centuries in the Baroque style. The building has a rectangular plan, with massive walls, laid on top with holes for oil and circular defense towers on corners.

The basement and first floor have semi-cylindrical vaulted ceilings. On the upper side is a spiral staircase. The main staircase, richly decorated, is carved in wood. The new owners have preserved it, and at its end, in the cellars where were tortured the serfs and where food was kept, is now arranged a room for wine tasting. The doors and window frames, the architecture, generally bears the imprint of the French Renaissance. The gate, in Baroque style, was built in 1769. The castle was famous for its gardens and the deer farm. From the castle cellars start tunnels leading to the castle of Sânmiclăuş, another family property.

Images from here.

Gorneşti Castle

Gorneşti (Hungarian: Gernyeszeg) is a commune in Mureş County, Romania. It is situated on Mureş River, 17 km from Târgu-Mureş and has a Székely Hungarian majority (75%). The village was documentary attested in 1319 (as Knezeg), when the king of Hungary, Carol Robert of Anjou, donated it to the Prince of Transylvania, Szecseny Tamas. The Szecseny family owned the domain until 1395, when changed some properties with a certain Zsigmund. Between 1405-1642 it belonged to Erdelyi of Somkerek, then was in possession of the Teleki family until 1949. It seems that in the 15th-16th centuries here was a landlord residence, fortified with walls and water ditches.

 

Teleki is a prominent name in the history of Transylvania and Hungary. The aristocratic family was actively involved throughout the centuries in both political-administrative and cultural activities. In 1685, Mihaly Teleki (1634-1690) became Count of the Holy Roman Empire, receiving the title from Emperor Leopold I. But the most famous family member was Sámuel Teleki (1739-1822), chancellor of Transylvania and founder of the Teleki Library in Târgu-Mureş. The most interesting character in the family is certainly the famous explorer of Africa, Sámuel Teleki (1845-1916).

The castle, built between 1771-1778 and finalized in 1802 by Count László Teleki, is a representative example of Baroque architecture in Transylvania. The project seems to be realized by architect Andreas Mayerhoffer from Salzburg, the castle resembling with the palaces Pécel and Godollo made by him. It was built into an impressive arboretum, in so-called Grassalkovich style, very popular in Budapest, and is the only one in Transylvania that hosts a Baroque statues park.

The U-shaped architectural composition is balanced, the central body is "en decroche" and the decorative elements are elegantly articulated. The facade is marked in its center by a raised risalit with rounded corners. The high roof with a huge cupola in the middle has skylights and a clock on top. From the main body of the building starts two wings to the garden. The castle has 52 rooms and 365 windows, symbolizing the weeks and days of the year.

In the Baroque period, the emphasis was on illustrating the social status. In this residence, this is highlighted by space representation, main hall, monumental staircase, rooms for receptions, areas for study - especially the library - and spaces for different types of artistic performances.

The explorer Sámuel Teleki (1845-1916) kept in the castle his collection of illustrations and the family's library, including 6,000 volumes. Unfortunately, a large part of it was destroyed during the two world wars. Count Domokos Teleki (1880-1955), a carpet collector and scholar, kept his Oriental and Occidental rugs in Gorneşti Castle. Unfortunately the Teleki Collection was never published, although its richness can be guessed at from a few pieces now in the Hungarian National Museum and in the Budapest Museum of Applied Arts, among them a 17th century Ushak medallion carpet fragment (numbered 1292 in the Teleki Collection inventory!).

The garden started to be laid out between the building and the moat in 1782, during the ownership of József I Teleki. The earliest known garden scheme, dating from c.1792, features ornamental parterres. However, József I Teleki, probably inspired by Rousseau, with whom he was personally acquainted, wished to lay out a landscape garden at that time.

In the early decades of the 19th century, his son József II Teleki, who had traveled in England as well, brought the landscape garden to completion. For this purpose, the moat at certain points was widened to form pools, and filled up at others. The garden's most significant edifice is József II Teleki's monument erected by his widow after his death in 1817 in the middle of the park. A design dating from 1831 features, in addition, a gloriette and an obelisk. A fine collection of deciduous trees were enriched with conifers from the 1850s.

The garden's last significant phase of improvement took place at the beginning of the 20th century when Domokos Teleki aquired some 18th-century statuary for the park. Seven mythological statues may originally have stood in the garden of Starhemberg Palace in Vienna before being transported to a private garden in Buda in the 19th century. Also among these newly acquired statues is a group of four gnomes, originally part of a series. Park paths and banks of ponds were decorated with numerous allegorical statues, but busts, such as Mirabeau's or Louis XVI, works by sculptor Martinelli.

The last owner of the castle, Count Mihaly Teleki, donated it to the sanitary authorities of Romania. At the moment, the castle shelters the Tuberculosis Observation Sanatorium and it is claimed in court.

Photos from here.

Brâncoveneşti Castle

Brâncoveneşti (formerly Ieciu and Delavrancea; Hungarian: Marosvécs or Vécs; German: Wetsch) is a commune in Mureş County, Romania. Brâncoveneşti is located at the eastern extremity of Transylvania Plain, on the upper Mureş River, at 10km from Reghin.

On a high terrace near Mureş River was a Roman fortification (Ala Nova Illiricorum), then in the Middle Ages (13th century) there was a fortress surrounded by ditches, visible today. This city was apparently destroyed by the great Mongol invasion of 1242. Brâncoveneşti was first attested in 1228 as Wecheu Fortress, in a document of donation issued by the Hungarian King Andras II.

The construction of Kendy-Kemény Castle began in 15th century, for Losonczi Dezsofi noble family. Over the next 150 years the area changed owners several times (Báthori Zsigmond, Bocskai István). In 1527 were performed important works to the castle. The castle was finished in 1557-1558 by Prince Ferenc Kendy, in the Transylvanian Renaissance style. It was fortified with ditches designed by Sava Armaşu (1599-1600), in the time of Michael the Brave.

In 1610 the area was owned by Gabriel Bethlen, Prince of Transylvania, then by György Rákóczi I. György Rákóczi II, Prince of Transylvania from 1648, donated the domain consisting of 5 villages, to a military leader named Kemény János. Kemény János becomes Prince of Transylvania in 1660, but died in battle in 1662, and his enemies devastated the domain. It was also devastated during the wars led by Ferenc Rákóczi II (the "Curuţilor" uprising). The Kemény family owned the domain for the next 3 centuries. The Kemény family rebuilt each time the castle.

The last Count, who had the same name as his ancestor, Kemény János, invited in 1926 at the castle 28 of the most prominent literary figures of the time, who founded the cultural association Erdélyi Helikon. From now on, for twenty years the Brâncoveneşti Castle became the center of the literary meetings of Transylvanian Hungarian writers.

The WWII hasn't brought great destruction, but after the Kemény family fled from the area in 1944 the population devastated complete the castle, which after 1945 became the home for severely mentally handicapped children.

The castle have a square-shaped plan, courtyard and corner towers, two larger and two smaller. Several windows have frames in Renaissance style. Built above the entrance is a picturesque stone balcony on consoles. The consoles can be seen at the floors of the towers. The entrance is on the north side, on a bridge over the outside ditch of the castle. Old documents show that the former citadel (13th century) was protected by ditches, walls and towers positioned below the plateau on which was the castle. These were destroyed during the post-war reconstruction works.

Iernut Castle

Iernut (Hungarian: Radnót) is a small town in Mureş County, central Transylvania, Romania. The town has a rich history, dating from the Neolithic Age (4500-2500 î.C.). Here were found also archeological traces of a Roman colony from the 2nd-3rd centuries. First attested in 1257 as terra Ranolth (the name comes from the Germanic name Reinold of the owner of feudal land), Iernut belonged to the early Romanian stately formations in the Middle Ages (cnezat, Gelu Voivodeship), the Voivodeship of Transylvania dominated by the Hungarian nobility (12th-16th centuries), the Transylvanian Principality under the Ottoman suzerainty (17th century), the Habsburg Empire (17th-19th centuries), the Austro-Hungarian Empire (1867-1918).

The Iernut estate was of secular feudal type. He later became the property of the princes of Transylvania (such as György Rákóczi I, Gabriel Bethlen or Mihály Apafi II), the property of tax authorities, gradually belonged to various noble families, being donated, sold and resold. In 1648, György Rákóczi II stopped here, on his way to Târgu Mureş, where he was to be crowned Prince of Transylvania. The Treaty of Radnót was signed here during the Second Northern War on 6 December 1656. The treaty divided the Polish-Lithuanian Commonwealth between the signing parties.

During that time several congregations and 15 diets of the Transylvanian nobility took place here. In the castle were emprisoned two Orthodox metropolitans of Transylvania, Dosoftei Ilie Iorest and Sava Brancovici, because they did not want to forsake their faith. Finally, the estate became the property of the Roman-Catholic Church in Transylvania.

The castle Kornis-Rakoczi-Bethlen of Iernut was built in late Gothic style with Renaissance elements for Gáspár Bogáti in 1545, but the buildings wiped out the traces of previous buildings, so that way the old castle looked until 1545 remained unknown. The portal frame dates from 1574, also built in Renaissance style. Between 1583 and 1585, the owner of the castle was Francisc Kendy. In this period, here was hosted for eight months the Genovese Franco Sivori, who had been serving the ruling prince of Moldavia, Petru Cercel. In 1608, the castle was donated by Prince Gabriel Báthory to Boldizsar Kornis as a reward for helping him to win the throne of Transylvania. In 1649, Francisc Kornis sells the castle to Prince György Rákóczi II for 22,000 florins.

During the Bethlen–Rákóczi era, several projects with a planimetrical conception inspired from the architecture treatises of the Italian Renaissance were performed, such the castle in Iernut (1617–1629, 1649–1656). It was the last large-scale construction in the Transylvanian Principality. The current castle, built in the first form in 1545, has been modified between 1650-1660 for Prince György Rákóczi II, after the plans of Venetian architect Agostino Serena. This one, performing various works, introduced in the construction of the castle the Renaissance style architectural elements.

The castle is composed of two parts: the castle itself and the gate building. In the second half of the 18th century was built the Snake House, with snake decorations - sign taken from the escutcheon of the Bethlen family. The gate building have specific architectural elements of the Baroque style: the opening gang, the roll-shaped decorative elements above the windows, the roof shape. The escutcheon of György Rákóczi and his wife Zsofia Báthory is on the south-western gate, the new entrance gate. The castle was the core of an important complex, being surrounded by walls with towers, warehouses and sheds, and a wide ditch, fed by the water of Mureş River.

The building is square-shaped, with towers at corners, and it has three levels from the first - partly buried in the ground - is actually a basement. The walls, 1m thick, are constructed of burnt brick, but one can see the basement stone walls. Outside walls have a sober look, with few decorative elements. On the north and south are two portals with semicircular openings, which provides access to the castle yard. On the northern side, the median axis is marked by a small balcony supported on two consoles with curvilinear profiles. Ground floor rooms retain some specific architectural elements of the Renaissance period.

The brick ceilings of the basement and ground floor rooms are vaulted in cross, with floral-shaped keystones, and associated in some places with small stone consoles, decorated with geometric and vegetal motifs. The ceiling of the first floor is plane. The doors have profiled frames with strongly raised cornices in the upper part. One of the most beautiful and well-preserved frames is the one of the room in the north-eastern corner, decorated with additional pillars supporting the same type of cornice. Also on the inside of the northern side is a semicircular and elongated small niche, whose framework is decorated with two flowers carved in relief.

The special element introduced by the Venetian architect in the planimetric composition and overall image of castle architecture of this building is the replacing of the southern wing with a loggia at the first floor, open to the outside and also to the courtyard. It has subsequently been closed. The trail of the semicircular arches are visible today, both on the northern wall of the courtyard and inside rooms. Galleries on three sides of the inner court, which mimics the typology of Renaissance loggia were added later, not belonging to the original plan of the castle.

The castle belonged to the Bethlen family descendants until 1885, when Mark Bethlen lost the castle to Count Jeno Haller during a card game. The winner donated the estate to the Roman-Catholic Church in Transylvania, that transformed it into a model farm and an agricultural school.

After 1920, the estate fell apart, and what remained was nationalized in 1948, and the castle became an agricultural college. Inside the Snake House was open a commemoration museum dedicated to the WWII, but after the events of 89’ the museum closed and the building was considerably damaged. After 1990, it hasn’t got an owner for four years, and currently it’s part of a return law-suit.