Bulgaria on the (self-service) menu at EU institutions
Specialities of Bulgarian cuisine including banitsa, kavarma and patatnik are among the country’s traditional dishes being served in coming weeks at EU institutions, part of the marking of Bulgaria’s holding of the rotating Presidency of the Council of the European Union.
The special menus will also include white bean soup, shopska salad, peppers filled with cheese, and biscuit cake.
The dishes will be prepared by the chefs of the self-service restaurants of the EU institutions, the Bulgarian EU Presidency website said.
It is a tradition for the self-service restaurants of the European institutions to prepare dishes from the country holding the rotating Presidency of the Council of the EU.
Already, to highlight the traditions of Bulgaria’s culture, there is an interactive installation “Abecedarium Bulgaricum”, exhibited in the atrium of the Justus Lipsius building – the headquarters of the Council of the European Union in Brussels.
Dr Venelin Shurelov is the author of the Bulgarian project in collaboration with students and lecturers from the Digital Arts Masters Programme of the national Academy of Fine Arts in Sofia.
The installation comprises 30 boxes with a metal frame and semi-transparent shatter resistant Plexiglas walls. Each of them contains one laser cut letter of the alphabet. A sensor reacts when sitting on it and activates a speaker that produces the original sound of the letter. The rest of the time the letters get activated randomly. The boxes and the cables are arranged freely and provide a visual metaphor of the connections between the letters to make up words.
The other highlight of the project is the presentation of Vladimir “Maistora” Dimitrov, with a 25 minute film about the great Bulgarian artist created by Shurelov in 2014.
In addition, a series of films interpreting elements of the historical heritage with contemporary visual means is being shown in the waiting area of the Presidency on the fifth floor of the Justus Lipsius building. Each month the multichannel video installation presents a different project.
(Photo, of a dish of kavarma: Velislav Nikolov, via the Bulgarian EU Presidency website)
