Lviv cuisine is an essential part of Galician cuisine. It is based on the traditions and tastes of peoples, who lived in this part of Eastern Europe for centuries. Each period has brought its peculiarities. When Armenians and Greeks settled here, Mediterranean and oriental fruits, spices and herbs have appeared on our territory. Owing to Hungarians, wine and hot spices in the first dishes became also popular. And as for Jews, they left their mark on almost half of the Galician dishes. However, the main tradition-bearers became Ukrainians and Poles as the largest and most influential peoples.
Galician cuisine became completed with all the necessary institutional features at the time of the Austrian rule in our region, and not without the influence of Austrians. In the nineteenth century, there was actually "stabilization" for the majority of national and regional cuisines and our cuisine was not an exception. At that time it was already presented in several forms: peasant, bourgeois and aristocratic, with its own culinary literature, dining etiquette and a full set of first and second courses, cold and hot snacks, desserts and drinks.
The maximum use of cereals has influenced the taste of Galician cuisine most of all. Falling into the hands of Galicians, any grain immediately became their own product. Therefore we have got about twenty different cereals made from only maize, among which banosh, mamalyha and kulish are the most popular. Other popular kinds of cereals have been buckwheat, barley, oatmeal, wheat and pearl barley.
The post popular kind of meat for Galicians became pork. The natural and geographical features of the region made the local people use primarily local fish, such as trout, carp, crucian carp, pike, tench and weather loach. At the same time, due to the traditional import and the influence of the Jewish traditions, herring became popular in Galicia, as well as various snacks and salads with it.
And of course, local vegetables and herbs are invariably popular. Among them there are various types of cabbage, bean, onion, garlic, pumpkin, later also potato, tomato, eggplant, pepper.
As you can see, this cuisine is at the same time Ukrainian and Polish, Jewish and Armenian, a little Italian and Austrian. The Galician cuisine is unique due to the amount of its flavors and variety of thoughts and disputes that concern consuming and analyzing dishes.
