Apples, specialty of the Vdovicenco household
Meet our next welcoming host – the family spouses Lilia and Sergiu Vdovicenco, their sons Victor and Dumitru, the daughter Snejana with her husbund Victor and their grandfather Victor. A large family, united, working together to develop their passion – growing apples. This is the household where you can see a real model of the young families lifestyle who manage to develop small successfull businesses in the countryside.
Red, yellow, sweet, aromatic, fizzy, fresh, baked or preserved, in cakes or tarts, juice or jam – we find here all kinds of apples, this being the house’s speciality. Apple production is an old family tradition. As a symbol, a Royal apple tree stands in front of their house. The Royal apple is an old Moldovan apple variety with red-brick colored fruits, with a sweetish taste, very aromatic and extremely juicy. At the Vdovicenco household this is the „king” element in preparing the cakes, pies and compotes. Besides the Royal apple tree, there are three other apple trees, planted at the birth of each of the children, a tradition respected by the Vdovicenco family from generation to generation.
The practice of cultivating apples comes from the grandfather Victor, a fruit grower with great experience. He has transmitted the passion to cultivate orchard with love to his descendants. Their estate covers an area of 4.5 ha where grow such domestic varieties like Simirenko, Florina, Golden Delicious, Jonagold, etc.
To get a rich and healthy fruit, apples are grown naturally without pesticides. The few pest treatments are environmentally friendly, used from the old times.
This year has been a very favorable year for the apples. The fruits are not very big, but healthy. Apples that don’t have a „commercial look” in fresh state, are processed according to a family recipe. Thus there is no waste of production.
The tasting at the Vdovicenco household begins with a glass of fresh apple juice, prepared after the grandfather’s recipe. To preserve it in the winter time the apple juice is boiled, without using food preservatives, no sugar even. Then you are invited to taste the delicious apple jam, fragrant and creamy. Peeled and sliced the apple is covered with sugar and simmered. The other familiy secrets of the jam preparing you are invited to discover by visting the Vdovicenco household!
Do not hesitate to taste the delicious baked apples stuffed with nutmeg as well as the apple cake. Obviously, there are always present fresh apples, red and yellow, juicy and sweet. Juice and jam jars, crates of apples are all neatly lined up in the cellar dug in 1936. Here the grandfather Victor will be your guide.
Meanwhile, the housewife, Lilia Vdovicenco, recounts with much love about the family business that is the main income revenue, mantaining the family, the house, gives the possibility to develop, to educate their children, to live life beautifully.
In the big yard, nicely landscaped, under the Royal apple tree the time passes unnoticeably…
Text in Romanian language: Lilia Curchi
Translation and adjustment: Silvia Ursul and Elena Scobioala
