Coliva for Soul Saturdays Romanian Style

February 8, 2010 by orthodoxfastingrecipes

I love all things Romanian. I love the language, the accent, the food, the clothes, the friendly people.
I even love the unwarranted parenting advice from the ladies. But, the thing I love most about
Romanian culture and church is the coliva. I cant imagine someone who wouldnt love this stuff.
Romanian coliva is sweet with a pudding like texture, a bit of crunch, and most importantly, it is fast
friendly. For you lovers of Greek style koliva, dont worry, Ill post a recipe for you too.
The most important ingredient to good Romanian style coliva is something called skinless wheat.
What on Earth is skinless wheat? you ask. Well, as far as I can tell skinless wheat is a wheat berry
without the bran. It is like white rice or hulless barley. Both of these have the outer skin removed for
faster cooking. Unfortunately, removing the bran also removes a good bit of the B vitamin content
found in wheat. That is how you make white flour and it is why white flour is fortified at the end of
processing.
For those of you lucky enough to live close to Serbian party stores, in or around Detroit, skinless
wheat should be easy to find. For the rest of us skinless wheat is elusive. Fortunately, Ive figured out
how to make your own at home. What follows are my notes from an entire day of coliva
experimentation. Three batches later -perfection.

Wheat bran coming off the berries

Wheat bran collecting on the side of bowl

Roughed up wheat berries

Sticky processed wheat berries, ready for the other ingredients

Walnut crumbs of perfection

ready to decorate

First, the master recipe:

1 1/3 c

Whole wheat berries (I recommend soft white)

1 Tbs

vanilla extract

1/4 c

sugar

2c
1/4 c

Ground walnuts
Raisins

Zest of one orange

Zest of one lemon
1 pkg graham crackers
Powdered sugar for decorating
Step 1. Lord bless my work.
Step 2. Skin the wheat as follows:
Put the wheat in the food processor to chop up the bran a little, then rinse the wheat in a bowl and
drained off the bran with the water. Be careful, I dont know if this will wreck your processor or not as
wheat berries are hard as nails.

(My is still working but yours may be delicate.)

I repeated this a few times until the surface of the berries looked really rough.
Step 3. Place berries in a pot and cover with water about an inch over the top. Add both zests. Bring
the berries to a boil the berries then simmer for 90 minutes until they are tender but NOT mushy. It
will look like boiled barley.
Cool to room temperature so the starch can start to congeal.
Step 4. Drain off any remaining water and put the wheat back into the food processor for a couple of
quick bursts. This will get the starch flowing and the wheat gooping. The berries should be a little
chopped up and very sticky.
**Please note that you will NOT get the same pudding like texture from processing regular boiled
wheat. I gave it a shot with the first batch of botched coliva and it just spun it around a little but didnt
cut it up or anything.
Step 5. Grind up the walnuts in the food processor. The walnuts should be like rough cracker crumbs
or graham cracker crumbs. Watch it closely or youll have walnut butter real quick.
Step 6. In a large bowl combine wheat, sugar, walnuts, and raisins. Some people swear by golden
raisins. Perhaps, this is just a matter of taste. However, a nun told me to use golden raisins because
they are the best and I do whatever nuns tell me to do. You probably should too.

Step 7. Press the coliva into a pretty bowl or platter.

Step 8. Blast the graham crackers in the food processor. Put these on top of the coliva to serve as a
base for the powdered sugar. If you do not use the crackers the sugar will soak right in and your
coliva will be delicious but ugly.
Step 9. Dust with powdered sugar until the top is pure white. Now decorate with a cross. Make your
cross out of Jordan almonds, cocoa, silver nonpareils, chocolate chips, plain almonds, etc.
Step 10. Deliver to church on time. Trust me, it is super embarrassing to approach the offering table
during the censing.
This recipe takes a long time. Dont forget, however, that you are making an offering for the dearly
departed and your work is important.
Pofta buna!

Ingredients: 1 kg wheat kernel, 250 g sugar, 150 g honey, water to cover the kernels,
240 g crushed walnuts, crunched graham crackers as needed, powdered sugar as
needed, vanilla, fine zest from 1 lemon, fine zest from 1 orange, colored candy, 100 g
milk chocolate grinded fine or cocoa powder.
Since coliva is a ritual dish, its preparation follows a ritual too. The day before the
liturgy prepare the wheat as follows:
Wash the wheat kernel with nine waters (one for each of the 9 angel squads in heaven)
then boil in a Teflon pot for 2-3 hours at medium heat. Stir thoughtfully with a wooden
spoon to prevent the wheat from sticking to the bottom of the pot. When boiled, put
content into an enameled pot and covered with a wet towel, so that the composition
wont form a crust.
The day of the liturgy:
Sweeten the composition with 250 g sugar and 150 g honey. Flavor with zest from one
lemon and one orange and with 1 TBS vanilla.

Add 200 g of the crushed walnuts and stir till all these extra ingredients incorporate in
the wheat composition evenly. Your coliva is now almost ready all it needs is the dcor
that will make it fit for the liturgy.

Place the composition on a large platter and form the coliva with your hands, respecting
its shape make sure you even the coliva to look like a cake. Coliva can take any form:
rectangular, oval or round, and sometimes even cross. With the rest of the crushed
walnuts and crushed graham crackers cover the coliva on the top and the sides. Add
powder sugar and then make your ornaments out of chocolate and candy. You can even
use half walnuts to form a cross or to ornate the sides of the coliva.

I hope the images posted give you some ideas on how to ornate this dish. Coliva is very
delicious, and many people choose to eat it in other occasions that those related to
death. If you want to do so, simply skip the shaping and decorating.