The Ajvar Scandal

In an attempt to address the root cause of the revolting smell emanating from the kitchen, my Kenyan housemate Maureen and I had decided to risk our lives and evict the fossilising food from the fridge.

“This goes in the bin, this must be Pete’s broccoli soup from 1997 and this is what used to be milk! Hang on, oh my Lord, what the hell is this?” These were the words that came from Maureen’s mouth, accompanied with a mortified face, when she picked up my jar of ajvar from the back of the fridge.

“It’s my ajvar,” I squeaked, in fear that my precious jar of ajvar was about to discover Hull’s waste disposal service.

“Ajvar? Is that what Albanians call refrigerated diarrhoea?” she said, while looking suspiciously at my prized pepper paste.

I tried to explain that it was still in date and that I had put it at the back of the fridge so that no one would eat it.  

“In the UK, this sort of thing gets flushed down the toilet! No wonder the Balkans is not in the EU!” she said, unconvinced.

As I was seeking a diplomatic solution to this major culinary crisis, Maureen turned the jar around only to realise that my ajvar was in a jar of Nutella.  

“Have they heard about food regulations in Kosovo, Serbia, Macedonia or whichever one of those messed up countries you are from?”

“Maureen, you are from Kenya!” I parried.

I had already started to simmer inside and was hoping she’d stop. But she didn’t. “And I thought Koreans were bad for eating dogs! What sort of country is this?

It is amazing to see what prejudice does to people and how one of the most delicious Balkans delicacies can all of a sudden become a source of shock.

For the sake of clarification, ajvar, believed to have originated in the region of Macedonia, is the result of tedious and meticulous labour, involving grilling, peeling, mincing and stewing of peppers with various herbs and spices. Neighbours often gather together to make it during autumn while gossiping, drinking and generally enjoying themselves after the lengthy preparation process.    

Despite Maureen’s ranting, I was determined to stand up for ajvar and the region: she would taste the “refrigerated diarrhoea”.

“Over my dead body are you feeding that to me!” she said, as I approached the source of such scorn with a heaped spoon of ajvar.

Ajvar is made and claimed by everyone in the Balkans. It is so popular that Slovenia tried to trademark it and sell in the EU, but failed to do so, due to naming issues.

“Oh God, it’s not that bad. In fact, let me try some more.

No, just give me the whole jar! How do you make it?

Whose is it?” she said in a sudden volte-face.

By the time I had finished my story she had scrounged the lot and then went on to interrogating me about the disintegration of Yugoslavia while licking the jar.

“So, you are Albanian but not from Albania – are they the bad ones?”

“Look at the bastard Slovenians for stealing the diarrhoea from Yugoslavs!”

“So it’s like Birmingham, London and Manchester all becoming independent one day”!

She handed back the empty jar and concluded that our region is a bit complicated for her liking. But recommended we keep making ajvar as neighbours altogether to keep ourselves busy.

I gullibly thought “keeping busy” was a euphemism for reducing the unemployment in the region.

“No, you fool! It takes so long to cook it, it prevents you lot from fighting each”, she quipped.