Europe
In Britain, Ireland and some Commonwealth countries, "black pudding" or "blood pudding" is made from blood and some filler grains and spices, often oatmeal. Blood sausage is also popular in Sweden (blodkorv), Finland (mustamakkara) and Baltic states Latvia (asinsdesa) and Estonia (verivorst), as well as in Poland (kaszanka), Germany (blutwurst), Austria (blunzen), Hungary (véres hurka), Spain (morcilla), Catalonia (botifarra), Slovakia (jaternica), Slovenia (krvavica), and France (boudin).
In Ireland, there is ample evidence of the persistence of the pratice of bleeding live cattle until well into the 19th century. It was considered to be a preventative measure against cattle diseases, and the blood drawn, when mixed with butter, herbs, oats or meal, provided a nutritious emergency food.
In Sweden, the blood soup svartsoppa, made with goose blood, is traditionally eaten on the eve of Saint Martin, especially in the southern region of Skåne. Other popular dishes, with blood as one of the ingredients include blodpudding (black pudding], blodplättar (blood pancakes), blodpalt (potato dumplings flavoured with reindeer or pig blood) and paltbröd (bread with blood in it, which is dried and boiled and eaten together with fried pork and bèchamel or onion sauce).
In Finland, pig's blood is used, with milk, flour and molasses, to make blood pancakes veriohukainen, usually served with lingonberry jam.
In Northern Germany pig's blood used to be traditionally mixed with vinegar, scraps, spices and sugar to make schwarzsauer. It's eaten warm or preserved in jars. Changes in taste and lifestyle have made this an uncommon dish.
In Portugal, the northern region known as Minho has a traditional blood soup named papas de sarrabulho. "Papas" translates as "mash" and "sarrabulho" is a popular expression for coagulated blood, so the literal translation would be "mashed blood". The soup is made with pig's blood, chicken meat, pork, ham, salami, lemon and bread, and is typically sprinkled with cumin, which provides the dish with its distinctive odor. It is usually served in the winter because it is a rather heavy dish. The dish is seldom eaten in Southern Portugal. Another traditional Portuguese dish known as cabidela is also made by cooking chicken or rabbit in its own blood, sometimes diluted with vinegar.
In Spain, the sausage known as morcilla is a kind of black pudding mainly made with pig blood, with spices, fat, and sometimes vegetables. In Andalusia sangre encebollada is a popular stew made with chicken or pork solidified blood and onion.
In ancient Lakedaimon, the Greek city-state of Sparta, the black broth was common: a soup with pork meat and blood.
Read more about this topic: Blood As Food, Dishes
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