All of us have a box grater in our kitchen. In Lithuanian cooking you will mostly need three sides of your grater - each of it has a name based on very specialized functions they are used for.
Here is the grater trio:
Here is the grater trio:
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1. "Potato Grater"
That is the key essential grater for such traditional dishes as potato zeppelins (Cepelinai), potato casserole (Kugelis) and potato pancakes (Bulviniai blynai). It is the fine prickly side of your box grater. It is also the one requiring the most elbow grease (try grating 6 pounds of potatoes with it :)). That is why 99% of Lithuanian households have an electric potato grater - an instrument specialized just for this task. More about it in my next post. |
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2. "Beetroot grater"
That is the conventional coarse grater. It is referred to as " a beetroot grater" in Lithuanian cooking probably because it is most commonly used in grating beets for cold summer soup (Šaltibarščiai) or herring-beet salad. It has many other applications as well. |
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3. "Carrot grater"
This one is similar to the beetroot grater, only finer (compare: the lower one in the picture on the left). The name of this grater is not so widely used as for the first two graters, but I guess is still commonly known. As the name implies, it is most often used to grate carrots. |
