Nowadays, traditional products are slowly returning to the spotlight. However, the old culinary traditions remain largely unknown and neglected. Over the time, they are less and less present in everyday cuisine, difficult to find in local restaurants and the names of authentic delicacies are rather unknown to young people. This is also the case of Rivne (UA) and Lublin (PL) cities, where the culinary traditions gathered for decades are not sufficiently promoted.

In order to preserve and promote the culinary heritage two regional capitals  - Rivne and Lublin, as well as the Agency for Sustainable Development of the City" (UA), have joined forces and prepare the project "Cultural heritage of the kitchen – promotion of culinary traditions through the professionalization of the gastronomic offer of Lublin and Rivne" (acronym MATSYK). The overall aim is to strengthen the cultural identity of both cities by promoting, preserving and popularizing their culinary traditions.

More about the MATSYK project, you can find in the Projects tab on our webpage.

The project implementation started on 1^st January 2020. At this stage, many of its project activities have already been completed. One of them was a short film about a traditional Rivne dish – "Matsyk", telling about its history, origins and methods of preparation. The film is widely promoted in mass and social media.

The film can be viewed here.

Additionally, the project partners prepared a cookbook with recipes of traditional Rivne cuisine. The catalogue is published in three languages - Ukrainian, Polish and English. Part of the printed copies is made in Braille for the accessibility of people with disabilities. The publication will be distributed during the gastronomic festival.

The culinary book can be seen here.

The Ukrainian beneficiary NGO "Agency for Sustainable Development of the City” conducted research to explore culinary features of the Rivne region. Their representatives established contacts with local restaurants and learned about the history of the origin of traditional local dishes. They organized an expedition, which took place in the village of Bilsk in Rokytnivskyi district, in order to examine the traditional dishes that came to Rivne from this area. Further expeditions are planned to learn about the regional culinary heritage, especially the dish "Matsyk", which is unique to the region, non-existing in other regions of Ukraine or Poland.

Other project activities include the creation of the association for cooperation in the field of gastronomic tourism and development of two separate cooperation and marketing strategies for the city of Rivne and Lublin (each of which will contain a chapter on cooperation in promoting the Polish-Ukrainian culinary heritage). As part of developing the Ukrainian strategy, a survey of the gastronomic traditions was carried out among the inhabitants. Vsevolod Polishchuk, the creator of the strategy, who previously participated in the promotion of the Galician cuisine brand and the development of Lviv as the main gastronomic tourism destination, conducted interviews and consultations with experts in the field of traditional culinary heritage. 11 experts from various fields were involved in the process. In close cooperation with the Polish partner, they jointly defined the main areas of cooperation for the promotion of Polish-Ukrainian culinary heritage.

All already completed activities and those foreseen for the near future: the international gastronomic conference in Lublin and the Gastronomic Festival "Matsyk" in Rivne, are being widely promoted in traditional and online media. Since the beginning of the project, around 45 posts have been prepared by the project partners and posted on the project's social media pages. To follow these pages please check the links:

https://www.facebook.com/rivnematsyk
https://www.facebook.com/dziedzictwokulinarnelubelszczyzny
https://www.instagram.com/rivnematsyk

According to the grant contract, the project should be completed by 31^st July 2021.

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Project of the week - MATSYK