Late-Night Stall · Tripe Soup
Shkembe Chorba
Photo: Kiril Kapustin / Wikimedia Commons · CC BY 2.5
It's Bulgaria's classic hangover cure — each diner doses the bowl at the table with garlic vinegar and chili to taste, specifically to shock a rough morning back to life.
Beef or veal tripe is simmered for hours into a thick, milky, paprika-tinted broth, then finished tableside with vinegar, crushed garlic, and hot chili oil. Sofia's all-night eateries and market kitchens keep it on the menu around the clock.
Why it's made this way: Tripe soup has fed Balkan cities since Ottoman times as cheap, filling nose-to-tail cooking, and Sofia's late-night café culture turned it into a specifically after-hours ritual.
More from Bulgaria
Part of World of Street Food — 3443 dishes from 118 countries.
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