Moldova

Sit at a Moldovan table and a bowl of mămăligă — thick boiled cornmeal, the country's edible bedrock — arrives with crumbled salty brânză sheep's cheese and a spoon of sour cream. This is a garden-and-vineyard country: tomatoes, peppers, cabbage and walnuts from the plot, everything pickled and jarred for winter, sour soups sharpened with fermented wheat bran. It tastes almost exactly like Romania, because history made them near-twins.

Then there's the wine. Moldova has one of the highest vineyard densities on earth, and its cellars go deep — literally: Mileștii Mici holds the Guinness record for the world's largest collection, nearly two million bottles down 200 kilometres of limestone tunnels, and Cricova runs 120km more. Come for a village feast of sarmale and plăcinte, and stay for the homemade wine that never stops being poured.