I’m at Mum’s in Poland. This afternoon she kept the promise of making some fresh home made doughnuts for us. The house still smells of oil, while we’re busy destroying the goods.
I was considering adding the recipe to this post, but I think it will be one of those things that I will not attempt making, as they’re only taste awesome at Mum’s. So just the photo reminder, still warm, slightly crunchy on the top, with a greasy layer left on the fingers, when picked up. Mmmmmm.
One of my most favourite dishes of all times. I make them at home sometimes, but at Mum’s they taste like heaven.
The stuffing is made of beef, chicken or turkey’s meat, boiled for hours, preferably when broth was made the day before. The meat is finely minced together with any veg or mushrooms from the broth, and seasoned.
The dough is made the same way as for kluski śląskie, the only difference is the flour, plain flour this time. To remind; boiled potatoes squeezed through the ricer, one egg and the amount of plain flour equal to the quarter of the amount of potatoes. Worked quickly, it doesn’t like to wait around.
Unhealthy as it is, it’s served with fried słoninka. Yum!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!
A dish that celebrates great beef. The one on the picture is done by my Mum, all the credit goes to her. Her choice of meat would be fillet, best one can obtain. It’s finely minced, seasoned with salt and pepper, some paprika and olive oil and worked by hand for a few minutes to make the meat smooth and shiny.
Mum then forms the meat in portions, to make it look good, makes a small hole in each and puts a raw egg yolk in the middle, for everyone to mix in by themselves. The egg has to be fresh and lovely as well, as it will not be cooked. Last thing to do is chop some white onions finely, some mushrooms marinated in vinegar and some pickled cucumber, prepared same way.
It’s good to put some salt and pepper on the table, as well some Delikat or other liquid sauce to improve the taste if somebody prefers it more salty.
Some cold vodka goes great with it.
This is so unsophisticated, that it’s not even funny. Zapiekanki can be made out of many things, it’s a good way of using left over veg and stuff from the fridge. In my experience it tastes best in Poland, at Mum and Dad’s allotment, baked over the fire in an old pan.
For me the perfect zapiekanka must have 2 key ingredients; potatoes and bacon. Tonight I used potatoes, one sweet potato, some carrots, a parsnip, boiled it all and left to cool. I pan fried some pancetta cubes along with some cup mushrooms and a large red onion, as well as one sad looking pak choi ( and it does not have much to do with the fact that we’re going on holidays in 2 days and need to empty the fridge).
Cooled veggies get chopped and layered in the baking dish with the fried stuff, some grated cheese, spring onions, some dried herbs and seasoning. A drizzle of olive oil and into the oven for about 30 minutes, just to give it all a crunch and melt the cheese nicely.
Warning- it’s very filling. Lovely, simple winter supper.
Ps. It’s snowing again, BIG, good luck to Heathrow…..
I’m still enjoying being ” in between jobs” and having time to cook things I normally enjoy only at my Mum’s, as standing in the kitchen for 2 hours is not always appealing after a day’s work.
So today it’s gołąbki- pigeons, if you like. Lots of work, but very lovely meal at the end of it.
First the stuffing; plain boiled rice, minced pork- in equal amounts, dry and quickly boiled and then chopped porcini mushrooms, 2 handfuls of them I’d say and save the liquid, it will be used in the sauce. 2-3 chopped and fried shallots, a clove of garlic and lots of seasoning, mixed together and that’s the stuffing.
Next it’s the cabbage leaves that need to be quickly softened in boiling water , otherwise they’d be difficult to fold. The hard bit in the middle of each leaf has to be cut flat for the same reason.
To make a gołąbek, you spread a wilted leaf flat, place some stuffing in the middle, flatted it and wrap up tight. When all done, place gołąbki in a pan bedded with some spare cabbage leaves, some olive oil and that liquid from the mushrooms. That stops them catching on the surface of the pan. Ready little things, in the pan nice and tight and then covered and slowly cooked, about an hour, check for the liquid and top up if necessary.
Last thing to do is a nice and simple tomato sauce ( although there are people like Moka who only like them in mushroom sauce) , a shallot, some garlic, fresh herbs, passata, red wine if there’s any around- there always is.
And that’s it, a pile of washing up to do while gołąbki are cooking.
The name of this cake I learned from my Mum has to do with the way most of it is prepared, the dough is pinched in a way and distributed all over the base, rather than rolled out or cut.
It’s simple; 1,5 tall glass of plain flour, half of a melted cooking margarine, 2 egg yolks, 2 tbsp of sugar and a bit of baking powder get all mixed into a soft dough, then divided in 3 equal parts. One goes into the freezer, second gets mixed with a tsp of cocoa and the third makes the cake’s base- rolled out on the bottom of a round tin.
The crucial ingredient of skubaniec is plum preserve, I use my Mum’s home made one, the good, good stuff that gets fried for hours until its thick and stuffed with lovely flavour. Can’t think of any better preserve to substitute it with, but don’t really have to, we’re going home in a month, will stock up!
Anyway, the base, the plum preserve, then the cocoa part of pastry gets pinched off all over the preserve, quite a lot of it, but you must be able to tell the layers apart. The next layer are walnuts, roughly chopped, onto the brown pastry. Then 2 egg whites whipped with some sugar, onto the walnuts,no need to make it very smooth, just plonk it onto the nuts roughly. And the last layer is the one from the freezer, pinched off the same way, all over the white layer.
Bake in 180 degrees for about 30-40 minutes. I’m eating it just as I’m writing and have to say, there could have been a thicker layer of the preserve, I used the remaining half of the jar I had, in future will be more generous. It is pretty though- is it not?….
These are so simple and quick, as well as usual, no sugar added! All that is needed are 3 equal parts of flour, cooking margarine and Polish white cheese, the same as for pierogi, to be obtained from a good Polish deli. It’s my Mom’s recipe.
Those 3 ingredients get mixed together into a sticky dough, it needs to be rolled out and with a small form cookies are cut out and baked until golden, so about 18-20 minutes.
When out of the oven I sprinkle them with generous amount of icing sugar, necessary, as no sugar is needed to make them.
Awesome with coffee.
In Poland we call them kluski slaskie, dumplings from Silesia, totally easy to make- with the right type of potatoes. I made them tonight, so that Zoe could taste something very Polish.
For the dumlings I boil some potatoes, squeeze them through the ricer when still hot, form them into a flat kind of ball and take out a quarter of it. Replace the missing quarter with starch- potato flour, excellent way to measure out the amount of the flour needed, my Mum’s way of doing it. Add an egg to all that, together with the quarter of potatoes taken out previously and quickly work it into a nice soft dough. The less floury kind of potatoes, the better, as the consistency required is quite rubbery. A thing to remember is to work that dough quickly and don’t keep it waiting, it gets loose.
Once the dough is done, I make it into a small roll and cut out small bits, form them into balls, flat them out slightly and make a little hole in the middle with one finger, hence the name which Florian bastardized a bit- kluseczki z dziurkiem. 🙂
They finally get thrown into a pan of boiling, salted water, boiled for a few minutes, about 4-5, not too long, they have to keep their shape but not be raw in the middle.
I served them today with a good beef stew, at Mum’s we always have it with meat and sauce.
One Polish dish that I cook most often would be pierogi. Florian loves them cooked, left to rest and fried crispy.
The filling is made of boiled and pressed potatoes, chopped, fried onion and a Polish white cheese, that can be obtained from any Polish shop. It is crucial the cheese is the right one, it can’t be replaced with cottage or ricotta. It’s all mixed up and seasoned well.
The dough is simple- flour and some warm water with a drop of milk. Rolled on, I use a glass to cut rings, place a teaspoon of filling on each and close them tightly, sealing the edges well, so that they don’t open when cooking. I boil them for about 4-5 minutes, serve them with chopped, fried onions and – if I have some- sloninka, pig’s lard, a cholesterol bomb, a flavour like nothing else.
