Polish Mains & Sides

10 Most Popular Polish Recipes in 2018

December 31, 2018 by polishhousewife 8 Comments

The title may be a little misleading, these are the top 10 Polish recipes in 2018 based on Polish Housewife page views, a roundup of my most popular posts this year. It caught my attention that half of these are dessert recipes. No matter how much we say that we’re trying to stick to a healthy diet and may actually be doing it, desserts are simply a lot of fun.

Of the remaining five recipes, the top two are fried, leaving numbers seven to ten to give us the appearance of healthy eating! It’s no surprise that we have two soups in this category. Polish dinner starts with soup, and that doesn’t stop in the summer. Why do you think Chlodnik was invented?

Kolaczki – a rich cream cheese pastry filled with all kinds of fillings, most commonly fruit, but you might also find nut or poppy seed
Makowiec – the Polish classic, poppy seed roll always makes an appearance at Easter and Christmas
Szarlotka – the Polish apple pie, one of the most popular desserts, served in every cafe and coffee shop
Placki Ziemniaczane – Polish potato pancakes, whether you shred your potatoes or grate them, top them with sweet or savory, I’ve yet to meet anyone who doesn’t love potato pancakes
Chrusciki, Chrusty Faworki, Angel Wings – a simple pastry with many names and claimed by many countries, a classic for Easter, Christmas, weddings, any celebration really
City Chicken – a dish that’s really Polish American rather than Polish, nostalgic comfort food from the USA’s Rustbelt
Kremowka Papieska – a reader’s question led me to this popular pastry, favorited by St. John Paul II
Chlodnik – orginally from Lithuania, but making an appearance on every Polish restaurant summer menu is this chilled, creamy beet soup
Zurek – this was the first Polish food that I ate in Poland and the unique sour rye broth makes it one of the most memorable Polish dishes
Mizeria – a light, refreshing cucumber salad, a perfect side dish for so many Polish entrees

In the interest of full disclosure, I participate in the Amazon Associates program, which means that purchases via the Amazon links below generate a small commission for this website.

It’s fun to look back and see what has caught readers’ eye this year, but I also want to thank you for being here, for sharing our collective culinary journeys. Let me wish you and yours the very best in 2019.

Smacznego I szczęśliwego Nowego Roku,

Lois

Polish Pate (Pasztet)

November 27, 2018 by polishhousewife 2 Comments

Pate is a lot like soup. That’s what I’ve come to believe. When you’re making soup, you don’t really need a recipe. It’s mainly technique. Meat, veggies, herbs, water and some time = something beautiful. The same is true for making pate. As a matter of fact, as you begin making Polish Pate (Pasztet), it looks just like soup.

I started to say the first time I had Pasztet was at a cooking class I took in Warsaw earlier this year, but that wouldn’t be accurate. One year when we lived in Poland, Major Demel sent Ed home with a charcuterie feast after his family slaughtered a hog for Easter. I do remember that there was a pate in the mix, but I was so in love with the White Sausage in a Jar, that I couldn’t think of anything else.

It was my second introduction to Polish Pate that stuck. During our cooking class, we fixed a few dishes, but they fed us many more. The breakfast was on par with the finest hotel restaurant buffet. It really was a celebration of Polish cuisine.

Normally, we think of pate that features liver. That’s not always true of Polish Pate (Pasztet). Adding liver is optional. According to Wikipedia:

In Poland, pasztet is made from poultry, fish, venison, ham, or pork with eggs, flour, bread crumbs, and a varied range of additions, such as pepper, tomato sauce, mushrooms, spices, vegetables, ginger, nutmeg, cheese, or sugar. A local form of pasztet is pasztecik szczeciński, a deep-fried yeast dough stuffed with meat or vegetarian filling, typical fast food dish of the city of Szczecin.

As I prepared to make my first pasztet, I came across numerous variations. I’ve written up what I did, but let me give you some ideas, and you can pick and choose what sounds good or fits what you have available.

Polish Pate (Pasztet) Variations

Consider the chicken livers optional, skip them if you like, but some say too much chicken liver can make the pate bitter, so don’t overdo it.

Consider using poultry rather than beef and pork.

Can’t find pork belly? Use pork fat (if you butcher doesn’t have it, I’ll bet they’ll save it for you).

Add other vegetables, such as carrot and parsnip, add a little garlic if you like

Rather than greasing the pan and preparing it with a dusting of breadcrumbs, line it with bacon, folding the slices around the top if they reach that far.

Garnish the cooked pate with chopped chives.

Serving Suggestions

This isn’t a spreadable pate. It’s firm and will need to be sliced.

Some like to serve pasztet as an appetizer on special occasions such as Easter and Christmas (Christmas Day, not Christmas Eve which is meat-free). You might pair it with a crusty bread and horseradish sauce (1 part grated horseradish from a jar to 3 or 4 parts mayo depending on how much you like horseradish) and gherkin pickles. Some like the pate with something sweet and tart such as lingonberry jam or a cranberry relish. I found that I like it with both horseradish sauce and lingonberry jam.

Slice the pate and use it for a sandwich filling, I would probably add the horseradish sauce and lingonberry jam to my sandwich, maybe a thin slice of onion, with a few gherkins on the side.

We’re eating one loaf for lunch this week, and freezing the second one for Christmas morning.

Do you make pasztet? If not, I hope you’ll give it a try!

Smacznego!

Lois

Polish Pate (Pasztet)

Author: polishhousewife

Description

Lightly flavored pate with pork and beef

Ingredients

2 tablespoons olive oil

1 pound beef, cut into 1-inch cubes

1 pound pork, cut into 1-inch cubes

Seasoning salt, to taste

1/2 pound pork belly, cut into 1-inch pieces

2 onions, peeled and quarterd

2 stalks celery, roughly chopped

5 – 10 dried mushrooms, soaked in hot water for 20 minutes

1 bay leaf

5 whole allspice

5 black peppercorns

3 juniper berries

7 cups water

1/2 pound chicken livers

1 large bread roll

2 eggs, lightly beaten

2 teaspoon ground marjoram

3 teaspoons sea salt

1/4 teaspoon white pepper

pinch ground nutmeg

breadcrumbs for pan

Instructions

Heat 1 tablespoon olive oil in Dutch oven or stock pot

Season beef and pork with seasoning salt, brown beef, remove from pan and brown pork

Return beef to pan along with pork belly, onion, celery, rehydrated mushrooms and the liquid (but be careful not to pour in any sediment or debris that was on the mushrooms), bay leaf, allspice, peppercorns, juniper berries, and water, bring to a boil, cover, and simmer for 2 to 3 hours, meat should be very tender, remove from heat

In another pan, blanch chicken livers by putting them in boiling water for 30 seconds, drain,a and rinse off any scum or foam

Add chicken livers and roll to pot with meat/veggie mixture, cool for 1 hour

Preheat oven to 350

Drain, run the mixture through a meat grinder, twice, mixture should be very moist, add eggs, marjoram, salt, white pepper, and nutmeg

Grease two 8 x 4 inch loaf pans, and dust with bread crumbs, bake for 45 – 50 minutes

Cool, and refrigerate over night before serving

Cookbook Giveaway – Wild Honey & Rye

November 5, 2018 by polishhousewife 4 Comments

We have a winner, Patricia K. from Nebraska, congratulations!

My latest Polish cookbook purchase is Wild Honey & Rye by Ren Behan, and I’m happy to say that I have a complimentary copy from the publisher, so that means a cookbook giveaway!

The author, a former attorney, grew up in England, the daughter of Polish parents. She writes beautifully about her love of good food and pride in her Polish heritage. Ren has taken Polish classics and put her own modern twist on them.

pierogi in a skillet with some on a plate

I don’t mean modern as in foams and molecular gastronomy. I mean the recipes, which are definitely Polish, reflect a modern, cosmopolitan nation with an interest in light, healthy eating with the freshest, seasonal produce and best proteins and grains. The color photos, which are my favorite part of any cookbook, are breathtaking!

If you want to be sure you have a copy, you can purchase via one of my affiliate links on this page (which means that Amazon sends me a small commission). If you’re the winner and end up with two copies, think of it as a head start on your Christmas shopping! 🙂

How to enter the giveaway

If you have signed up for my monthly newsletter, you’re already registered
If you’re not receiving my newsletter which includes some behind the scenes news and a yet to published on the blog recipe, you can do so at the top of this page in the box that asks you to enter your first name and your email address. I promise you that I’ll never share your information with anyone else.
Deadline: Wednesday, November 21st at 11:59 PM MST.
A name will be selected by a random number generator. I’ll contact the winner by email, and they’ll have 72 hours to reply with their mailing address. If I haven’t heard from them in that time, I’ll select another name randomly, and we’ll repeat the process.

Just to tempt you, we have a pierogi recipe from the book below!

Smacznego!

Lois

dough rolled out on marble slab, bowl of strawberries, and pierogi in the making

Recipe from Wild Honey & Rye: Modern Polish Recipes © 2018 Ren Behan

PIEROGI WITH STRAWBERRIES, HONEY, AND PISTACHIOS

Makes about 20 pierogi

2¾ cups/12 oz/350 g all-purpose flour or “00” pasta flour, plus extra for dusting

1 whole egg, plus 1 egg yolk

1 tbsp confectioners’ sugar

½ cup/125 ml lukewarm water

1 tbsp vegetable oil

For the filling and topping

2½ cups/12 oz/350 g fresh strawberries, hulled, quartered if large, or halved, if small, or blueberries

2 tbsp unsalted butter

Scant ½ cup/100 ml clear honey

¾ cup/1 ¾ oz/50 g pistachios, finely chopped

In a large bowl, mix the flour, whole egg and yolk, confectioners’ sugar, warm water, and oil together.

Tip the dough out onto a lightly floured work surface and knead for about 5 minutes until the dough is no longer sticky and feels smooth. Put the dough back into the bowl, cover with a damp dish towel or plastic wrap, and leave to rest for 30 minutes.

To fill: Divide the dough in half and keep one half covered with a damp dish towel to prevent it from drying out. Sprinkle your work surface with flour, then roll out the dough until it is about¼ in/3 mm thick.

Have a floured tray or board on hand. Using a pastry cutter or an inverted glass, cut out 3 in/8 cm circles of dough. Depending on the size of the strawberries, place a couple or a few pieces in the center of each circle. (If using blueberries, 2-3 blueberries will fit.) Fold the dough over to enclose the fruit. Using your thumb and finger, pinch the dough along the edge so that the pierogi is well sealed. Place each dumpling on the floured tray and cover with a damp dish towel while you make the rest.

To cook the pierogi: Bring a large pan of water to a boil. Carefully drop the dumplings in, a few at a time. They will sink at first, but will float up to the top when cooked-this will only take a minute or so.

Lift them out using a slotted spoon and place on a plate to cool. If you have sealed them well, none of the filling should have escaped!

Heat the butter in a large frying pan and gently fry the pierogi on both sides until slightly golden. To serve, drizzle with honey and sprinkle with chopped pistachio nuts.

CINNAMON WHIPPED CREAM

Serve this with blueberry-filled pierogi.

1 cup/250 ml heavy cream

1 tbsp confectioners’ sugar

1 tsp ground cinnamon

sugar or vanilla sugar, to sprinkle

Whisk the cream with the confectioners’ sugar and cinnamon until thickened.

Serve the warm pierogi with a sprinkling of sugar or vanilla sugar and a spoonful (or two) of the cinnamon whipped cream.

Polish Potato Salad (Sałatka Jazynowa)

October 2, 2018 by polishhousewife 5 Comments

Potato salad is potato salad you might say. I’m here to tell you, my friends, that the little things make quite a difference. Enroute to Poland, we’ve stopped off in Sacile, Italy to visit friends, one of whom is Polish. As it turns out, they both have family visiting while we are in town. So our gracious hosts scrambled to make room for 8 in their apartment. What I’m sharing with you today is the large batch of Polish Potato Salad (Sałatka Jazynowa) Mama Maria made for this housefull. You could certainly scale it down, but it’s so delicious, why would you?

Making the potato salad in this family is a team effort. Maria is boiling the veggies, which Tata Zbigniew peels and dices ever so finely once they’fe cool. Our friend, Greg who was kind enough to share his mom’s recipe, tells me that this is something his family always has for Christmas Eve and Slywester (New Year’s Eve). The veg are cooked the day before, possible left on the balcony to cool over night, depending on the weather, and he will wake up to find his parents busy in the kitchen, chopping and assembling the next morning.

I’ve noticed that so many Polish recipes, have you boiling the potatoes in their skins which seemed unusual to me. In the past, when I’ve made potato salad, I peeled and diced before boiling? Am I the only one? So I had to ask, why cook the potatoes in the skin? Actually all of the boiled veggies are unpeeled.

The answer was that the peel adds flavor (and most likely vitamins), and I have to agree. The flavor is very good. My own observation is that the texture is different, more consistent, and pristine.

The links below are Amazon affiliate links which means if you make a purchase, they sent me a few cents to help support this site.

As eight hungry people have been noshing on Polish Potato Salad (Sałatka Jażynowa), I’ve picked up some serving suggestions. Greg loves to eat it on toast, and Maria’s creative suggestion, which was fabulous, a small slice of a good bread, spread with butter, top with a thin slice of deli ham, put potato salad on half of the ham, fold the other half over the top, essentially making a ham and potato salad taco (on top of buttered bread). Yum-o! Pyszne!

Let me also share one other fun aspect of our evenings. Uno, a decidedly international version, has been the evening card game. The fact that there was no common language for all 8 of us added to the fun. Even the Americans who began with no experience in Polish were picking up these phrases:

what color – jaki kolor
red – czerwony
blue – niebieski
green – zielony
yellow – żółty

And my personal favorite “koniec!” for (the end or done! It goes both ways, Maria would play a wild card and confidently tell us the color was “blue.”

So whether your game nights are all English or involve more than one language, there’s no need to limit yourselves; this sałatka is so much for that a cookout side dish. Let’s hear your creative ideas for Polish Potato Salad (Sałatka Jazynowa).

Smacznego!

Lois