Tuesday, April 23, 2013

Polish Cuisine, American-Style…

…or something like that.

American people like their ethnic food. Even in my small hometown we have a pizzeria owned by a family who emigrated from Sicily years ago. There’s a Chinese restaurant owned and operated by a family from China as well. Another local restaurant has “sushi night” and you can even find “Thai Chicken” on the truck stop’s menu.

Besides all the funny questions my friends asked me about Poland, another common question was, “Can you make pierogies?” When I answered that in fact, I can, I got almost as many accolades as when I told them that I gave birth without anesthetics, twice.

The cuisine of my family was heavily influenced by my maternal grandmother who was not Polish, but worked her whole life in the food service industry. She liked to cook for us, but she didn’t like to eat. That’s why we had to buy her clothes in the children’s department.

My paternal grandmother, on the other hand, had some Polish roots. She was a Mihalik and her family some generations back  hailed from the Nowy Targ area. I guess that makes me a goralka. Now, wait a minute. If you think I’ve been hiding my Polish roots all this time, you’re wrong. Cooking “halupki” (gołąbki) and using the word “dupa” does not a Polish Babcia make. This grandma cooked a lot. I don’t know if she liked to cook, but she had to being the mother of 8 children. She was a specialist in making the food go far and she enjoyed her meals with us, that’s for sure.

Some of my extended family have compiled and printed some family recipes. I have to say that most of them are really bastardized versions of Polish dishes and some are unrecognizable. That doesn’t matter, however. It’s a nice and humorous look at part of my family’s culinary  history. Smacznego and enjoy.

SDC13198

SDC13199

SDC13203

SDC13202

SDC13205

SDC13206

SDC13207

SDC13209

SDC13210

SDC13211

SDC13212

SDC13213

SDC13214

SDC13218

And these two recipes below are my favorite. Nothing really Polish about them, but I love that the Never Fail Cake is placed opposite the Better Than Sex Cake.

SDC13217 

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6 comments:

Madlene said...

What can I say :) Beautiful book :)

Lois B said...

I love the book! You know you're looking at old, tested recipes when you see "oleo." :-)

Agniecha said...

Dobre! Kiszone jajka i cienki kolacz. I like it.

Anonymous said...

Lovely and so funny. Someone has put lots of effort into making this book. Don`t loose it.
Krysia CT

Chris said...

Madlene - I think so too :)

Lois B - Exactly, oleo. I also skip over the recipes with Crisco.

Agniecha - I think cienki kolaczy sounds like a pair of socks.

Krysia - No worries, my father bought about 5 or 6 copies.

And on the menu today at home we have kasia gryczana aka buckwheat.

BasiaB said...

They really bastardized versions of Polish but beside of this it's really good to know that someone likes aur food.Here in Italy they are not even try it and they saying all over the world that it's not good. It hurts sometimes...