fun in threes, sometimes fours
food and cooking
Kotlet schabowy z ziemniakami. She loves the pork — though we sell it to her as chicken — but she has to give the potatoes a bit of thought.
Still, she’s a Polish girl, through and through. Her favorite meal, the thing she would eat daily, the dish that gets her squealing with delight when she learns it’s on the day’s dinner menu: barszcz.
Yesterday was Tłusty Czwartek, "Fat Thursday." In Poland, it's traditionally a time for pączki, doughnuts. "Ile pączków zjedliście?" asked a friend in Poland of his Facebook friends. How many doughnuts did we eat? On Thursday we ate none. Dunkin Dounuts and Krispy Kreme don't count. They're doughnuts, not pączki. Traditionally filled with rose petal jam, Polish pączki really look, smell, and taste nothing like what we usually get in the South.
And then K discovered that Publix -- of all places -- sells "Original Pączki."
They're filled with raspberry jam instead of the ineffably good rose jam, and there's something not quite right about the consistency of the crust, but they're an acceptable substitute for a mid-sized Southern town.
L had one for dinner. "It's time she learned what 'Fat Thursday' is all about," proclaimed K. For her part, L was less interested in the doughnut than the filling, which she fingered out and declared to be delicious.
When Christmas Eve dinner includes two soups, multiple courses, and more desserts than one can possibly imagine, it's a good idea to get started a little earlier.
Ten days ought to do.
And so last night we began by preparing the cabbage/mushroom filling for the dumplings. It's neither a long nor a labor-intensive process, but when there will be cakes to bake and soups to season during the days before Christmas, it puts things into a little different perspective.
So last night we cooked the sourkraut, sauted the onions, ground them to a literal pulp, mixed a sprinkle of bread crumbs and called it a night.
Tonight, stuffing and fast-freeze.
Two turkey dinners in three days. One can only sit back and enjoy the journey home.
Some signs of autumn:
Some more signs:
Birthday picnics continue into the darkness and include sweaters and oysters:.
I ask the Girl if she’d like to try one. The shells have her undivided attention; the goodies inside, less so.
“You want to try?” I ask.
She touches the freshly-steamed oyster, licks her finger, then says, “No! It’s gushy!”
More signs: Sunday night trick-or-treat.
It's summer -- time for watermelons.
We try a Santa Claus melon. "At seven bucks for a football-sized melon, it'd better be good," I think.
"Tastes like pure honey," K says.
Perhaps a bit too sweet, though.
Anyone try one?
When K and I began dating, we met every one evening a week at Pasieka, a small restaurant in her home village. It gave us a chance to see each other during the week (it was a long-distance relationship: all of seven kilometers between our villages), and I didn’t have to cook for myself one day a week.
We’d have a beer or two, talk about our week thus far, make plans for the weekend — it was the highlight of the week. After our marriage, we visited Pasieka less frequently, but when we come back to Poland, we have to go back to Pasieka.
We walked to the restaurant for a bite of supper and to meet with “Johnny,” a friend who now lives abroad.
Except for the order of fries for the little girl who joined us, it was just like old times.
Crepes wrapped around a mix of pureed fresh strawberries, farmer's cheese, homemade whipped cream.
Strawberries: they're what's for dinner...
For many years of my youth, my mother and I went on Wednesday afternoons to a nearby farm to get fresh milk. The cream would sit on top, a visible band of white that dared you to disturb it.
Eventually, the couple stopped producing milk for sale and we went back to store-bought milk. It was a let-down.
Through a friend, though, K and I have found another farm.
Now if K’s mother were only here for a visit so she could make her amazing doughnuts…
