Polish national cuisine

[WooPeeA]

POLISH NATIONAL CUISINE

I know that some of you want to taste Polish national food available in Ireland. So there's something I can reccomend..

Polish cuisine has elements taken from the cooking traditions of the many national groups that lived in the country side by side for centuries, notably the Jews, Ukrainians, Belarussians and Lithuanians. There are also some Russian, German, Czech and Austrian influences as well as dishes from more distant regions: Italy, France and the Middle East. source



FOOD

Pierogi
Stuffed dumplings of unleavened dough and varying ingredients. Easy to cook, but unfortunately I don't know how to do that.

You can find them on the shelfs with Polish food or in the fridger in many supermarkets. There are many kinds of it.

Pierogi z miesem - with meat
Pierogi z soczewica - with lentil [Veg]
Pierogi z kapusta (i grzybami) - with sauerkraut/cabbage (and mashrooms) [Veg]

Pour a little bit fried onion and oil over it.

There's also Pierogi z serem (with farm cheese) which is sweet. Good with cream and cocoa. It's also suitable for vegetarians.






Kielbasa

One Polish well known is excellent smoked meats - kiełbasa. Very popular throughout the world, made after traditional recipes and smoked over juniper or fruit-tree twigs.

Perfect for BBQ!






Polish bread

Cheap and pretty good. I haven't seen anything like that in the supermarkets, but you can ask for Polish bread in every Polish food store. You can find one in your area.






Sweets

Pastries and cakes are a traditional type of dessert in Poland. Most often they are made from yeast dough (baba, drożdżowe) but there are also Swiss-roll types with poppyseed (makowiec), dried fruit and nut fillings (rolada), mazurek, apple Charlottes (szarlotka), cheesecakes (sernik) and gingerbreads (piernik). Doughnuts (pączki) with rose conserve are another favourite. source

Paczek:


Szarlotka:


Sernik with chocolade and oranges:





DRINKS

There's not much of Polish drinks available in Ireland, except beer and vodka. You can buy them in almost every supermarket including Tesco, Dunes Stores etc.

Polish and European beer are stronger than Irish or British. There's more alkohol in it (about 5% even to 7%) and it's bitter. One of the most popular are Tyskie, Lech, Zubr and Okocim. It costs about 2,00-2,50 Euro per can/bottle.

The most popular vodka are Wyborowa, Pan Tadeusz and Chopin.

[brendanyumo]

Polish food...yuk!! No thanks.

[Moonbaby]

Thanks for that WoopeeA!

Unfortunately the Perogi I've seen aren't veggie they contain pork fat

I want to make nice bread, I'm confused by the range of flours available.
What are these different flours for?

http://www.bdsklep.pl/index.php?cPath=237_124_97

Also what is this http://www.bdsklep.pl/index.php?cPath=237_124_101?

I'd love to know how you use Barley groats and buckwheat http://www.bdsklep.pl/index.php?cPath=237_124_99 in your cooking? I'd like to try them.

What is the best brand of kwaśna śmietana in your opinion?

As a veggie what does a typical dinner look like for you?

btw supervalus has a good range of Polish Juices and soft drink.

[Talliesin]

Originally Posted by brendanyumo

Polish food...yuk!! No thanks.

Could you elaborate on what it is about Polish foods that you haven't enjoyed? I'm particularly interested in how you found such different things to be unpleasant - was there a similarity in any way in what you disliked about the baking, the meat, the vegetable dishes and the sweets, or is it just a coincidence that you didn't like them all?

[Moonbaby]

I wouldn't even bother Tallesin, anyone who can say Yuk to this



....well clearly their opinion isn't up to much.

[tman]

I've only tried Lech and Bison Vodka so far, both were pretty damn tasty from what I can remember.
Pierogi sounds pretty damn tasty, I'll have to try that sometime...

[WooPeeA]

Originally Posted by Moonbaby

I want to make nice bread, I'm confused by the range of flours available.
What are these different flours for?

http://www.bdsklep.pl/index.php?cPath=237_124_97

I think the 3rd one is made for cakes as "tort" means cake in Polish. The last two are the potatos flours.

I really don't know what is the difference between the others..

Also what is this http://www.bdsklep.pl/index.php?cPath=237_124_101?

It's breadcrumbs, dried and crumble bread or breadroll. They are rolling a meat or pancakes over it before frying to make them crunch.

I'd love to know how you use Barley groats and buckwheat http://www.bdsklep.pl/index.php?cPath=237_124_99 in your cooking? I'd like to try them.

Don't know, I'm not the biggest fan of Barley groats and buckwheat. But I'll find something for you.

As a veggie what does a typical dinner look like for you?

Well, my typical dinner look like spaghetti or tofu. I love Chinese and Italian cuisine.

Polish food is not very friendly for vegetarians. There's much more meals with meat or fish than vegetables. I like a little fried pierogi with lentil. I like potato pancakes and the soups: tomato soup, mashrooms soup or onion soup with noodles or rise.

Oh, and scrambled eggs if I'm hurry or lazy.

[Moonbaby]

Originally Posted by WooPeeA

It's breadcrumbs, dried and crumble bread or breadroll. They are rolling a meat or pancakes over it before frying to make them crunch.

OOuuhh Crunchy pancakes sound interesting!

Thanks W

[Mr Magnolia]

Great post WooPeeA.

/applies stars

[Alun]

Yes, great post! There are loads of Polish shops opening up all over the place .. we've got one here in Bray, but I always find them a little daunting, not knowing what a lot of things are. I'm reasonably brave when selecting sausages and meats, but there are all kinds of things in packets, jars and cans that mystify me, I must say! Luckily some of the things have labels that contain a language I understand (usually German) so at least I can get some idea of what it is.

[Faith]

Originally Posted by brendanyumo

Polish food...yuk!! No thanks.

brendanyumo, unless you plan on backing sweeping statements like that up with your opinion, please don't bother posting.

[teetotaller]

If I could advice you something - If you never tried polish food before - don't buy ready to eat food in jars in Dunnes Stores - Bigos, klopsiki etc - It doesn't taste the same as home made food and it is not as good as fresh meal. Of course u won't be sick after eating this , but u may have bad opinion in general about polish food.

There are very good pierogi in freezers in DS, Tesco - I like pierogi with meat and pierogi with strawberries.

If you like to try new food - don't be afraid to go to polish shop and ask for advice.

u can get very tasty sousages ( kielbasa) that is something different to that what u can get in irish shops. I can also reccomend white cheese (twarog mazurski)

also very good ham - it is foiled but not sliced and my favourite one is (poledwica sopocka) made by Morliny.

generally if I get any polish meat here it is (sokolow) or (morliny) brand.


You can try some of polish sweets. in DS and Tesco you can get very good (ptasie mleczko) of WEDEL ( Wedel is most famous polish sweets producer. English translation for Ptasie mleczko is birds milk


also very tasty are wafers with chocolate - PRINCE POLO.



so

Try just once you won't loose much if you spend just few euro for something different.


I know that polish names can make you very carefull with choosing this kind of food, but Poland is as well EU country so we have all EU standards.


Let us know if you tried something and if it was tasty.

PS
My Irish friends visited with me my family house in Poland they spent there over one week- and they enjoyed their stay. They tried plenty of different things, drunk sea of polish beer and when they were going back to Ireland they bought a lot of polish sweets, sousages etc to share it with their families.



and last thing - polish bread - it is different than irish - there is no soda - u should TRY it

[WooPeeA]

Great advices teetotaller!! You're absolutely right with the Wedel, it's well known brand. Their chocolates and candies are amazing!!

[watna]

I'm very wary of Polish food tbh. I have a Polish room mate and she eats a lot of very strange smelling stuff from packets and jars. I usually cook everything from scratch so I find a lot of what she eats very unappetizing!

However, the food you posted looks lovely. I guess she just isn't too healthy and doesn't eat fresh Polish food. I may investigate getting some fresher stuff!

[s&mbarbie]

Pierogi are delicious. as are crokiet (savoury stuffed pancakes), If you want to try non packaged polish food there is a polish restaurant on capel street called Gospoda Polska, food is good though the service can be hit and miss