#bigos

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Aaalright! Sit down next to babunia table, because we're gonna eat today delicious foods!

5. Bigos

Imagine you have too much sauerkraut, dried mushrooms, some random meat pieces, onion, plums and spices. Is winter time, you wanna eat something delicious and yet you cannot gather any fresh veggies and fruits now. So what you're gonna do? Ofc put everything in one pot!

Bigos is in every single family recipe. It's on every important holiday dinners. It's in your heart, soul and blood. It's just the essence of Polish culture - food that doesn't look like Michelin gourmet and yet makes you feel like world loves you.

4. Zupa Grzybowa (Mushroom soup)

When is Christmas time, people usually eat czerwony barszcz (beetroot borsht, oh gosh I hate ohmassacring Slavic names in English so hard-). And that soup is DELICIOUS, but because at Christmas Eve time there is No Meat Rule (at least in my family) and nothing tastes better than barszcz with uszka (small pierogi like things with meat, literally called "small ears" plzdontaskwhy-) - my family always had mushroom soup as The Christmas Soup.

And tbh? It's perfect! Having a tons of dried mushrooms that ur grandma collected on her summer trip to countryside family? BAM! Mushroom soup! Together with sour cream and square noodles (they are objectively the best noodle shapes for mushroom soup) they are giving you a precious memory of screaming christmas carols together with ur fam and having a great time 💖

3. Knedle z truskawkami (Knedle with strawberries)

It's... kinda hard to explain for me what exactly is knedle. It's like dumpling, but made with potato dough and boiled. There are many versions, depending on the filling (you can put everything u want!) - but for me the most classic one is the one with strawberries. Now, I'm not a big fan of strawberries. I despise them, they are so annoying to buy, they spoil so quickly and sometimes you can find a small snail looking at you confused when u bite part of their fruit house (based on my experience, lol).

But here? Good Lord, it's so delicious! Sure, you will burn your tounge from eating freshly boiled fruit. but eating together with dumpling is an another level of heaven. Nothing gives me more joy than stabbing knedle with knife to release a strawberry juice and then eat that together with breadcrumbs fried earlier in the butter. So. Delicious.

Funny thing, my fam is kinda hipster here bc for me a default taste is the one with strawberries, when the whole Poland eats that with plums inside (we surely love plums in our food). It's not... bad, u can eat it. But for me numero uno is always a strawberry one.

(Also what's the deal with that fancy mint leaf on the photo, I don't know anyone serving knedle in such fancy way. Remember golden rule of Polish food: the less attractive on thr plate, the more delicious in ur mouth)

ALSO BE CAREFUL TO NOT STAB TOO HARD AND ALWAYS TOWARDS PLATE SIDE OR ELSE U WILL EXPLODE KNEDLE AND WHOLE TABLE WILL BE A MESS AND UR MOM WILL BE ANGRY AT MAKING HER FAVORITE TABLECLOTH DIRTY-

2. Pączki z dżemem różanym (Donuts with rose jam)

I remember clearly the moment in my life when I saw American style donuts for the first time as a kid. I was HELLA confused because why it looks so colorful and weird? Why there is a hole? WHY SOMEONE CUT THE BEST PART OF DONUT??? Ofc when I grew up I learned more about other countries culinary cultures, but it doesn't change the fact that I LOVE our donuts.

You can put any kind of sweet fill inside. Chocolate? Sure! Whipped cream? Not my fav but sure! Advocat cream? Sure! Pistachio cream? Something new, but it's actually delicious! But for me still the best one is the most classic one, which is with rose jam. And yes, we have rose jams here. And you know what's the funniest thing? It's not even the sweetest jam you can get here! It's more sour than sweet and usually you don't even feel that rose aroma (unless someone added a rose water to make it more rosey). But here the sour-sweet combo works perfectly! It's not too sweet, it's not too sour, it's just... perfectly balanced 💖.

Also one of my fav fun facts - there is a sacred Polish holiday called Tłusty Czwartek (Fat Thursday) where you are eating as much donuts as possible (because that's the time before that period before Eastern where you can't eat anything sweet). And NO ONE is allowed to say "awwww it has too much calorieeeeeees waaaah :ccc". That's forbidden that day. Also in the same day besides donuts you can eat my ABSOLUTE fav pastry, faworki (Angel Wings in English, the most accurate name ever). I love them, but because how expensive they are and how much trouble it gives to prepare them - I didn't include them here. But they are on my Top 10 foods.

And finally, my absolute favorite Polish food that suprise no one:

1. Pierogi

Look, I won't even pretend. This is the most Polish food that you can find in Poland. And I won't even try to pretend I'm some kind of edgy hipster who denies my own culture. Because I would ABSOLUTELY not do that.

Pierogi are in my heart, in my soul, in my blood and muscles and bones. In my dreams, in my memories, in my future. I could live without bread, without bigos, heck! even without pączki. But life without pierogi? I cannot even imagine that.

Of course, as your typical Polish food, you can put everything you want. Meat, blueberries, strawberries, cabbage with mushroom (very classic version), I saw recently some wild versions like shrimp or goat cheese. But my ultimate fav version is without a doubt - pierogi with white cheese. Sweet, moist, delicious, my childhood memory. 💖

(One more thing to all of you non Polish people: for the love of all food gods, stop using "pierogi" as singular word. Pierogi are like mouse-mice in English, you have a lot of Pierogi but one PIERÓG. Plzzzzz we have to learn about stupid mouse-mice irregular form at school, do for my people a favour and learn the same about Pierogi/lh)

And that's it! Thank you for coming to my TEDTalk!