I was staying with a Polish friend and she taught me how to make the most delicious bigos and traditional soup.

Polish dishes In many respects resemble Ukrainian and Russian cuisine. There are also many pickles, dishes from vegetables (especially cabbage), various types of meat and dough. However, if you take the red borscht, the Poles it is completely different. And they don't eat it with spoons, they drink it from mugs. Today we will tell you how to cook. bigos and leaflet - traditional treats of Polish cuisine.



Polish dishes bigos - traditional for Polish, Lithuanian and Belarusian cuisine cabbage. Kushanye is also common in some western regions of Ukraine. There are many options for making Bigos. Each cook brings something different to the recipe, although most ingredients remain unchanged.

Bigos is prepared either from sauerkraut or fresh. Most often, sauerkraut is mixed with fresh to make the taste more balanced. It is also believed that the more types of meat, the better. And if there is an opportunity to add game meat, then it can not be better at all! In addition, in the traditional version added dried mushrooms, as well as prunes, apples and wine.



Bigos recipe Ingredients

• 0.5 kg of fresh white cabbage
• 0.5 kg sauerkraut
• 300g pork
• 40g dried mushrooms
• 200g sausage
• 150g bacon
• 1 bulb
• 100g prunes
• 1 cup of dry red wine
• 2 pepper-scented peas
• 5 peas of black pepper
• 2 bay leaves
• 2 dried clove buds
• salt
• vegetable-oil

Preparation

1. Put the mushrooms in a small pan and pour 500 ml of cold water. Leave for a few hours, preferably overnight.
2. Boil the mushrooms in the same water in which they were soaked until they become soft (about 30 minutes). We drain water from the mushrooms and cut them with straw. Mushroom broth is not poured. - We're gonna need it.
3. We wash the sauerkraut (if it is very sour), filter it. We shink fine and put it in a pot. Pour a small amount of boiling water (just enough that the water covered the cabbage) and boil under the lid until ready (about 1 hour).
4. White cabbage is cleaned from external leaves, crushed. We pour a small amount of boiling water (to cover the cabbage). Add 1 teaspoon of salt and boil until ready (about 30 minutes).
5. We drain water from cooked cabbage and mix it with sauerkraut in one pan. Add mushrooms and mushroom decoction, as well as spices: pepper, bay leaf, cloves.
6. The meat is cut in cubes and roasted in oil to ruddy crust, salt. Separately roast the onion sliced with chopped bacon and sausage. Add to the cabbage along with the meat. Also add sliced prunes, sprinkle wine.
7. Cover the pan with a lid, leaving a small gap, and cook for at least 1 hour. After cooking, add salt and pepper to taste, let it cool, and then put in a cool place.
8. According to the traditional Polish recipe, Bigos is prepared for 3 days. During this time, all the ingredients have time to be saturated with taste and aroma. The next day we take the pan out of the refrigerator, bring it to a boil and boil for a few minutes. If there is too much liquid, evaporate it and cool it again, put it in the refrigerator.
9. On the third day, repeat the procedure, and Bigos is ready to use!

Traditional Polish bigos resembles stewed cabbage with meat, but the taste is much more interesting and multifaceted. Especially if you add all the ingredients specified in the classic recipe, and give the dish. brew.

The next recipe is a dish called jerek. It is a traditional Polish soup that is cooked. sourdough with the addition of pork sausages, as well as eggs and vegetables. Zhurek can be tried in almost every Polish cafe, and it is served in a very original way - in bread. The soup is very hearty, spicy, aromatic. It is not surprising that Polish dishes are so loved not only by locals, but also by tourists.



The Recipe of Zurek Ingredients

• 1.5 liters of meat broth
• 400g smoked pork ribs or bones, smoked or stewed bacon
• 500g raw white sausage
• 500ml starter on rye flour
• 2 tablespoons of dried marjoran
• 1 clove of garlic
• 6 tablespoons of cream 18-30% fat

In Poland, you can buy ready-made sourdough for the bush in the store, but you can hardly find such a thing here. It's okay. It's easy. cook up. For starter we will need 100 g of rye flour, 1 slice of rye bread and 0.5 liters of water.

Sourdough preparation

1. Let's get a sterile can. At the bottom, pour rye flour, add half a portion of water, thoroughly stir and pour the rest of the water.
2. We put spices in a jar, peeled and cut in half cloves of garlic, broken bread into pieces. Cover the can with a towel and leave in a quiet and moderately warm place.
3. Every day, twice a day, stir the sourdough and make sure that there are no traces of mold. If there's mold, leavenWe need to get married and prepare a new one.
4. After 4 days, the smell of sauerkraut should appear in the mixture. That's a sure sign she's ready. Carefully filter to remove excess particles and send to the refrigerator.

Preparation of the bush

1. Boil broth with the addition of sliced smoked ribs or bones or chopped into 4 parts of lard. Cook for about 20 minutes.
2. Add raw white sausage, reduce the fire and cook for about 20 minutes.
3. Add sourdough and cook for about 10 minutes. Meanwhile, add marjoram and garlic prepared as follows: unpeeled garlic fried in a small pan for about 10 minutes, then carefully knead.
4. Get the soup off the fire. Add cream and, if necessary, season with salt and pepper.
5. Take the sausage out of the soup, slice it, put it back in the soup pan.
6. We serve soup with boiled egg and bread.

If you like Polish dishes, we also suggest trying the recipe of traditional Polish cakes with onions, which will be an excellent addition to the zrek. Bon appetit!