It is Fat Thursday!!!

Fat Thursday in Poland is the traditional day to commit sin before Lent starts. Yes that is right sin. Which sin, well the sin of gluttony of course. It is to consume as many donuts (pączki, pronounced ponshkey) as possible. Everyone tries for at least 2, I would say, where as when I first came I think I had 6 or 7 as it was my first Fat Thursday and so everyone was stuffing me with them and wouldn't accept no for an answer. 


To give you an idea of what it is like a story from one of my students:


"I was waiting in line at my favourite bakery for about ten minutes to buy some to bring to work, when I was the second person in the line the woman in front of me asked "How many donuts do you have left?". The worker went off and quickly counted "about 200" was the response. "Fine, I'll take them all" she said, leaving me a little unhappy and late for work" 

So my student got to work donutless, late and hungry. Maybe that is the lesson here that the religion is trying to teach you, suffering comes in all forms. Either that or get out of bed early. Below is a video from my favourite pączki place on Chmielna in the city centre. Everyone who visits would know this as they all have to have one from here.

If you want to see some donuts from the above shop click here. Enjoy your Fat Thursday kids!

Cheese and honey

Well, searching through the old laptop to try and clean up and make some space I found some photos from earlier this year that I hadn't put up! Hopeless, I know. Sorry.

So these are from earlier in the year, when my 'adopted' cousin Darren and his lovely Margie popped into Wawa after they had spent some time in the South of the country around Krakow and Auschwitz. After being in such pretty cities as Krakow and Berlin, coming to Warsaw is certainly somewhat of a shock. As they say, if you can survive your first viewing of Warsaw, you can survive a lifetime. Especially when you come from the Central Train Station. To me, the station itself really isn't that unattractive, however if you ask a Varsavian, you will most likely find they loathe it in no uncertain terms. People say the design is horrible, but it isn't so much that, it is just poorly organised inside. The hallways are filled with take away stalls and the heavy smell of fried food and melted cheese is hard to escape.

The colour scheme, although a mix of grey, black and darker grey, really could be polished up and buffed into something that resembles sleek and modern design. I think if you gave me 50 strong men with crowbars, some big bins, a number of high pressure hoses and some decent lighting, I could make the station into a really nice, welcoming and warming place, where the homeless wouldn't want to stay drinking cheap vodka, maybe they would change to Italian red wine instead, and the new coffee shops wouldn't look out of place. Oh well, that is another subject for another day.

So we had some guests come and visit. They unfortunately got the worst of the weather, it was raining most of the days they were here, and as soon as they left we had 4 weeks of rain free, stifling heat. So alas the weather wasn't a big display for them.


We thought it would also be nice to give them a taste of something else very traditional. Here in Poland, alcohol is a big part of history and tradition. Although men will brag how they drink loads and loads, like in every country in the world, but here they do have a rich history of warming beverages. Hot spiced beer and wine, cherry liqueurs, and then this family. The honey based family. This drink is Krupnik, it is basically a honey vodka. I do like it especially on a cold and wet day.

It appears that Darren and Margie are a little hesistant, probably because Marty and I were smiling so much. They must have thought it was a joke or something.










You will be happy to know that they survived and actually thought it to be rather pleasant. I keep thinking about making some Krupnik or maybe even some mead, but it can take at least a year to make good mead, and well, I am not that patient when it comes to alcohol. We will see.






Back to our city guests, well we started by giving them a tour from the train station to their apartment on the best eating street in Warsaw. Yes, you guessed it. Chmielna St, home of my favourite hot donuts! yum! So on the way through, they were forced into having two each. We tried to show them a little of Warsaw's highlights, Old town, the university library, CK Oberza, Nowy Swiat and most of the "downtown" areas. We took them to eat traditional food, and Pierogi dumplings. It seems they might have liked it as they ended up staying longer than they had expected. Which is a good sign.
























We got them to try some of one of the growing number of Polish Cheese on the EU Food Heritage List. Oscypek a regional smoked cheese from the Southern Highlands is great with Cranberry Sauce, here Marty gave up a cheesy grin to match the cheese.

The worlds greatest donuts, or is that D'oh! Nuts!

Well, almost all of you who have ever read this before know how I love and adore food. I am constantly experimenting with food and have been completely amazed at how great food in Poland is/has been/was. I am sure that everyone gets sick and tired of me banging on about tasty morsels I have located either by reference, luck or experimentation. But, stiff! I like it.

So this brings me to Cukiernia Pawlowicz on Ulica Chmielna (Hops Street). It is actually not a traditional street as it is a pedestrian street, and was a well known prostitute alley/drug dealer shopfront before WWII, but the Germans changed that by gently removing (mostly through death) all the said law breakers. Ok, away from the history, this is a fantastic place. Being a Cukiernia and not a Kuchnia, it is not a kitchen but a sweet producer. This isn't a confectioner, but more of a pastry store but to confuse the matter, they can also sell icecream. Confused? I am too, sometimes there isn't a straight line in language. The shop is nothing more than a window on the side of the street, so in theory easy to miss. However, it stands out by two things, a delightful aroma emanating up and down the street and the almost always persistent line up at the window.

I have never been the biggest fan of donuts, although the staff at Kelly NZ may disagree, but Pawlowicz has changed my mind. These are deliciously fresh and light donuts, so not that heavy American style of gunk. These aren't called donuts nor another knock off name, they are Paczki (pronounced Ponch-ki). They make small batches, so you almost always get nicely warm donut in your little white bag. They have great flavours too. Chocolate pudding (czekolada budyn), Chocolate and Cherry (czekolada z Wisnia), Vanilla Custard (budyn), Raspberry (Malina), Blueberry (Jagoda), Rose Marmalade (Marmolada z Rozy {pronounced roo-szi}), Advocaat, and Toffee and this is just to name the ones I can remember. I cannot talk highly enough of them, and I blame these for my happiness and smiles when I am in the centre of town. I will even fill my sweet pocket in my belly with them after a kilo of Golonka, greedy and pig like I know. But, I know you would do the same!
These are the Rose Marmalade ones, they come sprinkled with Almond slithers. They look lovely, just not for someone like me with a nut allergy.
The little chocolate boys are calling my name!
Can you feel the warmth and love oozing out?
Going. See how fluffy and light they are!
Going. Oh yeah! That is the chocolate pudding centre.
Gone! Absolutely divine.