The Best Ever Hangover Soup
I’m Polish and I know that common opinion on Poles is that we are heavy drinkers. It’s certainly not accurate but as in every story there is a little bit of truth in that opinion. Yes, as a nation Poles had a tradition of drinking vodka or, as I would call it, a specific drinking culture. And what comes along with extensive drinking is obviously, a hangover. Our ancestors had found a couple of solutions for that. One was to cure yourself with the poison, which meant just further drinking. Smarter guys searched for better solution. Nobody knew back then, what we know today – that overdosed alcohol causes loss of water, salt and protein. And that’s the exact recipe for the soup. The hangover solution. The soup needs to be heavy (because fat slows down the breakdown of alcohol) and sour (because sour taste balances the acidity in stomach). We have many recipes for many different soups that meet these criteria, but most of them demand long time for cooking or special ingredients which are hard to find anywhere except Poland or Polish community. I would like to share a recipe, that will be accessible to everyone. Originally this soup is called Zurek. As a base there should be used something called sourdough, a leaven made from ray bread, flour, garlic, allspice and water as a starter and after few days all that should be added to broth cooked on special white sausage.
A few times in my long life I’ve been in situation where I needed Zurek and didn’t have sourdough prepared. So I’ve been thinking, like my ancestors, how can I do something similar to the original but faster, with more accessible products (that I already have) and you know what? I did it! I’ve found it. It’s right here, in front of you. Easy, tasty and fast to make. It doesn’t have to be treated as a hangover soup. It is really good for cold days or when you don’t have enough time to cook but you want to quickly feed your loved ones. And one more thing about the hangover. If you’re going to a party and you know you’ll be drinking, it’s even better to have that soup before you start. You’ll see, other guys will be drunk much faster than you, I promise. So if you want to try it out jump to next page where you will find the recipe and link to YouTube video to watch step by step guide. I would love to see you preparing that soup your own way and share your opinion on it or your version of this dish with me.
Lasanke it means Pasta with Sauerkraut and Sausage
You need to try to be smart in kitchen, especially when it is your own home kitchen. What I mean is that you always may attempt to try using all products without wasting food and money. I’ll give you an example. Assuming that you are making a hangover soup from my recipe. You will be using only water from sauerkraut. That means sauerkraut is a leftover, so you need to do something with it. You can prepare lasanke. This is a typical leftover dish but, to be honest, in my home once in a while we have to have it. It is so good. It is a very simple dish as a mix of old Polish and Italian kitchen. Why Italian? In XVI century Polish King Zygmunt I Stary (Sigismund I the Old) married Italian princes Bona Sforza. She brought to Poland a lot of new fashion and Italian food of course. She along with her court brought along unknown at that time in Poland vegetables, spices and pasta. The biggest in size pasta they were calling Lasagne. Poles added to this pasta sausage and sauerkraut and called it Lasanke. I tried many different pastas but in my opinion the one on the picture is the best one. But it is only my opinion. You can use the same recipe but instead of sauerkraut you can use sweet white cabbage, but it must be cut just like sauerkraut.
And now it’s time for famous Polish Pierogies. There are so many different dumplings in so many cultures all over the world! They can be boiled or fried, and there is vast variety of fillings and stuffings. They can be made from rice flour or rye flour, with egg or without it, with potatoes or without them. And they are called different names in different regions of World. Dumplings, Ravioli, Empanadas, Wontons or Fatayas. Different sizes and forms but still the same idea, stuffed dough. History of Polish Pierogies is probably very similar to other cultures’ history of dumpings. They were invented by poor people who couldn’t afford upper class food. They were transforming leftovers from nobles’ tables into something even more delicious then the original dishes by mixing, adding spices and food additives. That is why we can have so many different Pierogies: with meat, cabbage, mushrooms, sauerkraut, potatoes, white cheese, mixed ones and with fruits. All are usually serves as a dish themselves because this is very filling food. Most important part of the Pierogies is dough. My recipe from my Grandma is the best one of course. I have never ever heard from anybody even one bad word about it. On the contrary, I have heard many praising words. Coming back to our Sauerkraut and Mushrooms Pierogies . They are probably one of the best ones. They are just fine for vegetarians and would be appreciated by meat lovers also. You can serve them strait from boiling water or you can strain them, dry and fry slowly until you get rich nice crust. At the recipe section I am sharing whole recipe for other stuffings which In know how to prepare.
Veggie Beets Cold Soup
That soup is another story. The recipe originally comes from Lithuania but my Grandma adapted it and made something very similar but simply better for our family and friends. Normally it’s simple, made of cooked beets, then chilled and mixed with shredded cucumbers and soured milk. Almost every culture has its own recipe for cold soups, like Spanish Gazpacho, Korean Naengguk, French Vichyssoise or Balkan Tarator and American Banana Soup. All those soups are served on hot days, but none of them looks as cool as this beet veggie soup and trust me, you should try it.
A friend of mine, an American who doesn’t like beets told me that he wouldn’t even try this soup. Nevertheless he was so intrigued by how this soup looks, that finally he tried it. He ate it all and finally said he didn’t care there were beets inside this soup, it was delicious.
Croquettes origin is France, probably they were invented in XVII century and the name comes probably from a word meaning ‘crunch’. Again there are so many variations of this dish but the idea is very similar to dumplings, it’s just staffed dough. Croquettes may have different shapes , forms but one thing is always the same, they must be fried to be crunchy. Polish version of croquettes is very similar to old French version as well. Centuries ago French was widely used on Polish Royal Court, it was a second or even first language, it was a haute couture language. So it is obvious that we took a lot from French kitchen. One of the remnants of this legacy are crapes. If you add to crapes the same filling you are using with pierogies, then here you go. You just need to roll it, put into breading and fry. Croquettes are ready. Actually it is another example of inventing new dish by poor people. As a filling you can use leftovers and use them as stuffing. As of stuffings you can choose between cooked meat, sauerkraut, mushrooms, potatoes, cheese or mix those as a base to prepare them. You can also serve croquettes as a dessert also, especially with farmer cheese or fruits. The main difference is, you are not use breading to fry and you could add sweet toppings like sweet sauce or sugar and butter. In a recipe section you can find recipe for those fillings.
Everybody know what goulash stands for, it’s simply cooked pieces of meat with veggies. There are so many ways in which you can prepare it, there are so many recipes for it. Different recipes in different countries with various kinds of meat and vegetables. Original goulash comes from Hungary and it is a very heavy, filling, beef, tomato and potatoes dish. It was very popular in southern and eastern Europe. It came to Poland centuries ago and it stayed as another poor peoples’ dish. Because in Poland we do prefer pork, Polish version of Goulash is made from pork and wild mushrooms instead of veggies and is not hot at all. Sometimes it is served with potatoes by side and sometimes with pasta. It remains a very heavy dish.
Because I love soups and I love chili con carne I invented my own dish based on original goulash. To be honest it was a discovery in my research about another version of hangover soup. So I came up with a goulash-based hangover soup. And it works. So now we have soup instead of Goulash, beef, wild mushrooms and hot hot paprika with tomato sauce and light homemade noodles. Delicious, just give it a try.
This is a totally mixed dish. It looks like an Italian dish with fettuccine pasta but it’s not. It could be a French dish because of traditional tenderloin in green peppercorn sauce but it is not. It is absolutely my dish, my own invention inspired by French and Italian cuisine . I mixed Italian and French flavors and added mushrooms and you know what? It works perfectly. I remember when I did it for the first time, at my birthday party, years ago. Everyone was completely surprised by the taste, it looked so good and the taste was even better. It was the day, when I heard word ‘wow’ multiple times. Since then I had to prepare this dish on every celebrated birthday. For me it was so great, because this dish is so easy to make, so fast to prepare and cook without paying too much attention to it. This dish is a perfect example of being creative, and that is what I am trying to convince you to do. Be creative in your kitchen.
I also tried to use different kinds of meat, like chicken or beef, but it didn’t work for me. Maybe it would be fine with veal. Maybe instead of green peppercorn you could use something else, instead of meat you could try fish or other seafood. I never tried it, but you could. Try it and let me know please.
This dish reminds me of the 60’s and 70’s when in Poland we didn’t know what a word steak actually means. We didn’t have access to good enough beef for traditional steak, we didn’t know how to prepare one. So instead, we have been making something we were calling beef steak which actually was a minced beef steak. Because of the fact that we had a very popular tartar steak, which was just raw meat with additives we accepted the real beef steak with no problem. Usually it was served with potatoes or mashed potatoes and pickles or pickled beets and onion. I know in the US it’s called country steak and it’s usually served with onion and mushroom gravy, but my version is a little bit different. No gravy at all. Instead of gravy a lot of long and slowly fried to perfection onion and Brussels sprouts fried with breadcrumbs and lemon juice. It is a simple dish but if made the right way, it’s really delicious.