I love goląbki – but must admit they are time consuming to make.
I came across this idea of using all the ingredients and making them into large kotlety( meatballs) cooking them in stock and then adding a tomato sauce.
This dish was very popular in Victorian times in Britain.
It originated in India and was often served for breakfast.
It originated in India and was called –‘khichari’.
It was started as a dish with rice, fried onion, lentils and eggs.
Over time, the lentils were left out and fish was added.
There are many different recipes but they all include: boiled rice, fish (often smoked) and hard boiled eggs. Paprika, cayenne pepper or curry powder is added.
I made this whilst doing some research into old English recipes.
Everyone loved it and I thought that it would be a “hit” in Poland too.
INGREDIENTS
2 onions – finely chopped
75g butter (do not stint on this)
300ml of vegetable stock
200g-250g long grained rice – boiled
250g-300g smoked haddock
3 – 4 hard boiled eggs – cut into quarters
1 lemon – cut into quarters
1 teaspoon ground paprika or cayenne pepper
Salt and pepper to taste
*
Flat leaved parsley to garnish
METHOD
Poach the fish in the vegetable stock for 6 – 8 minutes.
Remove the skin and flake the fish.
Meantime melt the butter in a large frying pan.
Gently fry the onions till golden.
Add rice and a few tablespoons of the stock.
Add the paprika, stir and continue cooking.
Add the flaked fish and more stock if too dry.
Cook through for a few minutes.
Season to taste.
Serve in a large dish with hard boiled eggs and lemons around the side.
Garnish with flat leaved parsley.
Diners should squeeze lemon juice over their portion.
There are many versions of tomato soup – some people just add tomato puree or a tin of tomatoes to rosół, (chicken bullion). For many this was standard practice on Monday with any that was left over from Sunday lunch and also in winter months in the past when fresh tomatoes were not so readily available.
I prefer to make a more refreshing fresh tomato soup.
Ripe tomatoes make the best soup – if you are lucky enough to have your own from the garden or allotment then these will be great or look out for ripe tomatoes on a market rather than the hard bullet ones often sold for salads.
Many years ago, well before Poland joined the European Union, when there were not as many Poles living in England, one of my English friends went for dinner at at a Polish lady’s house. On telling me about the lovely food she said ” ….we had tomato soup with rice in it!” My instant reply without thinking was “but tomato soup always has rice in it”.
Ingredients
700g – 800g of ripe fresh tomatoes
1 large or 2 medium onions
1.5 litres of vegetable stock – came be from a cube or powder
Salt & ground pepper to taste
A little granulated sugar – optional – might not be needed.
Boiled rice to serve
Method
Pour boiling water over the tomatoes in a bowl and leave to cool.
Skin the tomatoes.
Chop the tomatoes into quarter.
Chop the onion into fine pieces.
Place the tomatoes, onion and vegetable stock into a large saucepan.
Bring to the boil and then put on the lid and simmer for at least 30 minutes.
You want the tomatoes and onions to have cooked away into the liquid -no large pieces left.
Season to taste.
Although sour soups are popular in Poland – tomato soup does not want to be sour. Depending on the tomatoes used, I sometimes add a little granulated sugar.
To serve place a handful of cooked boiled rice into each soup plate.
Served here in my mother’s Crown Devon – Fieldings – Glenwood soup plates – made in England – 1939.
Soup plays such huge part in Polish meals and I will be writing much on the subject soon (I could write a huge book on Polish soups alone).
Soups are usually served with some sort of accompaniments or garnish.
Some soups have traditional accompaniments but every cook will improvise with what they have.
These accompaniments include a wide variety of pasta and noodles, dumplings, rice, potatoes, croutons, hard-boiled eggs, pulpety (little meatballs) chopped, cooked sausage and crispy fried bacon and so on …. the list is endless.
Many of the soups to which these are added are of the clear consommé type.
Pasta, Noodles & Rice
Very small pasta shapes are used or larger pasta is cut into small pieces.
The pasta, noodles or rice are all cooked beforehand and a small amount is placed in the soup dish and hot soup poured over them to serve.
Often a small amount of pasta, noodles or rice is kept back from when they are being cooked for another dish – these are best kept in the fridge.
The chopped eggs are sprinkled on top of the soup or several pieces ‘floated’ on top of the soup when serving.
Krokiety
These are made using pancakes which are filled with sauerkraut & mushrooms, meat or cheese then folded and rolled, then dipped in bread crumbs and fried.
I have found a firm that has these ready made for frying and I think they are good.
I fry them in quite a lot of oil on both sides and then put them in the oven at GM4 – 180°C for around 20 minutes.
I have not made them from scratch myself – I must do this soon .
Photo below from my Kuchnia Polska book,1971
Kuchnia Polska, 1971 – Polish Kitchen or Polish Cookery
Pasztecik
This is similar to an English sausage roll, often made with a yeast dough pastry, and filled with pasztet (paté), meat, sauerkraut & mushrooms or cheese.
Photos below from my Kuchnia Polska book, 1971
I have eaten these in Poland in cafes and restaurants but not made these myself – something else to try out soon.
Bread
Bread can be served with soup – it is usually not buttered.
For these salads you will need some cold cooked rice – I use long grained or Basmati rice – but it can be whatever you like to use.
I rarely cook the rice specially – I am more likely to use what is left from a previous meal.
However for these I cooked some rice to see how much was needed.
I find the best dressing for these salads is one based on lemon juice with the addition of some runny honey if you want a little sweetness.
Rice, Peas & Sweetcorn Salad
Ingredients
400g cold boiled rice
100g of cooked garden peas
1 small tin of sweetcorn, drained (or frozen loose sweetcorn – cooked)
Juice of 1 lemon
Salt & ground back pepper
1 tablespoon of honey if desired
Method
In a large bowl mix the rice, peas and sweetcorn together.
Pour over the juice of the lemon and mix well.
If you are adding honey then warm about 1 tablespoon gently and mix that in.
Add salt and pepper to taste.
Rice, Peas,Sweetcorn & Peppers Salad
Ingredients
400g cold boiled rice
100g of cooked garden peas
1 small tin of sweetcorn, drained (or frozen loose sweetcorn – cooked)
1 or 2 fresh red peppers or bottled ones
Juice of 1 lemon
Salt & ground back pepper
1 tablespoon of honey if desired
Method
In a large bowl mix the rice, peas and sweetcorn together.
If using fresh peppers then remove the stalk and the seeds and chop the flesh into small pieces.
I often blanch the peppers by putting them in a dish with boiling water and letting them stand for about 10 minutes the drain and pat dry.
If using bottled peppers then drain them from the liquid and cut into small pieces.
Add the peppers to the salad mixture.
Pour over the juice of the lemon and mix well.
If you are adding honey then warm about 1 tablespoon gently and mix that in.
Add salt and pepper to taste.
Inspired in Castor – Rice Salad with Leeks
Not long ago I spent a stitching week in Castor, Cambridgeshire, with a group of super ladies. I was responsible for some of the catering. One evening there was a large amount of leftover cooked rice, peas & sweetcorn, so I decided to make this into a salad with other ingredients we had in the kitchen.
This turned out to be a delicious salad and it got a lot of approval & I will certainly be making this again.
Ingredients
400g cold cooked rice
100g Cooked peas
1 small tin of sweetcorn – drained (or frozen loose sweetcorn – cooked)
1 -2 Grated carrots
1 grated eating apple
1 -2 leeks
Green part of spring onions – chopped fine
Flat Leaf parsley – chopped fine
Salt & ground back pepper
Juice of 1 – 2 lemons.
Flat Leaved Parsely
Method
Chop the leeks as fine as you can into circles and then cut these into half and put them into a large dish.
Cover the leeks with boiling water and leave them to stand until the water is cool.
Strain the leeks, leave them to cool down completely and then dry them with a clean tea towel or kitchen roll.
Mix the rice, apple & vegetables together in a large dish.
Pour the lemon juice over the salad.
Add salt and pepper to taste.
This was served with a beef in beer gulasz (casserole) & the salad provided a good balance against the richness of the casserole.
I have tried this out as a just vegetable variation.
In my Polish cookbooks there are many variations without meat and they use mushrooms or other vegetables and grains, but these tend to use just dried mushrooms and often rather than rice use buckwheat or pearl barley. Whilst these grains are maybe more traditionally Polish in style I wanted to do a recipe which would initially be more appealing to the English taste. Also I wanted to use mainly fresh mushrooms.
Ingredients for the filling
150 to 200g of rice
400g of mushroom caps – white and/or chestnut
Some butter to fry the mushrooms
5g of dried mushrooms (more if you desire)
A few tablespoons of boiling water
Salt & pepper to taste
Method
In a small bowl add the boiling water to the dried mushrooms , just enough to cover them, and leave overnight.
Stepped Dried Mushrooms and Chopped Fresh Mushrooms
Parboil the rice and leave to go cold. (You can use any already cooked rice you might have cooked already – it is not that critical – it will just have a softer texture).
Finely Slice up the mushroom caps (You can chop them into smaller pieces) and fry them in the butter until they are soft.
Making a Pulp of Dried Mushrooms
Using a knife make a pulp of the dried mushrooms or chop them into small pieces if they have not softened enough.
Add the mushroom pulp and the liquor in which they were steeped to the frying mushrooms and continue cooking the mixture evaporating of most of the liquid or about 10 minutes.
Leave the mushrooms to cool.
In a large bowl mix the parboiled rice and mushroom mix, add salt and pepper to taste.
Mushroom & Rice Mixture
Prepare the cabbage leaves
You need a large white cabbage or a savoy cabbage or I have now started using sweetheart cabbage – you might need 2 of these as they are not usually so large.
Patience is called for here to avoid getting scalded fingers. You have to heat or steam the cabbage to make the leaves pliable so you can remove them one by one and use them to encase the filling.
You need the largest pan you have into which you place the cabbage head.
I boil some water in a kettle and pour this over the cabbage in the pan. With some heat under the pan I let the cabbage cook a little. The temptation is to boil too quickly so making some of the leave too soft and runs the risk of getting scalded as you try to remove the leaves.
Another method is to place the cabbage into a metal colander and set this over the pan of water so that it is steamed rather than boiled – I think this method is the one I like best.
As the leaves become soft, you have to cut them off from the stalk and stack them up for to use later, you can cut out the thickest part of the stalk from the first few larger leaves. Pre heat the oven to GM3 – 160oC
Fill the leaves with the rice & mushroom mix and roll them up from the stalk end, tuck in the sides and secure with the outer edge of the leaf to make a small parcel.
Place the rolls into a large casserole dish, packing as many rolls as possible in rows in the dish. Depending on the depth of the dish repeat this for another layer.
If you have any extra cabbage leaves place these on the base of the dish and then to put extra leaves on the top of the rolls.
The rolls sometimes have a habit of getting slightly burnt on the top as they come out of the liquid and sometimes at the base if they have been in the oven a long time, these extra layers protect the rolls and can be discarded at the end.
Make a vegetable stock and pour this over the cabbage rolls.
Ingredients for Vegetable Stock
Vegetable stock – I like to use the Swiss Marigold Bouillon vegetable stock powder which is in a tub mixed with boiling water
1 tube of tomato purée
2 bay leaves
3 or 4 peppercorns or allspice or both.
salt & pepper ( note there might be enough salt in the stock cube)
Mix up the stock powder in a jug with boiling water, add the tomato purée and then the rest of the ingredients. You need a large amount to cover the cabbage rolls.
Pre heat the oven to GM3 – 160oC
Cover the rolls with this liquid. It is a good idea to have extra which you can use to top up as they are cooking.
Cover with a lid and place in the oven and cook for several hours. Check them occasionally and keep them covered with liquid as much as possible.
As mentioned earlier I make these a day beforehand and then put them back in the oven for an hour or so before serving.
They are a complete meal in themselves but you can give serve them with some bread to mop up all the liquid sauce.
Note
Wigilia – Christmas Eve
I will be writing a post all about the special meal on this day later when all the dishes are meatless.
Gołąbki are made using fresh cabbage and the name means little pigeon or dove. This name comes about from its size and shape and also from to the idea of this being a little delicacy.
The cabbage leaves are used to make a little parcel with a meat and rice filling and these are then cooked in a liquid stock or sauce.
I have read that this is a very old dish which originally came from the Byzantine Empire and was made with vine leaves, as it came north; cabbage leaves replaced the vine leaves.
The main 3 ingredients are: cabbage, rice and minced meat, and you also need a liquid to cook them in, which in my mother’s case was always a stock with tomatoes.
You can use white or Savoy cabbage. White cabbage has softer more pliable leaves and I think make the best gołąbki . Savoy cabbage has firmer leaves that are easier to work with but take longer to cook; these can be easier for a novice to use.
You need a large head of cabbage to get large leaves.
You can use any type of rice but the stickier types are the best.
The traditional Polish version uses pork. My mother used beef as this was more readily available in England. Now that minced pork is more available and you do not have to hand mince it, I use either or even mix the two.
There are many variations using, fresh or dried mushrooms, buckwheat instead of rice, and a stock without tomatoes. In fact buckwheat is a more older version as it grows in Poland and rice would have to be imported.
This recipe is my mother’s and for me this is just right!
Mama’s Classic Recipe
Ingredients
1 large head of white cabbage or Savoy cabbage
400g rice
500g of minced beef or pork
chicken stock – a cube or concentrate will do
1 tube of tomato purée
salt & pepper
2 bay leaves
3 or 4 peppercorns or allspice or both
Although the gołąbki take a while to put together, you then leave them to cook in a slow oven for hours which is easy.
You can reheat them on the next day and in fact I think they taste better the longer they have been steeped in the cooking liquid and I always make them a day in advance.
They also freeze very well, so I pack any left in portions of 2 or 4 for a later date. Because of this I like to make as big a batch as I can in one go.
I use a very large enamelled oval dish with a lid which is ideal for this.
As you need whole largish cabbage leaves I sometimes use 2 cabbages to get the bigger leaves.
You need to parboil the rice in salted water so that it is about half way to being cooked and then strain the rice and let it go cold, but if you have some plain boiled rice left from another day you could use this as this is not critical.
In a large bowl mix the rice and minced meat and add salt and pepper. The exact amounts do not matter. I like it to look about 50/50 white and pink but these can be made with much more rice to eke out the meat available.
Next comes the hardest part and patience is called for here to avoid getting scalded fingers. You have to heat or steam the cabbage to make the leaves pliable so you can remove them one by one and use them to encase the filling.
You need the largest pan you have into which you place the cabbage head. I boil some water in a kettle and pour this over the cabbage in the pan with some heat under the pan I let the cabbage cook a little. The temptation is to boil to quickly so making some of the leave too soft and runs the risk of getting scalded as you try to remove the leaves. Another method is to place the cabbage into a metal colander and set this over the pan of water so that it is steamed rather than boiled.
As the leaves become soft, you have to cut them off from the stalk and stack them up for to use later, you can cut out the thickest part of the stalk from the first few larger leaves.
Instructions from my Polish cookbook “bible”
Pre heat the oven to GM2 – 150oC
Place a small handful of the rice & meat mixture onto a cabbage leaf and roll up from the stalk end, tuck in the sides and secure with the outer edge of the leaf to make a small parcel.
Place the rolls into a large casserole dish, packing as many rolls as possible in rows in the dish. Depending on the depth of the dish repeat this for another layer.
A tip I got from my late cousin, Krystyna, is to use extra cabbage leaves on the base of the dish and then to put extra leaves on the top of the rolls.
The rolls sometimes have a habit of getting slightly burnt on the top as they come out of the liquid and sometimes at the base if they have been in the oven a long time, these extra layers protect the rolls and can be discarded at the end.
Make a large amount of liquid stock with hot water and tomato purée and add bay leaves, peppercorns and allspice.
Cover the rolls with this liquid. It is a good idea to have extra which you can use to top up as they are cooking.
Cover with the lid and place in the oven and cook for several hours. Check them occasionally and keep them covered with liquid as much as possible.
As mentioned earlier I make these a day beforehand and then put them back in the oven for an hour or so before serving.
They are a complete meal in themselves but you can give serve them with some bread to mop up all the liquid sauce.
Journey From A Polish Kitchen 