{"id":472,"date":"2009-01-31T14:50:23","date_gmt":"2009-01-31T18:50:23","guid":{"rendered":"https:\/\/blogs.transparent.com\/polish\/?p=472"},"modified":"2009-01-31T14:50:23","modified_gmt":"2009-01-31T18:50:23","slug":"im-hungry-lets-make-bigos","status":"publish","type":"post","link":"https:\/\/blogs.transparent.com\/polish\/im-hungry-lets-make-bigos\/","title":{"rendered":"I&#8217;m Hungry, Let&#8217;s Make Bigos"},"content":{"rendered":"<p>I\u2019m cold and I\u2019m hungry and that\u2019s always a very bad combination. And I\u2019m not in the mood to write about grammar today.<br \/>\nSo, let\u2019s talk about food instead.<br \/>\nI found half a cabbage in the fridge (leftover from making okonomiyaki the other night) and I\u2019ve been thinking what to do with it. I hardly ever make <strong>bigos<\/strong>, because my guy doesn\u2019t like it. But he surprised me today by saying <em>\u201cyou could make that cabbage thing, you know, the one you like and I can\u2019t stand.\u201d<\/em> And I know he\u2019s just trying to be nice to compensate for the fact that he left a plastic bag full of souvenirs on the floor in our hotel room in Antigua, but hey, what so I care? He told me to make <strong>bigos<\/strong> and that\u2019s all that counts. I\u2019m off to the kitchen\u2026<\/p>\n<p>Now, there isn\u2019t one proper <strong>bigos<\/strong> recipe, instead there are as many as there are families in Poland. It\u2019s one of those dishes that everybody knows and everybody has an opinion about. So, with that in mind, I\u2019m going to share with you MY <strong>bigos<\/strong> recipe. No, it hasn\u2019t been passed down for generations (my mom couldn\u2019t make nice <strong>bigos<\/strong> if her life depended on it and hence avoided it like a plague), it\u2019s entirely mine, but it\u2019s been tested and approved by fellow Poles the world over.<\/p>\n<p>So, here we go:<\/p>\n<ul>\n<li>\u00bd kg or less (about 1 lbs) white cabbage (<strong>\u015bwie\u017ca kapusta<\/strong>), thinly chopped<\/li>\n<li>\u00bd kg or less (about 1 lbs) sauerkraut (<strong>kiszona kapusta<\/strong>)<\/li>\n<li>a couple of sausages (around \u00bc kg or \u00bd lbs), can be <strong>polska kie\u0142basa<\/strong>, can be something else, I use chorizo and nobody can tell the difference, chopped into pieces<\/li>\n<li>bacon, cut up into pieces, I use quite a bit, because it\u2019s yummy (<strong>bekon, boczek<\/strong> or <strong>skwarki<\/strong>)<\/li>\n<li>pork (hmmm\u2026 I\u2019m estimating &#8211; around \u00bc kg should be fine) chopped into pieces (<strong>wieprzowina<\/strong>)<\/li>\n<li>proper <strong>bigos<\/strong> recipes call for veal, but I don\u2019t use veal so I simply ignore it and add more bacon, or sausages. But if you like veal, then less then \u00bc kg should be fine. (<strong>ciel\u0119cina<\/strong>)<\/li>\n<li>a bunch of dried mushrooms (I use a handful, and if European mushrooms are hard to come by, I\u2019ve been know to use dried shiitake) (<strong>grzyby suszone<\/strong>)<\/li>\n<li>chopped onion (<strong>cebula<\/strong>)<\/li>\n<li>tomato paste (<strong>koncentrat pomidorowy<\/strong>)<\/li>\n<li>salt (<strong>s\u00f3l<\/strong>)<\/li>\n<li>pepper (<strong>pieprz<\/strong>)<\/li>\n<li>bay leaf (<strong>li\u015b\u0107 laurowy<\/strong>)<\/li>\n<li>a couple of whole grains of allspice (<strong>ziele angielskie<\/strong>)<\/li>\n<li>dried juniper berries if you like (<strong>jagody ja\u0142owca<\/strong>)<\/li>\n<\/ul>\n<p>Ok, let\u2019s get started:<br \/>\nThrow all that sauerkraut into a BIG pot, pour some boiling water over it and simmer for about 1 hour.<br \/>\nI can\u2019t be bothered to cook fresh cabbage separately, because that means more washing up later on, so I just dump fresh cabbage (thinly chopped) into the simmering sauerkraut and add dried mushrooms. You may have to pour some more boiling water if the mixture is too thick.<br \/>\nIn a separate skillet cook bacon, onion, pork, sausages and then add into the cabbage pot. Add bay leaf, allspice grains, a few dried juniper berries, whatever else you like.<br \/>\nCook for about 40 minutes on low heat.<br \/>\nIf the mixture is too runny, you can thicken it with a bit of flour. I\u2019ve never done it, because my <strong>bigos<\/strong> is always nice and thick.<br \/>\nAdd some tomato paste and red wine if you like.<br \/>\nSimmer for a bit longer.<br \/>\nTaste it and see if it needs more salt, pepper, whatnot.<br \/>\nAnd voila. Ready!<br \/>\nServe with nice crusty bread.<\/p>\n<p>Generally, the longer you cook it, the better it is. Just be sure you don\u2019t burn it.<br \/>\nThe more kinds of meat in it, the yummier it is.<\/p>\n<p><strong>Smacznego<\/strong>! (Bon appetit!)<\/p>\n","protected":false},"excerpt":{"rendered":"<p>I\u2019m cold and I\u2019m hungry and that\u2019s always a very bad combination. And I\u2019m not in the mood to write about grammar today. So, let\u2019s talk about food instead. I found half a cabbage in the fridge (leftover from making okonomiyaki the other night) and I\u2019ve been thinking what to do with it. I hardly&hellip;<\/p>\n<p class=\"post-item__readmore\"><a class=\"btn btn--md\" href=\"https:\/\/blogs.transparent.com\/polish\/im-hungry-lets-make-bigos\/\">Continue Reading<\/a><\/p>","protected":false},"author":37,"featured_media":0,"comment_status":"open","ping_status":"open","sticky":false,"template":"","format":"standard","meta":{"content-type":""},"categories":[3],"tags":[7338,306832,978],"class_list":["post-472","post","type-post","status-publish","hentry","category-culture","tag-bigos","tag-cooking","tag-recipe"],"aioseo_notices":[],"_links":{"self":[{"href":"https:\/\/blogs.transparent.com\/polish\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/posts\/472","targetHints":{"allow":["GET"]}}],"collection":[{"href":"https:\/\/blogs.transparent.com\/polish\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/posts"}],"about":[{"href":"https:\/\/blogs.transparent.com\/polish\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/types\/post"}],"author":[{"embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/blogs.transparent.com\/polish\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/users\/37"}],"replies":[{"embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/blogs.transparent.com\/polish\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/comments?post=472"}],"version-history":[{"count":0,"href":"https:\/\/blogs.transparent.com\/polish\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/posts\/472\/revisions"}],"wp:attachment":[{"href":"https:\/\/blogs.transparent.com\/polish\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/media?parent=472"}],"wp:term":[{"taxonomy":"category","embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/blogs.transparent.com\/polish\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/categories?post=472"},{"taxonomy":"post_tag","embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/blogs.transparent.com\/polish\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/tags?post=472"}],"curies":[{"name":"wp","href":"https:\/\/api.w.org\/{rel}","templated":true}]}}