From the earliest times, especially in the Polish countryside, the fruits of wild trees growing in spits, fields and forests were eaten. They were used in traditional food and simple peasant cooking. Whole wild apples were added to barrels of sour cabbage to give it a special flavor and aroma. In Kurpie, sour apples were eaten as a pungent side dish. Wild pears were eaten raw or dried. They were used to make sweet soups, which were combined with mash and bread.
Fruit orchards were an integral part of the Polish landscape. We owe their presence to monks, especially the Cistercians and Benedictines. It was they who brought to our country many different varieties of fruit, and above all apples. Certainly, many of us remember with fondness the taste of old varieties of apples - kosztela, early papierówka, titówka, Pamiorange coke or antonówka, and pears - congressówka, luxówka, józefinka, July dean. Over time, from the gardens and orchards of monasteries, manor houses and parsonages, fruit trees found their way to peasants' homesteads. In folk tradition, apples were a symbol of health, beauty, fulfilled courtship, love and marriage. Not surprisingly, they found their place in many Polish rituals and customs. They always had to be found on Christmas tree planters and Christmas trees, wedding rods and harvest wreaths. They were given to children to eat on St. Blazej's Day to guarantee them good health.
Over time, completely new varieties of fruit came to Poland: apricots, peaches, cherries, walnuts, quinces, węgierki and renklody plums, gooseberries, currants, vines, melons and, in the late 19th century, strawberries. Horticultural societies and scientific institutes were established with extensive research, education and guidance programs. Orchards were established in the countryside to provide fruit both for home consumption and for sale. The largest orchards and plantations of fruit bushes can be found in Sandomierskie, Lubelszczyzna, Mazowsze, near Łowicz and Grójec, in Malopolska, mainly in the Nowy Sącz region, in Greater Poland, in the Lubuskie region famous for grape growing, in the Lower Vistula Valley, Silesia and Swietokrzyskie.
Fruits can be eaten in almost any form. They are delicious both raw and in processed form. They are excellent as summer coolers, desserts, healthy snacks, smoothies, juices, and as an accompaniment to meat dishes. Recipes for fruit dishes can be found in old cookbooks. Here are some of them:
Blueberry soup with sour cream
Boil a liter of cleaned and rinsed black berries in 1 ½ liters of water, spread it well with a quiver, strain it through a sieve, add sugar to taste and boil it again with a tablespoon of potato flour, broken with half a liter of sour cream and, having infused the soup with it, bring it to a boil. It can be served hot or cold. Such a soup tastes very good cold on hot days. Serve it with sweet croutons.
Maria Ochorowicz-Monatowa "Universal cookbook", [1913].
Cherry soup
Rinse two pounds of dried or three quarts of ripe cherries, grind a little in a mortar, pour half a pot of water and boil in a pot for half an hour, strain through a sieve, pour into a tureen, season with cream, add half a pound of sugar, a little cinnamon, put in ice to make it completely cold. Giving to the table put round biscuits or croutons. You can add a couple of glasses of red wine instead of cream. Wanting to have this soup hot, you need to boil it before serving and give it the same way.
Maria Marciszewska "Cook of the Nobility", 1892
White sauce with gooseberries
Heat a tablespoon of butter with a tablespoon of flour, spread with broth, throw in a handful of pickled gooseberries and boil. Then a couple of tablespoons of cream smash with two egg yolks, mix with the sauce, heat and pour over a dish of veal, chicken or turkey.
"Practical Warsaw Cook," 1895
Cherry jam sauce
Fry a few tablespoons of good jam in the fat from a pork roast, pour in a few tablespoons of sauce from the roast, a quart of wine, some sugar, cloves, cinnamon, boil, strain and pour or serve in a saucepan for a hog roast, wild boar or pork loin.
Maria Marciszewska "Cook of the Nobility", 1892
Vinegar from fruits
Fruits unsuitable for drying, as these: apples, pears, plums, chop finely and pour in a condensation of boiling water, taking for 6 pots of fruit 30 quarts of water, cover and leave for 8 days to ferment. When it ferments, pour the liquid through a thick sieve, add half a quart of yeast and a piece of wholemeal bread. Clot together, do not plug the bottle with a cork, but tie it with a cloth and put it close to the stove. After 8 weeks, the liquid prepared in this way will turn into a good and thick vinegar. This vinegar is sometimes cloudy at first, so you can strain it through flannel or tissue paper into smaller bottles.
"Practical Warsaw Cook," 1895
Cherries in vinegar
Peel beautiful ripe cherries from their roots, put them in a tureen, pour over prepared and cooled syrup, made from two pounds of sugar, counting on 3 liters of cherries, half a liter of vinegar and half a liter of water, a few cloves and a piece of cinnamon. The next day, boil the syrup again, put the cherries in jars, pour the syrup over them, tie with a bladder and boil in hay like other compotes.
Maria Ochorowicz-Monatowa "Universal Cookbook", [1913].
Peaches in spirit
Peel ripe peaches from the skin, throw them into boiling water for four minutes, then drain them in a sieve. For two pounds of fruit, make a syrup of one pound of sugar and a cup of water, throw in the peaches and slightly boil them. On the second day, pour off the syrup, boil, degum and pour the hot syrup over the peaches. On the third day, add to the syrup a quarter liter of the best spirit or white arrack, diluted with half a glass of water, boil and pour it over the peaches arranged in jars.
Maria Ochorowicz-Monatowa "Universal Cookbook", [1913].
Strawberry butter
Pour two quarts of unsalted, fresh, clarified and still warm butter into a pot of ripe, cleanly peeled but not rinsed strawberries, let it stand in a warm place for two days, so that the butter does not set, then pour it onto a thin canvas, tie it, hang it on something, so that it drips into a clean container; Then fry this butter in a clean whitewashed saucepan so that it clarifies completely, add a little pure white salt, pour it into jars, tie them with lined paper or canvas and store in a cool dry place.
Maria Marciszewska "Cook of the Nobility", 1892
Chicken dish with gooseberries
Put the cleaned chickens in a saucepan, spoon over the vegetables, a tablespoon of butter, two tablespoons of broth and simmer under the lid on low heat. When they are almost soft put a quart of whole raw gooseberries cleaned from stalks or marinated in bottles on a pair of chickens, boil together, taking care not to overcook the gooseberries, pour in a spoonful of sugar, light the sauce with butter and flour and spend.
"Praktyczny kucharz warszawski", 1895
Rice with apples
Boil a pound of rice loose in milk with butter. Peel a few wine apples from the peel and from the centers, cut into thin slices, sprinkle coarsely with sugar, mix with a quarter pound of sultana raisins and in a saucepan greased with butter and sprinkled with breadcrumbs arrange in layers, giving a layer of rice on the bottom and on top. Put in a hot oven for a good half hour to bake, then put on a platter and serve doused with juice.
Maria Ochorowicz-Monatowa "Universal Cookbook", [1913].
Blueberry Kisel or Cowberry Kisel
A liter of fresh blueberries crumpled over a bowl, pour in a liter of water, boil and strain. Then leave a quarter liter of liquid to cool, and to the rest add three-quarters of a pound of sugar, a piece of cinnamon and a couple of cloves (which you later discard) and boil again. In the cooled juice, crush two heaping tablespoons of potato flour, pour it into the boiling liquid, and after two minutes, stirring constantly, pour it into the boiling liquid, and after two minutes, stirring constantly, pour it into a salad bowl or into a mold soaked in water and sprinkled with sugar, and put it out into the cold to set. Serve to the table with raw sweet cream in a separate pitcher.
Maria Ochorowicz-Monatowa "Universal Cookbook", [1913].
Lacquered plums
Prick large eel plums from their seeds by cutting them on one side; place them in a stone pot and pour hot light syrup made from 1 pound of sugar counting on three pounds of fruit. Let them stand like this in the cold for 2 days, then pour off the syrup, boil it, scrub it, and pour it over the hot plums again. This activity should be repeated every two days six times. Finally, drain the plums from the syrup, fold two by two one into the other so that they are thick and large, and on a sieve dry them slightly in a lukewarm oven. Then fold into jars and keep in a dry place.
Maria Ochorowicz-Monatowa "Universal Cookbook", [1913].
Pie with cherries
A quart of flour is leavened with a quart of milk and a pint of yeast. As it rises add a tablespoon of butter, 4 eggs, knead it on a pastry board and let it rise some more, then roll it out on a baking tray greased with butter place it, and after it rises give on the dough a layer of cherries peeled from the seeds, which were sprinkled with sugar for an hour and let the juice out. Put in a hot oven, and after baking sprinkle thickly with sugar.
"Practical Warsaw Cook," 1895
Shortcake with berries
Cream a pound of unsalted butter, to it add half a pound of fine sugar, 3 whole eggs and 2 yolks, grated lemon peel and a pound of the most beautiful flour, mix all this into a fluffy mass, roll out a circle of the size you like, put it on a paper greased with butter or a cake pan, surround with a rim of the same dough, poke with a knife and overlay with gooseberries scalded with boiling water, which cool in a sieve, sprinkle heavily with fine sugar, mix with a few finely crushed rusks and cinnamon and overlay with tem dough, cover with pieces of butter on top, bake and deliver warm to the table. The same can be done with strawberries, raspberries, plums or cherries, only there is no need to parboil them, but rinse with cold water; to cherries, when they drip from the juice, after removing the seeds, do not add rusks, but lavish sugar and cinnamon; when they brown in the oven, give out hot.
Maria Marciszewska "Cook of the Nobility", 1892
Text: Joanna Radziewicz
Photo. pixabay.com
Source:
1. Ogrodowska B.: Traditions of the Polish table. Warsaw, 2010.
