Once very popular in traditional folk cooking, today these ingredients are truly underappreciated and underused. Various grains, seeds, and nuts — from sunflower seeds to hemp (with their phenomenal protein content), pumpkin seeds, and walnuts. On the one hand, they no longer play the role they once did, when even a hundred years ago, nuts and seeds … Read more
What’s the worst thing about vacations? Especially when you live alone. In the middle of the forest. The contents of the fridge when you get back. It’s a good idea to get rid of everything in the fridge before you leave, so you don’t get greeted by a newly evolved civilization when you return. And when you come … Read more
One of the most important Christmas Eve dishes of my childhood, a dish never made at any other time, was “kutia”. For some, it’s noodles with poppy seeds. In Silesia, there’s moczka, there’s siemieniotka. A sweet dish with nuts, raisins, honey, and sometimes alcohol (a good kutia needs a touch of brandy) is a legacy … Read more
TVP: texture vegetable protein. Until recently, only TSP, or “textured soy protein,” was available on the market. These are all those products like dry soy cutlets (affectionately called “sawdust cutlets”), pieces, granules, steaks — large, rectangular cutlets with a fibrous texture. TSP products had their time, at least in Poland, in the 1990s, when they were pretty … Read more
A culinary creation is also an open work, dependent on context. Different people will taste different dishes from the same pot, shaped by the context of their experiences. And it’s not only about culinary experience — often, cultural context is even more influential. This becomes clear when, like me, you cook from within one culture for people from … Read more
No, Not Sweet Nuts are somewhat underrated in our daily diet. In plant-based cooking, cashews or other seeds are often used as substitutes for yellow or white cheese. But apart from such niche recipes and desserts or cakes, nuts, or other seeds, are rarely seen on our tables. In traditional cuisine (not folk, more like … Read more
Ice cream is chilled fat with sugar and protein. If you want to make good plant-based ice cream, remember these three components. The first records of chilled, icy desserts date back 2,500 years to Persia, where they prepared desserts resembling today’s sorbets. Icy desserts appear in a Roman cookbook from the 1st century and in … Read more
I like the name “Traditionally roasted Soymeat” The fact that something is traditionally roasted (especially if it’s wood-fired…) nobilizes what ends up on the plate.What’s funny is that it’s part of the mythology of the Golden Age, present in human cultures forever. INGREDIENTS:10 previously soaked soy cutlets (see Notes)2 onions (about 150 g)1 bell pepper … Read more
How to Make a Punk Salad from Leftovers and What’s Left, or 8 Rules of Salad Composition Like the 8 Arms of the Chaos starSalads, salads, salads. Hastur, hastur, hastur.Next to soups and casseroles, they are unrivaled in the world of leftover cuisine.They’re always made differently, as we use whatever we have in the fridge … Read more
Are you familiar with soups with a regenerative insert? The regenerative insert, also referred to as the meat insert, was somewhat of a symbol of significant changes that took place in the way Poles ate after World War II, as well as the shortcomings of those changes. When I have a lot of work, my … Read more
