Poland

Country - Polish

Cuisine Description - Polish cuisine (Polish: kuchnia polska) is a mixture of Eastern European (Lithuanian, Belarusian, Ukrainian, Hungarian, etc.) and German culinary traditions, with some Russian, Italian, and Turkish influence due to historical reasons. It is rich in meat, especially beef, chicken and pork, and winter vegetables (cabbage in the dish bigos), and spices, as well as different kinds of noodles the most notable of which are the kluski. It is related to other Slavic cuisines in usage of kasza and other cereals. Czernina remains a delicacy, although modern butchers cannot provide fresh duck blood for its' preparation. Generally speaking, Polish cuisine is hearty and uses a lot of cream and eggs. The traditional cuisine generally is demanding in preparation, and Poles allow themselves a generous amount of time to prepare and enjoy their festive meals, with some meals (like Christmas eve or Easter Breakfast) taking a number of days to prepare in their entirety.
Traditionally, the main meal is eaten about 2 p.m. or later, and is usually composed of three courses, starting with a soup, such as popular bouillon or tomato or more festive barszcz (beet) or żurek (sour rye meal mash), followed perhaps in a restaurant by an appetizer of herring (prepared in either cream, oil, or vinegar). Other popular appetizers are various cured meats, vegetables or fish in aspic. The main course is usually meaty including a roast or kotlet schabowy (breaded pork cutlet). Vegetables, currently replaced by leaf salad, were not very long ago most commonly served as 'surówka' - shredded root vegetables with lemon and sugar (carrot, celeriac, beetroot) or fermented cabbage (kapusta kiszona). The sides are usually boiled potatoes or more traditionally kasha (cereals). Meals often conclude with a dessert such as makowiec, a poppy seed pastry, or drożdżówka, a type of yeast cake. Other Polish specialities include chłodnik (a chilled beet or fruit soup for hot days), golonka (pork knuckles cooked with vegetables), kołduny (meat dumplings), zrazy (stuffed slices of beef), salceson and flaki (tripe). Copyright Wikipedia