Pork chop in bread crumbs is one of the staples in Polish food. Looking similar to the Wiennerschnitzel, it is prepared from pork, either with or without the bone. The dish dates back to the 19th century and at some point it has become a symbolic Polish Sunday lunch, served with fried sauerkraut and mashed potatoes, sometimes fried as well. Rather on the heavy side, luckily the tastes, or more importantly the culinary trends, have changed and these days it tends to be served with cooked vegetables or salads. As far as the preparation is concerned, it is one of my favourites - easy and quick to prepare, plus nothing much can go wrong with it. You need: Sliced pork chops an egg 1 cup flour 1 cup bread crumbs salt and pepper garlic powder a pinch of dried basil and oregano (these are not in the traditional recipe, but they add a nice touch) 2 tbsp oil 2 heaped tbsp butter Beat the chops with a mallet until they're quite thin (about 0.5 cm) season, and sprinkle powder ...

Summer being over, it's time to look for a way to avoid succumbing to the autumnal blues. What can be better than baking a nice cake? :-) I began the autumn baking season with a Polish style apple pie - szarlotka /pron: sharlotka/. Funnily enough, one of the most iconic Polish cakes, actually originates in France, and what's more, stewed apples is just one of the filling possibilities - it may be made with pears, peaches, apricots and other fruits. The Polish version, though, is invariably made of stewed apples, often with cinnamon, cloves, and sometimes raisins. Just imagine - the wonderful blend of sweet pastry, stewed apple with a clove and a note of cinnamon... The version I present today is the most basic one. There are quite a few varieties of the cake, but in this case I do believe that less is indeed more! :-) For the pastry you need: 3 cups of plain all purpose flour 4 eggs 250 g soft butter or margarine 1 tsp baking soda 1 cup caster sugar 1 pack vanilla s...

The last Thursday before the Ash Wednesday is called "Fat Thursday" in my country. It is the last Thursday of carnival, and it used to symbolise the end of the period of fun, partying and feasting, as Lent, the period of somberness and fasting was about to begin on Ash Wednesday. Long time ago, our ancestors had savoury doughnuts, made with pork fat and bacon and would consume them with large quantities of strong alcohol. The tradition of eating doughnuts on "Fat Thursday" has prevailed till this day, and there is even a superstition that if you don't have a doughnut on Fat Thursday, the rest of your year will be full of misery and misfortune! Thus, all diets have a "day off" and everybody indulges themselves in doughnuts, faworki, carnival roses and other sweets. There are long queues outside cake shops (they take orders for doughnuts a week or so in advance) and every grocery will have a good supply of doughnuts and faworki on this day. The only...