I’ve seen a lot of nice things to eat in Poland, but none of them were pies. The more I think about this the odder it seems. You may wonder why would I spend any time at all thinking about this, but then you don’t know me. Let me get one thing straight from the very beginning: this is not a rant, complaint, criticism, or belittlement – I’m genuinely mystified as to the absence of Polish pies. The pie is one of the simplest, most ancient, and most convenient forms of food preparation. I don’t understand how it never caught on here. Or did it and I’m just not seeing them?
A pork pie. Pastry on the outside, mechanically reclaimed pig meat and mysterious jelly on the inside. Mmm…
The essence of the pie concept is the containment of sloppy, hard to handle food in a firm, crusty, edible package called pastry. Pastry is just flour, water, and a little fat rolled flat and baked. Even the fat is optional. Pies can contain just about anything. The idiomatic mom’s apple pie, the standard by which Americanness is measured, is a classic sweet version; the steak and kidney pie, a British pub staple, is a classic savoury version.
Apple pie. As American as being the butt of cheap bombing jokes
A steak and kidney pie in its natural habitat.
If you’re mentally putting together the elements of a flour and water casing around a sweet or savoury filling and coming up with the answer “pierogi,” don’t worry I’m way ahead of you. Clearly there are similarities, but there are also crucial differences. Crucial difference number one is that pierogies are boiled, not baked, and crucial difference number two is that pierogies are individual bite-sized items served in a group while a pie is a single big item from which slices are taken. Both of these have a bearing on the convenience and longevity of pierogi as compared to pies – pierogi are wet and sloppy and don’t keep.
As if this post wasn’t exciting enough already, I have more. As part of my customarily extensive research on such things I happened across a Ukrainian dish called “pyrih” that looks suspiciously like a pie. Even more interestingly, as if that were possible, the Russian word for this Ukrainian dish is apparently “pirog,” and the Polish word is “pieróg.” Seems there is more to this than meets the eye. Polandian readers will undoubtedly be able to enlighten me further.
A pyrih, apparently. Looks like a pie and lives just across the border in Ukraine.
Again pierogi”s”, can I remind You that word pierogi is plural itself and there is no need to put s.
Even in English?
It’s the same situation like English word cattle, or sheep. Plural itself no need to put “s”
Eskimos is a plural as well, but we say Eskimosi, aren’t we?
Eskimos = one man, Eskimosi = many
It’s like ” nos ” = 1 nos , 1 piece, it doesn’t mean
it’s plural…
Nosy = many of them , plural
Funny but that’s true
You can remind me, but as a punishment you will have to put up with me reminding you that the word “you” only has a capital letter if it’s at the beginning of a sentence, or happens to be some poor unfortunate’s name.
Sorry for that, in polish is a custom to show respect for receiver by witting you with capitol letter.
Only kidding with you, no need to apologize :)
Good to know – i must remember that… ;]
I think you’re on to something here (about the pies, not the pierogis…). I’ve now had a similar conversation with a number of Poles who love them! From what I’ve read, baking in pastry was a way of preserving bits of meat in medieval times (the word ‘pie’ comes from magpie – a bird that collects various odds and ends), so I suspect that pies were unknown to the Polish nobility. According to “The Last Food of England” by Marwood Yeatman, pies really took off in the north of England in the 19th century. I guess the industrial revolution meant that workers needed filling, portable and self contained food to eat at work and as many women also went to the factories, production of food was taken over by by bakeries and then commercialised. Maybe the Polish art of pie making died out over time.
I’m definitely on to something, no idea what though. I’ve often thought pies might go down a storm here if they were introduced, seems like the kind of thing Poles might like. Also cider, but that’s a story for another time.
The pie does indeed have a long and glorious history. They are a great way of preserving food and making it portable – see the Cornish pasties mentioned by Scatts.
I just find it weird that there is no tradition of pastry here. Any idea why?
Island, I love Cornish Pasties, they are my favourite, and the
potato & cheese pie, and the beef pie…
But saying we do not know no pastry ?
That’s an official offence!
Pierogi , kopytka, pyzy, knedle , kulebiaki, kolduny…-
if that’s not pastry – I will eat my …whatever.
I do understand why you are missing your pies ( nie psy) so much – as much as I miss my pierogi, which you can’t make, and have no idea about them here at all!!
Thanks God for Polish shops….
We come from two different ends of Europe, we have a different tradition in cooking and the climate determines what we eat and how we eat.
There is no doubt about it.
So – quit wondering, and start cooking :))
By the way – I surely think the Briths pies would struck a big success with the Polish stomachs :))
That’s our sort of food .
When I first started doing business in Poland in 1990 I thought it was the pie capital of the world. As I would jog through upper Sopot I would see many signs on gates and fences proclaiming: “UWAGA ZLY PIES”. Then I asked my assistant what all these Zly Pies were about……………………………… and they were certainly not what I thought.
Certainly could have been a nasty surprise :D
I felt the same but the other way round when I came to the UK and saw a fish&chips bar:
Fish
Chips
Springrolls
Pies…
:D This is how nasty rumours get started
Hi Bob, hilarious he he – I was laughing my head off :))
Zly Pies – dobre !
See ? There is pies all over , Island must have missed it :))
Jamie, I hate you. Blatant displaying of mouthwateringly good pork pies in a country where they are not available is ILLEGAL and SADISTIC!
I think the apple pie is a bit of a red herring as sweet pies are available here. Not quite the same as an English fruit pie but close enough.
How do you feel about gołąbki – meat wrapped in a case, just happens to be cabbage instead of pastry. You could remove the steak & kidney in that picture and replace with a couple of nice gołąbs without them looking out of place.
I know where you’re coming from though. You need to visit the frozen section of M&S food corner in Zlote T, there they have pies! Fish pies, meat pies, cottage pies, shepherd’s pies………….
I’d give my left arm for a decent Cornish Pasty though! Slightly shocked it didn’t get a mention in dispatches.
I’ve seen something like a sweet pie (open topped) but the point is they don’t have a pastry base – it’s something more like crushed biscuit, like in an American cheesecake. What I’m really getting at is that there doesn’t seem to be any pastry, i.e. baked flour, water, and fat, which seems odd.
Apologies for the blatant pork pie porn, I was going to put in a picture of a giant succulent game pie but relented at the last minute.
Where have you been eating? Pastry (flour, fat, water or sometimes egg) is what mazurki, tarty and babeczki (shortcrust pastry), ciastka francuskie and paszteciki (puff pastry), strudle (filo), faworki (choux) are made of.
I wanted to write that ;)
kulebiak:
http://pychotka.pl/przepisy-kulinarne/inne-wypieki/kulebiak-dro%BFd%BFowy-z-kapust%B1-i-grzybami..html
paszteciki:
http://www.wielkiezarcie.com/recipe13172.html
You might be right about the industrial revolution. But it has a good side – one can have a full dinner comprising of meat, veg and a staple in every milky bar, and a soup. This is as Granny used to cook, so can’t possibly be bad for you!
About the pies – some of them are excellent, but I recall that Scatts has been grossed out by unknown meat, and what else is in a pie?
I much prefer the roast dinner with veggies and gravy, and the pie for pudding (hehe, I love that expression). Rhubarb pie, or bramley apple pie. And definitely a glass of bitter or Rioja.
You have some really good Rioja here, you know? It’s not quite miód, but very nice. ;)
How about kulebiak? Quite popular in some regions (I know wiki is a bit confusing here, but we know it as a Polish dish).
http://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Coulibiac
http://images.google.co.uk/images?q=kulebiak&oe=utf-8&rls=org.mozilla:en-US:official&client=firefox-a&safe=images&um=1&ie=UTF-8&sa=N&hl=en&tab=wi
Never seen one. Looks delicious though and certainly qualifies as a pie. From reading some of the articles associated with the image search it sounds like it is a regional dish from eastern Poland, i.e. close to Russia, Ukraine etc.
Airam jesteś Marią naprawdę? :-)
Naprawde jestem! ;-)
Cieszę się! To piękne imię! I większość Marysiek jest fajnych! :-)
Guess who this is
Chimera (in Kraków) does ‘pies’ – well, sort of. You can get a kind of pastry ‘pieróg’ thingy with grzyby and kapuszta or something like that, and then they have that famous broccoli tart: definitely crumbly savoury pastry with butter in (leaning slightly more towards the French pastry side of things).
Okay, but it’s about as Polish as a Big Mac. Will look more carefully next time I’m in there.
Chimera, not Polish?? Don’t be fooled by the abundance of imported Mediterranean vegetables: why, I’ve seen gołąbki in there many a time! (not always vegetarian either…)
Well, the pie tradition hails apparently from the nineteenth century, when Western Europe became industrialized. The ovens, to that point inefficient and reserved only to the financial elites, started to appear in the streets, and the pie became a popular food of the working class.
Poland, thanks to its general backwardness back then, did not enjoy the mass popularity of pies, and the later wars and unpleasant events successfully blocked the culinary exchange.
I can talk like this all day, but I can’t get a job in Poland. Frustrating, innit?
what do you do?
Pies were on the menu in Elizabethan England. As domestic kitchens didn’t have ovens, the British housewife used to take her pies to the bakery to be cooked during the day, while the baker was selling the bread he’d baked overnight.
To Kulebiak (kind of pie with meat or fish or cabbage) I will added also: Kołacz old slavian feast pie especially wedding-pie (but rather without “top hat” when with filling and usually in the sweet version with white cheese rubbed with eggs yellow and sugar).
Now is soup in bread (zupa serwowana w chlebie) in role of polish pie in many restaurants who wants to be noble / szlacheckie!
And what about all paszteciki/pastry/patty with meat or cabbage or mushrooms with cabage – my favourite? They are little pies in fact! I recommend “pierogi szwedzkie” on Długa Street in Kraków, they are swedish variation on this subject.
In Galicja there still exists (but rather in private houses) strudel! Inheritance after C.K. Austria Deceased.
When I made pie or quiche in home, my mother criticise it as “byle co” = nothing good to eat. (Nothing to laugh as I am perceived as quite good cook as every women in our family).
I think the problem with strudel, pie and quiche is – they are the best warm= served and eaten fresh after baken. And polish people prefer cakes which can be served and are still good 2-3 or more days after baking (in the case of unexpected guest).
I want feast pie. Sounds great.
There have been lots of suggestions, but they’re all very obscure rather reinforcing my point that pies and pastry are largely unknown here. I’ll have to check out these Swedish pierogi.
I just got a LIDL catalogue from my Reklama box. Next week they will be selling English food (and guess what? there’s a photo with Big Ben in the background), and, according to page 3, they will be selling steak pies. They will also have real marmalade and mint sauce! It’s a pity they won’t have penguin bars, marmite or powdered gravy though…
Just found it online:
http://www.lidl.pl/pl/home.nsf/pages/c.o.20091020.index
Favourites so far are Fisch and Chips, Sos angielski (mustard?),
Syrop z czarnej porzeczki (is blackcurrant juice English?). No custard I note.
Isn’t sos angielski custard?
ohhh syrop z czarnej porzeczki is clearly Ribena :)
pie … rogies hmmm… almost funny.
I am pretty sure there is some connection with the kanapka.
Like some kind of refusal for anything that implies covering food with bread or anything even vaguely similar.
slandi1 = z pewnością jakiś porąbaniec? :D
Internet fraud squad here –
NOTICE
Complaints have been received and an offence has been reported under section P, subsection i), paragraph e) of the IWC (Internet Whoppers Code): Picture no.3 purports to show a Steak and Kidney Pie in its natural setting whereas the photograph in fact depicts a Steak and Kidney Pudding.
You shall hereby correct the error and pay the fine of much grovelling and apologising. As yet not injuries, domestic altercations or street brawls have been reported as a consequence of this error but it is only a matter of time, hence swift action should be taken to avoid further legal consequences.
I find special offer for island1. Just because I wanted to make him good! :D
Jamie, imagine! You can win a trip to… London by bying and eating your lovely pies, especially your steak pie!!! There’s a week of british cuisine!!!
http://www.lidl.pl/pl/home.nsf/pages/i.home
http://www.lidl.pl/pl/home.nsf/pages/c.o.20091020.p.Danie_z_wolowina
Disgusting is this that on the steak pie it is written… succulent! Equals that british quisine will be a cactus in your throat dear taster?
Interesting to note that Lidl tried the same British food extravaganza in Germany over a year ago. Here are a few people talking about it – http://www.toytowngermany.com/lofi/index.php/t97987-0.html
I wonder if they are doing the usual trick of sending all the unused stock to Poland? Better check the sell-by dates.
Also, it seems this “Hatherwood” brand is dreamed up by Lidl rather than being anything genuinely British so these dishes will be a Germany interpretation of British food, made to a low price-point. Yum!
I’m a bit out of date with British tastes but Cheddar cheese displayed alongside tiramisu is a little unusual. Potato waffles? Royal Rum and Irish Cream tea bags? Lord Nelson tea?
I do need a jar of Sweet Pickle though. I’ve a tin of corned beef in the fridge that’s waiting for a pickle accompaniment.
One thing about pies, that explains why they don’t exist in Poland: fuuuuj.
Scatts you stole my topic I wrote yesterday!
The pie is something that is completely lacking in Polish cuisine. People are often befuddled when I try to explain it to them, to which they just reply, “Oh, it’s a tart.”
As for that apple pie comment: I don’t get it.
well, i think we do not do those pies here with meet because they are just…. not good for us. if we do pastry i must be sweet and with meet it is just…fuuuuuj!
with meat of course, sorry for typing error!
thats it i’m opening up a good old fashioned pie and mash shop with liquer of course that get them going!
Internet fraud squad again.
We note there has been no correction to the labelling of picture nr 3 (which describes a Steak and Kidney Pudding as a pie) and as such this web log topic has been reported to the European Internet Regulatory Authority for telling porkies!