8 Days until Thanksgiving!

Can you tell we are getting excited around here for Thanksgiving?  Ja-Ja has been busy getting ready and so has his family.  Babci cleans the house, polishes the silver, and gets the serving platters ready.  John Jr. is contributing a freshly-shot pheasant for the table....

Easter is Here!

Easter is a time of renewal, as it coincides with Spring, and what better way to renew mind and body than feasting with those we love?  

This year, Ja-Ja attended Easter Brunch with his family, and everyone brought their favorite dishes for the feast - cold ham, two kinds of kielbasy (venison and traditional pork) and, of course, Babka!  We also don't want to overlook the rye bread, crumb cake, pound cake, croissants, scrambled eggs, sausage, bacon, french toast, pastries made from nuts and poppyseeds, chocolate bunnies and fresh fruit!

Best of all, was the champagne punch with apple, guava, mango, orange, cranberry and pineapple juice.  We needed two batches of the punch, and three pots of strong, aromatic coffee to wash it all down with.

We consumed about 4 day's recommended daily allowance of all of it, and cancelled the prime rib dinner - we were too stuffed!

Best Chrusciki Recipe of all Time

Here it is - for all you Polish Epicures, the original, fantabulous, best of all time recipe for Chrusciki::

12 Egg Yolks
4 cups flour
1/2 cup sugar
1/2 cup sour cream
pinch of salt
1 shot of rye whiskey

Beat egg yolks until golden colored.  Add sugar, sour cream and salt.  Then add flour, mixing until a ball forms.  Mix whiskey in at this time.

Separate a small fist sized ball of dough and roll very thin on a well-floured surface.  Cut dough into 4" to 5" diamond shapes, making a slit in the middle.  Pull one corner through the slit, and fry in a deep skillet of hot crisco oil.  Remove from oil when golden but not browned, drain.  Sprinkle with powdered sugar when cool.  Enjoy!

Chrusciki is my Life!

That's right, Chrusciki is life, and Life is Chrusciki.  Here's how we make it:

The Big Cheese himself

Start with some egg yolks, flour, and such,

Measure very carefully,

Now it's getting doughy...

Don't forget the most important ingredient!

Roll out the dough very thin....

Twist and Shout

Famous Frying Fun, Batman!

The Master at Work

The delicious finished product.  Outstanding!

Chrusciki Making is not for the Faint of Heart

Ja-Ja learned to make that Polish Delicacy called Chrusciki from his mother, using a recipe that goes back hundreds of years - to the old country.  Babci (Ja-Ja's mum) brought the recipe with her as a 12-year old immigrant from Wormza, Poland, to preserve the tradition of baking that she had come to know and love as a girl.

What is Chrusciki, you ask?  A pastry made from dough rolled thin, twisted just right, then fried in oil until tender brown and flaky.  Doused with powdered sugar, it is a treat for the senses, and one of the most-beloved foods of Eastern Europe.

It is said that Karol Wojtyla, otherwise known as Pope John Paul II, used this same recipe in his family..