Tomorrow is Fat Tuesday, the day before Ash WeWednesday. I’m sure that most of you dear readers know about the partying and weeks of decadence that lead up to the church holiday. While Kitchenwyche isall for earning my beads (wink, wink), my eastern european heritage has another tradition: Pączki.
What exactly is a Pączki? Well, it’s a really big, overstuffed jelly doughnut. Ash Wednesday starts the Lenten season. If you are Catholic (and many other types of Christian), this means a period of fasting, penance and sacrifice to prepare for the death of the Christ.
While today the church is alot more lenient with dietary restrictions, it wasn’t always so. Making Pączki was a way to use up all the fays and sweets that were forbidden to be eaten during lent.
I have a yearly ritual of getting up at 5:00am and huffing it to the east side of Buffalo to get these tasty treats. I haven’t a clue how many calories are in them, but if their actual weight (@1/4lb each!!!!) is any indicator, you’ll need all the days between now and Ostara to work them off!
For those of you who are truly traditional, here is Aunt Hattie’s Pączki recipe. Feel free to make it your own and use any type of jam or jelly, but raspberry is the most traditional. Raspberries grow pretty much anywhere. Even the poorest citizen can find them in a field. It didn’t (and doesn’t!) take much to turn them into a royal treat of homemade jam. I will warn you ahead of time, this recipe makes ALOT of doughnuts: @ 4 dozen. You can guess why I don’t make it that often. I have tried unsuccessfully to reduce the recipe in size, but it just hasn’t worked out. Results were inconsistent. Since you will have so much dough, most household stand mixers won’t accommodate this batch. My own 12 qt mixing bowl barely holds it, and I use that for hand mixing. My suggestion is to make them for a party or bake sale. 5am looks better every time is go to make them!!!!
Sponge
In a large bowl, dissolve 3/4 oz of yeast in 1/4c of warm water. Add to this 1/2 qt of room temp milk and 3 c flour. Let this sit at room temp until bubbly, about 1/2 hr.
While your sponge is bubbling away, in another bowl combine:
1/2 quart warm milk
1/4 lb butter
2 tbsp shortening
1/2 c sugar
2 tbsp whiskey
Mix these ingredients into the sponge. Add to it:
6 large eggs
1/2 tsp salt
9 c flour
2 tbsp shortening
1/2 c sugar
With a wooden spoon, mix everything together until you have a smooth dough. Your arm is pretty much going to feel going to fall off LOL! Cover bowl with plastic wrap (Aunt Hattie used a towel) and let the dough rise until it id doubled in size. Then, pull off pieces about the size of a small apple (golf ball) and roll into balls. Feel free to use more flour to keep the dough from being sticky.
Place the balls on a well oiled cookie sheet and let rise until doubled in size. This will take @ 1/2- 3/4 hr.
When risen, fry the dough balls in a deep pan filled with “lard” (vegetable shortening is a good choice). They should be light to golden brown on both sides.
Drain on paper towels or a brown paper grocery bag. When they are cool enough to handle, use a pastry bag to fill them with raspberry jelly.
Eat them as they are or roll them in some granulated or powdered sugar. Glaze is also nice drizzled on them, but quite messy.
ENJOY!!!!!!!!!!!!
Just the thought of Valentine’s day makes us think of love and lust. As a pagan, I truly embrace both.
Just how did we as a society get to our modern celebration of the holiday? As with many other holidays, the Roman Catholic church cashed in it’s conversion dollars, banking on the already reveled feast days.
Legend has it that Valentine was a priest living during the reign of emperor Cladius II. His legacy was one of war and many soldiers were needed. Cladius outlawed marriage for young men, thinking that they would be more apt to enlist in the army if they were not tied down with a family. Valentine continued marrying couples in secrecy until he was caught assisting the young lovers and was put to death on February 14. This just so happens to be the festival of Juno (Hera in Greek) queen of all the gods and goddesses. She also is the goddess of women and marriage.
Still another story of the church is that Valentine was thrown into prison for assisting Christians to escape from Roman jails. He apparently fell in love with the warden’s daughter and signed his love letters to her “from your Valentine”. Sound familiar?
Whether you believe either story or any more that are out there, Feb. 14 is and always will be associated with St. Valentine, a martyr.
Feb. 15 also is the fertility festival of Lupercalia. It honors Faunus, the god of agriculture, and the twins Romulus and Remus, who were raised by a she wolf, a lupa. During the celebration, a goat would be sacrificed for fertility and a dog for purification. Young men flogged young women with the strips of hide. The maidens were receptive in hopes that it would make them and their crops more fertile in the next year. Later that day single women’s names were drawn by single young men. They would become sexual partners for the balance of the year. If children resulted from the union, the couple would marry. Around 500 A.D. Pope Gelasius changed the lottery and enforced chastity. Now the names drawn were those of saints whose lives were to become that person’s role model. The Roman pagans continued the tradition in silence, sending a note to their chosen one.
And now who can forget Cupid? The son of Venus, goddess of love and beauty, is probably the most recognised symbol of Valentine’s day next to the heart. He was noted for shooting arrows at humans (sometimes gods and goddesses) causing them to fall deeply in love.
Today red roses and chocolate dominate as the most popular gifts. Chocolate is rich in phenylethylamine, a chemical naturally occurring in the human brain. Scientists believe that boosting levels in women acts as an aphrodisiac. The word aphrodisiac comes from Aphrodite (Venus). Roses and rose petals have long been used in love spells, not to mention that they are really beautiful and smell enticing.
So go ahead and celebrate the day with someone you love, even if it’s yourself.
Oh…..and please don’t say, “sweets for the sweet.” Doesn’t anyone remember high school English class? In Shakespeare’s “Hamlet”, Queen Gertrude said those words when she placed flowers on Ophelia’s lovely corpse. The young lady had committed suicide.
This recipe was sent to me by one of my readers Christy. Thanks for the great info!!!!
“I made a traditional potato and onion filling. This makes enough to fill about 3 dozen: 3 medium gold potatoes, 1 medium onion, enough butter to saute. Peel and cut potatoes into 1 inch pieces. Place in pot with enough water to cover. Boil until very soft, about 15-20 minutes. Meanwhile, dice the onion and saute in butter over medium heat until translucent and golden in color. Drain the potatoes. It’s important that the potatoes be very soft, since you will be mashing without adding any milk. That’s also why I recommend gold potatoes. They have a better texture for this than russet or other white potatoes. Mash the potatoes and stir in the sauted onion. Allow to cool to room temp before filling pierogi.”