Fish with Whiskey

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The Way to Warsaw

Hi all, I finally managed Andy to do a guest post. I just feel like he is more in touch with the Motherland then me. Here goes:

In search of Stalinist architecture and Polish hipsters we bravely headed East of Central Europe to Warsaw

A: "It's only ...."

T: "I know Andrew!"

A: ".... one stop"

We were very fortunate to enjoy a sunny clear weekend for our trip

Unfortunately in Ostbahnhof, Tegan's head spontaneously turned into an apple

But by the time she was aboard the train and on the way to Catholic Poland an unknown saint intervened and she was miraculously cured

Before long we were crossing the Mighty Odra river. Please not the absence of ponies and rainbows on the German side and similar lack of burning rubble and rusting BMW car chassis on the Polish side

While Tegan basked in the sun I attempted to finish reading Infinite Jest before I get old next month

Greeted by the advance party at Warszawa Centralna

We checked in and explored the Warszawa old town

In front of the Polish Academy of Sciences we have Copernicus' vision of the universe

Here is little old Earth with my favourite Moon in the background

The Martian! Now a Major Motion Picture

One small step, one giant leap

T perfecting her dandy

Family!

While Warszawa was almost completely destroyed by the end of 1944 clearly a lot of work has been put into restoring the old town down to the smallest detail and elsewhere there are many modern buildings springing up.

This poor guy had to keep on asking tourists to please stop hitting him and touching his costume

Here is the Royal Castle with clock tower

In the old square or Rynek Starego Miasto is a statue of the Mermaid of Warsaw. Legend has it that in the Polish Dreamtime she was swimming down the Vistula River and liked the look of Warszawa so she decided to stay. Now she protects the city with her trusty shield and sword.

Church!

Meat in a cup of bread

Pącz-ki to my heart.

I guess anyone who knows me won't be too surprised to see that one of my first Polish posts is about Pączki.

These delicious, sweet, perfectly-fried-fluffed-and-filled delicacies, pronounced more like 'pOnchki' than 'pac-see', are Poland's version of a jam-filled doughnut (or Berliner).

But let me tell you friends, the word doughnut just doesn't cover it.

When we arrived in Warsaw, one of the first questions I asked the magical Google machine was 'where can I get the best Paczki in the city'.

As luck would have it, it turned out that my beloved had chosen a hostel directly between two of the most famed bakeries in town. I'm sad to say that we never made it to A Blikle- I guess now I have another reason to return to the Capital, but we did manage to feast on some of the exceptional product from Cukiernia Pawłowicz.

Cukiernia Pawłowicz is a hole-in-the-wall bakery on the Chmielna pedestrian wall. We went by in the morning, and there was no queue, just a very friendly lady who helped translate some of the 20 or so different flavour offerings into English. Oh yeah, and a slightly scruffy gentleman, who was being served tea, and convinced us to buy the Rhubarb flavour (featured above).

Thanks for nothing man! Definitely one of the least tasty of all the consumed Paczki.

Paczki dough is not at all sweet, but instead has a fairly distinctive 'yeasty' flavour. Often in addition to the filling flavour, the little dough balls are garnished with some sort of candied fruit peel, or, in the case of this fine and fluffy fellow below, flavoured throughout with orange.

Add a slightly tart traditional rose jam to the centre of a perfectly risen dough and produce a completely crispy outer shell with some sort of synergistic marriage of light frying and glaze... and then sprinkle on yet another layer of texture, complexity and rich almondy flavourings... and you have a beautiful beast.

Fun fact, apparently the addition of a bit of alcohol to the dough prevents absorption of too much oil!

Oh yeah, and did I mentioned that all the doughnuts were somehow, magically, always warm?

Did you want to see the inside?

I have to be truthful.

The rose was nothing compared to the plum.

Which contained a more plentiful, and tarter, inside.

And the surprise player?

To be honest, when she said the word 'halva', I thought she was mistranslated.

The problem with chocolate or nutella doughnuts, is that they can be waaaay too sweet.

Add the slight nutty bitterness of halva?

Problem solved:

At 3 to 3.2 Polish zloty, they come in at just about 80 cents for anyone earning in euros.

Unsurprisingly, I went back for more, although none of the new flavours where as good as the first time. In fairness, I picked them without any translation help: and thus ended up as 'egg nog', 'cheesecake' and 'cherry cheesecake'.

Thankfully, I was smart enough to go straight for the halva again!

Don't forget to visit Cukiernia Pawłowicz the next time you're in Warsaw!

The Grassy Knoll, Poznan

Last weekend we headed to Poznan (Posen to the German community), a smallish student town about 300 km directly east of Berlin.

The Plan: to escort Andy's parents, who had been staying with us, out of Germany, and to reunite them with Andy's dad's three sisters (and their respective partners).

(L-R: Barbara, Krystyna, Sandra, Andrew Snr- that is to Andy: Aunt, Aunt, Aunt, Father)

It was one of those weekend things where I take too many photos and then have to spend the next six or so weekends sorting them all out.

But just to show you that we did have some time to relax in our whirlwind tour, I present: The Grassy Knoll (or pillow).

More soon.

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