American baking products (bread, shortening, etc)

Hello everyone! I am new here, though I have read a lot of posts over the last few years. I finally decided to make my own account because of the challenges I am having in the kitchen. I miss many American foods.

I read the only possibly related thread about shortening and it wasn't very helpful. That post is here:
https://polishforums.com/food/shortening-used-baking-stuff-50492/

I really want to make biscuits. Not cookies (those aren't biscuits!!), but the most delicious bread on the planet. I crave these delicious little things! But I need shortening to make them. I always want to make American cakes. I'm sorry, but I just don't like Polish cake at all. I wish I could start an American bakery xD

I also can't find masa harina. I want to make homemade tortillas and tortilla chips. I am so happy I finally found pinto beans. I'm going to start making homemade refried beans and bring back my favorite foods! I might be from the US, by my stomach is Mexican!

EDIT: By the way, I made some delicious cornbread a few days ago and I ate WAY too much! Today I plan to make banana nut bread. I have only recently started cooking these things. Does anyone else have any suggestions or advice?

You can buy vegetable shortening at the brit shop

britishshop.pl/en_GB/searchquery/shortening/1/phot/5?url=shortening

I don't know why American products are so often sold as British products, but every product on that page is American! Maybe I can get some Crisco. I bought some "tłuszcz do pieczenia" at Carrefour yesterday and I'll see how that works for biscuits (American bread, not cookies).

The shop started by selling British products but they soon found that people from other nations living in Poland also missed their favourite home goodies.

If there is something you want from the US and it is not on the website they can sometimes get it for you.

Good luck with the cooking

dolnośląsk - shortening
There used to be a Polish vegetable shortening called ceres. Haven't seen it for years. Dunno if it's still produced and sold.
Found this on wiki:
Ceres - roślinny tłuszcz jadalny, biała lub kremowa substancja otrzymywana z miąższu orzechów palmy kokosowej[potrzebny przypis]. W Polsce produkowany w procesie chemicznego utwardzania z oleju rzepakowego[1]. Stosowany do głębokiego smażenia, m. in. pączków, faworków.

I use either Palma, or lard (refined smalec). The latter is what Americans call shortening, just not the vegetable kind (which you can't make at home - it's an industrial process).

[moved from]

there are a few places that do mash with steak - the restaurant at the Intercontinental, Butcher and Wine, Hard Rock and that is about it.

In general it is difficult to get southern food in Poland - I cannot think of anywhere that does biscuits, gravy, grits, greens and only a few places attempt fried chicken. There are some places that do barbecue but none of it that I really eat. Its the one cuisine that is missing in Warsaw - everything else Indian, Mexican, Italian, Spanish French, Thai etc etc has plenty of options.

I dream of hominy grits and collard greens (separate not together) Polenta and szczaw are okay but not the same....

Also biscuits... the lack of quick bread in Polish cuisine is a bit weird. I don't know if it's part of Czech cooking but in Hungary they have pogacsa (apparently originally fromTurkey...)

And cornbread! It goes so well with lima bean soup cooked on a hambone....

Indian & Mexican food suks in Warsaw atleast.Its not at all authentic and catered to Polish taste.Fugging salatka with every dish almost and so is vietnamese.Lately I have been having dinner from Duzo Mia,vietnamese place by me on Zlota where I hate that they charge me extra 50 grolsh for take out.Once I had real good Indian in heenka market at a kiosk operated by a pakistani guy.he made really good meat dishes with chinsy/flimsy naans(they save on flour i guess)but too far to drive just for food.

Polish food is the best in Poland at those canteens in public office buildings esp outside Warsaw and cheap,I really enjoy that food.
In hardrock I only like there onion rings and Saigonkis.
@cms-do you live around there?
Der Elephan by plac bankowy has good seafood now though.

Blurgh, there's a reason for that! Biscuits and gravy looks to be completely inedible and revolting, not to mention those horrid-looking grits.

can't be worse than fried tomato and ...beans (for breakfast?)


blasphemy!!!!

I still can't understand that Americans don't understand a good fried breakfast :(


I promise one day to go south of the Mason-Dixon Line and try for myself!

Speaking of American food, I watched this entire video a few weeks ago - youtube.com/watch?v=rY32voilw_A - and what surprised me was that hash browns are something completely different there.

I dunno - i split my childhood and teens between the US and UK and i miss the American version of breakfast much more - either at a small diner or at a chain - Bojangles, waffle House, IHOP :) all great. In fact i had a great job cleaning at Waffle House when I was in college and their hash browns are great

Lul Bul - no I am not living there - i have a place in the country and come into town every few weeks for work so i eat out a lot in Warsaw. Indian is getting better - try Guru on Widok.

Waffle House is fascinating to me as a business, especially the way that they just keep on going. Natural disaster? No worries, Waffle House will be open!

I'd like to try their version of hash browns, just because it looks so completely different to anything I know.

I think I may have been at a waffle house a couple of times... maybe. Not something I know at all.

I had a cousin living in the countryside who was a great southern cook (all made from basic ingredients including the cows in their pasture...) her mother in law was even better (I remember Sunday dinners at the mother-in-law's house when I spent the summers.... the South has it all over other regions of the US when it comes to food).

Fried steak, fried bacon, fried ham, fried sausage, fried eggs, fried hash browns, fried omelets, fried potato's w/fried onions, fried pancakes, fried.........unlimited.

No wonder you are so jealous of Americans.

Get a second job and save your money up and I will be happy to pick you up at the airport and show you a time you will never forget.

We use to call it the Awful Waffle lol way back when I used to live in Florida.

Actually, it's a great place and usually filled with interesting characters after the pub closes.

It's hugely diverse as well, isn't it?

Black people in the South know how to cook and use spices.
People in New York put two pop tarts in the toaster and call it breakfast.