Genealogy / Information on family name, Krzycki [23]

There are 270 people named Krzycki in Poland.
BTW you can tell your friend that Polish surnames ending in -ski and -cki have a noble ring to them and are the equiavelent of German names starting with von and French ones with de. In an English context, assuming your friend's Christian name is Thomas, Tomasz Krzycki would be roughly translatable as Thomas of Ryeshire.

Genealogy / Last name Sapeta [44]

There are nearly 800 Sapetas in Poland, and the largest single cluster is found in in the mountainous areas of southern Poland's Bielsko-Biała region, "Polish hillbilly country". Its origin may strike some as humorous.

Genealogy / Polish Surnames Anglicized? [48]

The barred £ was apparently mmisread by some non-Polish INS official as a K. Early on, I saw the Polish pope's name in some Anglo-publication given as Karol Wojtyka. Same confusion no doubt.

Food / Borscht - Zurek / Bialy barszcz recipe [153]

For recipes on how to make both white barzscze (aka żurek) and red barszcz, including the tart beet, oat or rye sour needed to produce the real thing, check out 'Polish Heritage Cookery', all in English, published by Hippocrene of NYC.

Food / Kopytka, pyzy, kluski [60]

Merged:Silesian dumplings

When you've had your fill of burgers, pizza, quiche, curry and kebabs, try these:
WHITE (SILESIAN) DUMPLINGS (białe kluski [śląskie]): Peel 10 medium potatoes and cook in boiling salted water until tender. Drain well, run through ricer and set aside to cool slightly. When still very warm stir in 3 handfuls of potato starch, 1 scant handful of enriched white (regular) flour and 1 t salt, Work ingredients into a uniform dough. Form walnut-size balls, flatten slightly and make indentation on one side with thumb. (That's for the pork nuggets, drippings or gravy to fit!) If dough does not stick together well (which may happen if the potatoes have cooled too much), then work an egg white into dough before forming dumplings. Cook in large pot of boiling salted water without crowding. After they float up, reduce heat and cook another 3 min. Remove to colander with draining spoon and drain well. Serve with fried gold-brown pork fatback or bacon nuggets, pan drippings or gravy. Those not raised on these somewhat rubbery dumplings may find they take some getting used to.

SILESIAN DUMPLINGS ANOTHER WAY (kluski śląski inaczej):Cook 2-1/4 lbs potatoes in jackets, peel under cold running water and run through ricer. When they have cooled as bit, stir in 2 raw egg yolks, 1/2 c potato starch, 1 T white flour and 1 t salt. Proceed as in preceding recipe.

BLACK (SILESIAN) DUMPLINGS (czarne kluski [śląskie]): Peel 3.3 lbs potatoes and cook one half in boiling salted water until tender. Meanwhile, grate the remaining raw potatoes into linen sack, twisting to extract moisture and collecting drippings. When drippings settle, pour off dirty water and add the white sediment (starch) to the grated potatoes. Drain cooked potatoes well, run through ricer and combine with grated potatoes. Add 1 t salt and work mixture well into a uniform dough. Form walnut-size balls, flatten slightly and make indentation on one side with thumb. Cook and serve like white dumplings. At Sunday dinner in Silesia it is not uncommon to serve separate platters of both white and black dumpling to accompany the steak roll-ups (roladki), roast goose, pork or whatever.

Life / Hepatitis C in Poland...please help. [59]

Have you checked with the Szpital Chorób Zakaźnych near the Wola PDT (dept store)?

Language / I want to learn Polish. Where to start? [180]

If you can afford the time (6-8 horus a day) and expense, there is nothing like the Berlitz total-immersion method. You'll be rattling Polish off in 2 months' time.

USA, Canada / Where can i find Spirytus Rektyfikowany in the USA? [77]

In the USA its availability varies from state to state. Eg, in Illinois it is sold at your average off-licence, but in Michigan across the lake it is illegal.

Food / POLISH RECIPES! [287]

Have you seen the word tochinel in print or was it conveyed merely by word of mouth? Since it does not ring a bell (unless it was meant to mean tłuczone /mashed/ as someone suggested), check if this was not a Jewish dish. Some poeple say 'my great-grandmother used to make this dish in Poland', but that does not necessarily mean she was an ethnic Pole.

Food / Cooking Polish kiszka [99]

Something like English black pudding, German Blutwurst or French boudin (a distant relative of Scots haggis), but in Poland preferably made with buckwheat groats. It's called kaszanka in Poland and kiszka in America..

Food / pasztet recipe? [12]

TURKEY PTÉ (pasztet z indyka): Into bowl crumble 3 stale kaiser rolls (or equivalent amount of other white buns or bread) add 2 c milk and set aside to soak. Grind the meat from 2 cooked turkey drumsticks and thighs and an equal amount of cooked white meat together with the soaked rolls and 2 raw turkey livers at least twice. Three times is even better, because a good pasztet should have a smooth, creamy texture. When ground mixture stops coming out, add a stale slice of white bread to grinder to force out any remaining filling. Beat 2 eggs until creamy and work into meat mixture by hand. Continue kneading, squish mixture between fingers until it is uniformly blended. Mixture should be on the soft and mushy side. If it is on the stiff side, work in a little skim milk until absorbed. If it is too soggy, work in some bread crumbs. Season to taste with salt, pepper, 1/4 t grated nutmeg and a pinch of marjoram. Transfer mixture to vegetable-sprayed non-stick rectangular pan in which pâté should be no higher than 2 inches. Smooth top of mixture, cover with strips of uncooked bacon and bake in preheated 350° oven about 60 min. When cooled to room temp, cover with aluminium foil and refrigerate until ready to serve. Slice 1/4-inch thick and serve cold with horseradish sauce or tartar sauce.

NOTE: Feel free to substitute cooked pork and/or veal for some or all of the cooked turkey. Chicken livers may be used if turkey ones are unavailable. A jigger of cognac may be added to mixture before baking. This is a favourite starter at elegant Polish dinner-parties.

Food / pasztet recipe? [12]

Poles are traditionally not as fond of beef as are Anglo-Saxons. I suppose you could add a little to a pâté, maybe even up to 1/2, as long as fatty pork made up the balance. An all-beef one woudl be heavy tasting and lack the smooth lightness and appetisingcolour of the traditional Polish pasztet which should have a nearly spreadable consistency.

Comparing it with meatloaf (as soem people do on teh absis of sight alone) is unjustifed because meatloaf is made with coarsely minced raw meat, whilst pasztet is made from thrice-minced precooked meat.

Food / pasztet recipe? [12]

Pasztet can be made with most any meat, including rabbit. Polish cuisine was a make-do type of cookery due to historic reasons (invasions, deportations, famine) and also bore the imprint of the individualistic Poles' love of improvisation. Hence dishes vary not only from region to region and village to village but from home to home, even within a single family. Polish recipes are more like orientational guidelines rather than hard and fast formulae.

A favourite pâté included game such as hare, boar or venison. However, since game is very strong-tasting, usually fatty pork or veal was add to round out and mellow the flavour. The turkey pasztet is not very typical but it may be easier nowadays to prepare than one containing hare, boar or deer meat.

Genealogy / Last name Sapeta [44]

There are at several possible sources of the Sapieta surname including: 1) indigenous - from the Polish verb sapać (to gasp, be out of breath), in which case sapieta, sapacz, sapała, sapak, sapaka, sapuś, sapol and probably a few more would be colloquial for gasper (someone who breathes heavily, wheezes, gasps for air, etc.); 2) Indigenous toponymic nickname from such Polish localities as Sapy, Sapice or Sapałówka (Gasperville, Wheezeton); and 3) The Iberian (Portuguese) connection already mentioned in this forum. Occasionally Polish names coincide with those of different nationalities but mean something totally different, eg Posada (in Polish -- a prestigious, good-paying position, in Spanish -- an inn).

It cannot be ruled out that different Sapietas got their name from different sources. There are additional sources of this surname as well.

Food / Stuffed cabbage - gołąbki - recipe [59]

Some suggestions for the adventurous:

GO£ĄBKI/CABBAGE ROLLS, PREPARATION (przygotowywanie gołąbków): Core 3 lb cabbage, place cored-side-down in pot of hot water to cover and simmer to wilt leaves. Remove outer leaves as they wilt to rack or absorbent paper to drain. When cool enough to handle shave down the thick central vein of drained cabbage leaves or pound it with kitchen mallet to soften. Place an oblong scoop of filling at the base end of each leaf. Fold sides of leaf over filling and roll up away from filling. After the gołąbki have been rolled, line the bottom of a roasting pan with half the leftover undersized, damaged or otherwise unused cabbage leaves. Place the cabbage rolls snugly in roaster no more than 2 layers. Drench with sauce or stock (app. 2-3 c) of choice (for varieties see recipes below) and cover with remaining unneeded cabbage leaves. Surrounding the gołąbki with extra leaves will prevent them from scorching. Bake covered in preheated 350° oven 1 hr. Reduce heat to 325° and cook another hr. Switch off heat and leave in oven another 20 min or so for flavors to blend. They will be even better when reheated the next day.

CABBAGE ROLLS, MEAT & RICE-FILLED (gołąbki z mięsem i ryżem): Prepare filling by combining 1 lb raw ground meat (pork, pork & beef, pork-veal-beef combination, or ground dark-meat turkey) with 4-6 c undercooked rice, 1-3 chopped butter-fried onions fried and 1 egg. Mix ingredients well and salt & pepper to taste. Drench cabbage rolls in roasting pan with either of the following:

Tomato sauce
-- 3 c tomato juice (plain or containing several dashes Tabasco or 1/4 c spicy-style ketchup);
-- 3 c puréed tomatoes or stewed tomatoes ;
-- 3 c stock (meat or vegetable) mixed with several T tomato paste;
-- 2 c canned tomato soup mixed with 1/2 c ketchup (regular or spicy) and 1/2 c water;
Sour-cream sauce
-- Drench gołąbki with 3 c home-made stock or store-bought beef or poultry bouillon (cubes, granules); when cabbage rolls are cooked, pour of any remaining pan liquid that has not been absorbed, stir in 1 c sour cream and enough stock to make 3 c sauce; 1/2 a mushroom cube will greatly improve its taste; drench cabbage rolls with sauce and bake another 15-20 min.

Note: Prepare extra sauce on the side for your gravy-boat for those who like to drench their go³¹bki and accompanying mashed potatoes with sauce.

Sauceless, pork-nugget-garnished
-- Drench gołąbki with 2-1/2 c home-made stock or store-bought beef or poultry bouillon (made with cubes or granules); transfer cooked cabbage rolls to platter and drench with 1/4 lb golden-brown fatback nuggets (skwarki) and their drippings.

CABBAGE ROLLS, MEAT & GROAT-FILLED (gołąbki z mięsem i kaszą): Proceed as above, but substitute cooked barley, buckwheat groats, Kraków groats (fine buckwheat) or millet for the rice.

CABBAGE ROLLS, COOKED-MEAT & RICE/GROAT-TYPE (gołąbki z pieczenią i ryżem/kaszą): Proceed as in either of the preceding two recipes but substitute cooked ground meat (roasts, chops, dark-meat turkey, chicken, etc.) and/or ground, skinned smoked kie³basa for all or some of the raw ground meat.

CABBAGE ROLLS, MEAT-FILLED (gołąbki nadziewane miêsem): This will remind many of a meatballs wrapped in cabbage leaves, because that’s exactly what they are. Break up 2 stale bread rolls into bowl and drench with milk to cover. When soggy, grind and combine with 1 lb raw ground meat (as in meat & rice filled gołąbki above). Add 2 butter-fried chopped onions, 1 egg and any leftover milk from the rolls. Mix well and salt & pepper to taste. If mixture is too soft, mix in a little bread crumbs. This is soemthing liek metablls wrpaped in cabbage leaves.

CABBAGE ROLLS IN MUSHROOM SAUCE (gołąbki w sosie grzybowym): Prepare cabbage rolls as in any of the recipes above. Add a mushroom bouillon cube to the water rice or groats are cooked in. While gołąbki bake, wash and slice or dice 12-16 oz fresh mushrooms (domestic or wild). Stew them in 2-3 T butter with a finely chopped onion until cooked (about 15 min). Add 1 mushroom cube dissolved in 2 c hot water, mixed with 1 c sour cream fork-blended with 1 heaping T flour. Simmer 10 min. When cabbage rolls are cooked, add any remaining pan liquid to mushroom sauce. Salt & pepper to taste. Ladle mushroom sauce over gołąbki and garnish with chopped dill and/or parsley (optional). 1 oz cooked chopped dried mushrooms will make these gołąbki even more exquisite.

CABBAGE ROLLS WITH MUSHROOM FILLING (gołąbki z grzybami):
In 3 T butter, margarine or oil sauté 8-12 oz fresh (wild or cultivated) mushrooms (washed and chopped fine) with 2 med chopped onions. Combine with 3 - 3-1/2 c preferably slightly undercooked rice, barley or buckwheat groats, cooked with 1 mushroom cube. Add 1 raw egg and mix to blend ingredients. Salt & pepper to taste and (optional) garnish with 1 T chopped fresh parsley. Fill pre-wilted cabbage leaves as usual, drench with 3 c vegetable stock (in which 1 mushroom cube has been dissolved) and bake in preheated 350° oven at least 2 hrs. Serve drenched with mushroom sauce (see cabbage rolls in mushroom sauce) above.

MUSHROOM & GROAT-FILLED CABBAGE ROLLS (gołąbki z kasz¹ i grzybami): Pre-wilt cabbage leaves as for all gołąbki. Chop and fry 8-16 oz fresh mushrooms and 2 onions in 3-4 T butter until tender and combine with 4 c slightly undercooked groats (buckwheat, barley, millet) or rice. Stir in 1-2 eggs, salt & pepper generously and add a heaping T fresh, finely chopped dill and/or parsley. In roaster drench with 2 mushroom cubes dissolve in 4 c hot water.

GROAT & POTATO-FILLED CABBAGE ROLLS (go³¹bki z kaszą i kartoflami): Peel, cook and mash well 3/4 lb potatoes and set aside. Grate 2-1/4 lbs peeled, raw potatoes, pouring off liquid. In 4 T oil fry 3 chopped onions until lightly browned. Combine mashed and grated potatoes, add fried onion and add 1/4 c uncooked Kraków kasha (fine milled buckwheat groats). Mix ingredients well and salt & pepper rather generously to taste. Use mixture to fill pre-scalded cabbage leaves, roll up and place snugly in baking pan. Scald with boiling salted water or vegetable stock to cover, bring to boil and cook uncovered 15 min. Cover, transfer to 350°oven and bake 2 hrs. After switching off heat, leave in oven until cooled to room temp. Refrigerate until needed. To serve, brown on all sides in hot oil.

Genealogy / Kozlowski / Krzysik in the Korczyna / Krosno or Wapiersk / Lidzbark [18]

Re locating long-lost relations in Poland, it all depends whether you've got their current addresses or not. If so, you can phone their local government ofice and ask for the Dział Ewidencji Lduności (Populationm Records Section). They will know who is living in their area. If you lack their addresses, than a detective agency is probably the best way to go.

Genealogy / JARENTOWSKI/BIELAWSKI/MAKOWSKI [20]

All the surnames you listed are researchable. Indeed, the Wielkopolska (Poznań) region seems to be the Jarentowski ancestral stronghold.

Life / Mothers day in Poland [19]

Mother's Day (Dzień Matki) is celebrated on 26th May in Poland.

Life / Why many funny stories about Polish People in Europe? [38]

Why are anti-Polish jokes so short?
So the idiots who tell them can remember them!

Life / Drinking games in Poland [44]

No widely known games as such, but many humorous toasts, including
-- Zdrowie pięknych pań oraz mojej żony!
-- Cluśniem bo uśniem.
-- Jan Sebastian BACH
-- Żeby nam się dobrze działo, a że działo to armata, aby nam się armaciało!
-- No to chlup w głupi dziób!
-- Cztery kąty a piec piąty
Anyone know any others?

USA, Canada / Polish Language Newspapers available in the US [21]

There used to be a number of Polish papers in Ohio. They included Monitor Clvelandzki and Polonia w Ameryce. The Cleveland Polonia's big daily was

Wiadomości Codzienne, but it was the weekly Ameryka-Echo out of Toledo that was read nationwide. Probably the last such publication was the Związkowiec/Alliancer, official organ of the Cleveland-based Aliance of Poles (see below). When the Alliance merged with Chicago's PRCUA, the Związkowiec folded and it now exists only as an insert to the PRCUA organ Naród Polski.

DEFUNCT 'Związkowiec/Alliancer'
(Organ of the Alliance of Poles in America)
6966 Broadway Avenue
Cleveland, OH 44105

THE FOLLOWING IS A LIST OF THE MAIN POL-AM NEWSPAPERS NOW STILL APPEARING IN THE USA:

Polish-American Journal
Mr Mark A. Kohan, Editor, PAJ
PO Box 328
Boston, NY 14025,USA

Dr Wojciech A. Wierzewski
Editor-in-Chief, 'Zgoda'
6100 North Cicero Avenue
Chicago, IL 60646-4385, USA

Mrs Renée Harzewski
Editor-Publisher, 'Am-Pol Eagle'
3620 Harlem Road
Cheektowaga, NY 14215, USA

Mrs Kathryn G. Rosypał
Executive Editor, 'Naród Polski'
984 North Milwaukee Avenue
Chicago, IL 60622-4199, USA

Mrs Linda Romalewski
Editor, 'Polish-American World'
3100 Grand Boulevard
Baldwin, LI, NY 11510, USA

Editor/Publisher Krystyna Teller
Polish News (now only online version)
6134 W. Belmont Avenue
Chicago, IL 60634

Straż Monthly
Editor Edmund Kotula
1004 Pittston Avenue
Scranton, PA 18505, USA

Raymond Bittner
Polish Art Center (Web site)
9539 Jos Campau
Hamtramck, MI 48212

'Polish Falcon'
615 Iron City Drive
Pittsburgh, PA 15205-4397, USA

Michael Symański
Polish Weekly/Tygodnik Polski"
11903 Jos. Campau Ave,
Hamtramck, MI 48212

Mr Jacek Hilgier
Editor, "Gwiazda Polarna"
2619 Post Road
Stevens Pt, WI 54481-6128, USA

Mr Marty Cepielik
'News of Polonia'
2245 E. Colorado Blvd #104/177
Pasadena, CA 91107

Dr Wojciech Białasiewicz
Editor-in-Chief, 'Dziennik Związkowy'
5711 North Milwaukee Avenue
Chicago, IL 60646-6215

Nowy Dziennik'
(Independent Polish-language daily)
333 West 38th Street
New York, NY 10018

'Dziennik Chicagowski'
(Independent Polish-language daily)
1900 North Austin
Chicago, IL 60639

Sebastian Szczepański
Czas Polski/Polish Times
3940 Morrissey
Warren, MI 48091

Marcin A. Bolec
Biały Orzeł - White Eagle
129 Kingston St, 4th Floor
Boston, MA 02111

'Post Eagle'
(New Jersey's English-language Polonian weekly)
800 Van Houten Avenue
Clifton, NJ 07039

'Sarmatian Review'
(Scholarly journal focusing on Polish
history, culture and society)
PO Box 79119
Houston, TX 77279-9119

'Nowy Dziennik'
(Independent Polish-language daily)
333 West 38th Street
New York, NY 10018

'Gwiazda Polarna'
(Polish-language fortnightly)
2619 Post Road
Stevens Point, WI 54481-6128

'Tygodnik Nowojorski'
(NY Polish-language weekly)
922 Manhattan Avenue
Brooklyn, NY 11222

'Głos Polek'
(Organ of the Polish Women's Alliance)
205 South Northwest Highway
Park Ridge, IL 60068-5876

Genealogy / surname Krawiec [38]

Yiddish kravitz is an adaptation of the Polish krawiec (from the verb krawać - to cut /cloth/). The more typical Yiddish word and name was Schneider (from German) in Poland often respelt Sznajder.

Majdosz might have originated in dialectic peasant slang to mean southpaw (left-handed person) -- something once frowned upon as unnatural and abnormal.

Life / POLES FIND CZECH FUNNY! [42]

Mea maxima culpa. That's what happens when you know a smattering of different Slavonic tongues. I wanted to start with perepraszuju, but that must be Ukrainian.

Food / Sauekraut and Peas served at Wigilia [15]

Here is the recipe, if itnerested.

SAUERKRAUT & PEAS (kapusta z grochem): Soak 1-2 dried bolete mushrooms in waterr several hrs and cook in same water unitl tender. Chop mushrooms and return to their water. Cook 1 c yellow split peas in 2-1/2 c water until tender. Drain and corasely chop 1 qt sauerkraut and rinse if it is very sour. Squeeze out moisture,place in pot, add water to cover, 1 bay leaf several peppersorns and 1-2 graisn allspcie and simmer about 60 min. Add mushrooms and their stock, cooked drained peas adn (optional) 1 (Winairy ro Knorr) mushroom bouillon cube. Sauté 2 chopped onions in 3 T oil until tender and lightly browned around the edges. Stir in 2 T flour and brown lightly. Stir in several T sauerkraut liquid from pot, stir mixture into sauerkraut and cook covered on low heat at least another hr, stirring occasionally. Sauerkraut & peas can also be cooked only on the cooker or transferred to baking dish and baked in a medium oven. Season with 1 t sugar, 1/4 t pepper and several pinches of ground caraway and/or marjoram. Note: The more time-consuming original recipe called for whole yellow dried peas which need to be soaked overnight and cooked in the same water the next day until tender.

Food / Bread Baking in Poland [65]

In the recipe ingredients you list wholewheat rye flour. Did you mean wholegrain rye flour as in the heading?
Do you use only rye flour which is very low in gluten and does nto rise too well. Usually some white (wheat) flour is added. In fact the breads now comemrcially made in Poland contain less and less rye flour, only 30-40%. Many brands are becoming more and more like the cotton-fluff stuff the Brits call white bread.

Genealogy / POLISH NOBILITY NAMES IN -SKIi [82]

The -ski ending simply means of or from, as does de, di (Italian), van and von.
Yesteryear's Tomasz z £owicza would in time have evolved into Tomasz £owicki in much the same way as Sir Andrew of Hartmore would have eventually become Andrew Hartmore.