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OK, so this post isn't about holy breads – as in the Eucharist. It's about breads with holes. And I don't mean little pockets of air as in sourdough bread. I mean breads that are shaped like rings, wreaths or knots, with the dough surrounding one or more holes. You know, bagels, pretzels and the like.
In a few shopping malls and other places in Warsaw you can find stands like the one pictured here, selling what the sign claims to be ''krakowskie precle'', or "Cracow pretzels". Intriguingly, [http://krakowskieprecle.pl/o-firmie the company that distributes them in Warsaw] proudly boats that these "pretzels" are shipped each morning straight from Mr. Czaja's bakery in Cracow. But if we take a look at [http://malafirma.pl/piekarnia/pieczywo1.html Mr. Grzegorz Czaja's bakery website,] we'll see that what he bakes there is not pretzels, but something called ''obwarzanki'' (pronounced '': {{pron|awb-|vah-{{small|ZHAHNzhan|kee}}-kee''). It seems as though the ''obwarzanki'' magically turned into pretzels the moment they arrive in Warsaw! Can we chalk it up to merely yet another linguistic difference between Cracovian and Warsovian Polish? Or is there a more profound distinction between pretzels and ''obwarzanki''?
"Pretzels, "bagels" and "''obwarzanki''" are all used by tourists and native Cracovians alike to refer to the specifically Cracovian bread which "takes the form of an oval with a hole in the middle" and whose "surface is formed by strands of dough twisted into a spiral".<ref>Description of the product according to: [https://eur-lex.europa.eu/legal-content/EN/TXT/?uri=CELEX:52010XC0216(01) Publication of an application pursuant to Article 6(2) of Council Regulation (EC) No 510/2006 on the protection of geographical indications and designations of origin for agricultural products and foodstuffs (2010/C 38/08), EC No: PL-PGI-005-0674,] Official Journal of the European Union</ref> Although unique to Cracow, it nonetheless belongs to the great diverse family of holey breads. So let's take a look at the bigger picture now.
