Changes

In this post I’m going to continue telling the [[Genuine Old Polish Bigos|history of bigos]], the Polish national dish, and also return to ''Pan Tadeusz'', the Polish national epic. We’ve already discussed what the protagonists of ''Pan Tadeusz'' [[Epic Cooking: Breakfast at Judge Soplica'sSoplica’s|used to have for breakfast]], but what we omitted back then was the hunters’ breakfast from Book IV of the poem. That one took the form of a picnic, out in the woods, shared by a group of hunters who had just successfully concluded a bear hunt (although the bear itself was shot by Father Worm, who mysteriously disappeared a moment later).

The Polish word ''bigos'' is often rendered into English as ``hunter's stew"“hunter’s stew”, but in fact, hunter’s bigos, or ''bigos myśliwski'' (pronounced: {{pron|bee|gawss}} {{pron|mish|leef|skee}}), is just one of its many varieties. Whether it’s a&nbsp;kind of bigos made from game meats or simply bigos eaten by hunters, but made from any kind of meat, is open to debate. As for me, I’ve never really understood why anyone would enjoy shooting terrified animals, but if Poland’s national bard himself (even if he admitted to be ``a “a wretched marksman"marksman”<ref>Mickiewicz, ''op. cit.'', Book IV, verse 43</ref>) wrote so much about hunting in his epic, then let’s at least quote a&nbsp;short excerpt, which is still quite up-to-date and may not be appreciated by the pro-hunting lobby in Poland.

[[File:Koncert Wojskiego.jpg|thumb|The [[Epic Cooking: The Perfect Cook#“Hreczecha is My Name”|Tribune]] playing a &nbsp;horn, a &nbsp;hunting scene from ''Pan Tadeusz'' illustrated by Michał Elwiro Andriolli (1881)]]

Or allowing a &nbsp;pregnant she-hare in the heath,

| tytuł = Pan Tadeusz, or The Last Foray in Lithuania: A &nbsp;Tale of the Gentry during 1811–1812

Anyway, after the hunt was over, the hunters (who had left home early in the morning with empty stomachs) treated themselves to a&nbsp;feast in the midst of the forest. Fires were built, ``meats“meats, vegetables, flour" flour” and bread ``were “were brought from the wagons"wagons”,<ref>Mickiewicz, ''op. cit.'', Book IV, verses 820–821</ref> Judge Soplica ``opened “opened a &nbsp;box full of flagons" flagons” of Goldwasser<ref>Mickiewicz, ''op. cit.'', Book IV, verse 821</ref> (a&nbsp;herbal liqueur from Danzig, or Gdańsk, famous for the gold flakes added to every bottle), while ``in “in the pots warmed the bigos."”<ref>Mickiewicz, ''op. cit.'', Book IV, verse 831</ref> ''Pan Tadeusz'' contains what is without a&nbsp;doubt the most beautiful literary monument to this Polish national dish. Or maybe bigos is considered a&nbsp;national dish because it is mentioned in ''Pan Tadeusz''? Whatever the case, Mickiewicz himself admitted that he didn’t quite know how to describe what bigos actually tastes like.

[[File:{{#setmainimage:Aneta Talaga, bigos.jpg}}|thumb|350px|Bigos from ''Pan Tadeusz''.<br />A photo from the [http://www.anetatalaga.pl/index.php/bigos-tradycyjny Ms. Aneta Talaga's Talaga’s appetising blog.]]]

“Because the Swedes have cut up a &nbsp;great many cabbageheads!”</poem>

Jest i&nbsp;bigos cielęcy. A &nbsp;ja krzyknę głosem:

It was called ''bigos hultajski'' (pronounced: {{pron|bee|gawss}} {{pron|Hool|tie|skee}}), or ``poor man's bigos"“poor man’s bigos”. Back then, the Polish word ''``hultaj"“hultaj”'' ({{pron|Hool|tie}}) referred to an itinerant peasant who travelled from village to village or from town to town looking for various short-term jobs.<ref>{{Cyt

}}</ref> ''Bigos hultajski'' was, then, something like real bigos, as it was made from chopped meat, but of the cheaper kinds, like sausages and fatback, and it took its sour tang not from expensive limes or lemons, nor even from vinegar, but from sauerkraut or pickled beetroot juice. The sauerkraut had the additional advantage of serving as both filler and preservative. It wouldn’t take long to discover that such sauerkraut bigos could be stored for a&nbsp;long time and reheated multiple times, which made it a&nbsp;perfect food not only for itinerant peasants and domestic servants, but also for soldiers, hunters and travellers. Zygmunt Gloger, who liked to share his personal experiences in his turn-of-the-20th-century ''Old Polish Encyclopedia'', reminisced that ``in “in the old way of travelling, it was a &nbsp;superbly practical invention of Polish cuisine, which I experienced myself in 1882, when Henryk Sienkiewicz and I travelled for a &nbsp;few days on horseback to the Białowieża Forest."”<ref>{{Cyt

[[File:Bigos myśliwski.jpg|thumb|Hunter's Hunter’s bigos as painted by Alfred Wierusz Kowalski (1877)]]

When the flavours you need are bitter and sour. {{…...}}

Is, just as true bigos, so messy and jumbled. {{…...}}

Gdzie potrzebną przyprawą jest gorycz i&nbsp;kwasy. {{…...}}

Jest to czysty hultajski bigos, mieszanina. {{…...}}

''Bigos hultajski'' also makes an appearance in the title of a&nbsp;four-decades-younger novel by Tytus Szczeniowski (published under the ''nom de plume'' Izasław Blepoński), ''Bigos Hultajski, or Social Poppycock'' (''Bigos hultajski: Bzdurstwa obyczajowe''). It’s not really a&nbsp;novel in the modern sense, but rather a&nbsp;loose collection of stories, drafts, digressions, polemics and sociological conjectures, arranged into a&nbsp;plot without a&nbsp;beginning or an ending. Apparently, the only thing the binds its four volumes together is a&nbsp;series of four forewords (and one ``hindword"“hindword”), which are incidentally considered the most interesting parts of the entire work.<ref>{{Cyt

| This novel is a &nbsp;messy mixture of everything, {{…...}} just a &nbsp;scaffold thrown to the wind, to hold images haphazardly hung thereupon {{…...}} All bizarrely entangled and without any logic {{…...}} Such will be this book, full of repetitions, chatter and descriptions that fell off the pen wherever they happened to be nudged by my imagination; this is why I’ve entitled it “Bigos Hultajski”, which is made from a &nbsp;variety of things. It’s a &nbsp;poor man’s dish, but a &nbsp;savoury one; and perhaps it will be said of this novel that it is a &nbsp;poor man’s roman and an unsavoury one.

| oryg = Romans ten jest nieporządną mieszaniną wszystkiego, {{…...}} jest tylko rusztowaniem na wiatr rzuconym, aby mogło utrzymać obrazy bez ładu zawieszone {{…...}} Wszystko dziwacznie poplątane i&nbsp;bez związku {{…...}} Taką będzie i&nbsp;książka niniejsza pełna powtarzań, gawęd i&nbsp;opisań spadających w&nbsp;nią tam, gdzie wyobraźnia je z&nbsp;pióra strąciła, i&nbsp;dla tego nazwałem ją Bigosem hultajskim, który z&nbsp;różnych i&nbsp;rozmaitych rzeczy złożonym bywa. Jest to potrawa, choć hultajska, ale smaczna, a&nbsp;o tym romansie może powiedzą, że jest hultajski a&nbsp;niesmaczny.

With time, the word ''``hultaj"“hultaj”'' gained a&nbsp;negative connotation that it has today. In modern Polish, it’s roughly equivalent to the English ``rascal"“rascal”. The origin of the term ''``bigos hultajski"“bigos hultajski”'', now understood as ``rascal's bigos"“rascal’s bigos”, was largely forgotten. Gloger hypothesised that ``because “because the best bigos contains the greatest amount of chopped meat, then there is a &nbsp;certain analogy with rascals, or brigands and highwaymen, who used to hack their victims to pieces with their sabres."”<ref>Gloger, ''op. cit.''</ref> And so even today we can find explanations, as in [https://pl.wikipedia.org/w/index.php?title=Bigos&oldid=54979769 Polish Wikipedia,] that ''bigos hultajski'' is a&nbsp;kind of bigos that is particularly heavy on meat and not – as in its original sense – a&nbsp;dish in which the scarcity of meat was masked with sauerkraut.

On the first day, cook sauerkraut and meat separately. On the second day, combine the cooked sauerkraut with chopped meat; this is but a &nbsp;scaffold for a &nbsp;future bigos, which dilettantes consider to be true bigos already. On the third day, reheat the mixture, miscalled bigos, and douse it with grape juice. On the fourth day, reheat the substance and add some bouillon and a &nbsp;tiny bottle of steak sauce. On the fifth day, reheat the mixture and sprinkle it with pepper in a &nbsp;grenadier manner. By this point, we’ve got some juvenile, fledgling bigos. So, to make it mature and strong, on the sixth day, reheat it; on the seventh day, reheat it – and – on the eighth day, reheat it. But on the ninth day, you’ve got to eat it, because, on the tenth day, classical gods, attracted by the scent of bigos, may descend from the Olympus to snatch this delicacy away from the mouths of mortals!

| To reheat, toast and reheat again is a &nbsp;method which adds splendid characteristics to things of this world. One of such things that may be reheated over and over, forever, is the question of Warsaw’s sewer system.

Unfortunately, not everything that tastes good is good for your health. Bigos happens to have a&nbsp;reputation for being an excessively high-fat dish that tends to sit heavy on the stomach. What’s more, it is usually made from leftovers, which has often aroused suspicions as to the freshness of its ingredients. You can see it, for example, in ''The Good Soldier Švejk'' by the Czech writer Jaroslav Hašek, where, on the one hand, one should be glad that ``“''bikoš'' cooked in the Polish way" way” made a&nbsp;career as an important part of the Austro-Hungarian army’s diet on the Galician front, but, on the other hand, it was accused by Lieutenant Dub of giving him diarrhoea.

| Before they got to Żółtańce, Dub stopped the car twice and after the last stop he said doggedly to Biegler: “For lunch I had bigos cooked the Polish way. From the battalion I shall make a &nbsp;complaint by telegram to the brigade. The sauerkraut was bad and the pork was not fit for eating. The insolence of these cooks exceeds all bounds. Whoever doesn’t yet know me, will soon get to know me.”

| In the meantime, Gaudentius, who hadn’t failed to provision himself for the journey with leftovers from the feast of Yasnohorod, was busy reheating and consuming bigos, generously seasoned with sausages and fatback, which he had retrieved from his coffer, and washing it down, in strictly calculated intervals, with ample doses of vodka, which he kept by his right-hand side in a &nbsp;large rectangular decanter. {{…...}} Bigos, as is known, induces great thirst, which had to be quenched with a &nbsp;concoction of some kind; nearby, at Finke’s, this and other “remedies” were at hand for savouring. This venture, undertaken with certain tact, yet amateurishly, took quite some time; it had been over an hour since the sun had hidden below the horizon, when Mr. Pius was still exorcising the effects of the greasy bigos with last drops from the last bottle.

| oryg = Tymczasem Gaudenty, który nie zaniedbał uprowidować się na drogę okruchami jasnohorodzkiej biesiady, odgrzewał i&nbsp;konsumował wydobyty z&nbsp;jaszczyka, i&nbsp;suto kiełbasami i&nbsp;słoniną przyprawiony bigos, skrapiając go w&nbsp;ściśle wyrachowanych interwałach sporą dozą szpagatówki, która się przy nim, na prawicy, w&nbsp;dużej czworogrannej flaszy znajdowała {{…...}} Bigos, jak wiadomo, wzbudza silne pragnienie, wypadało więc ugasić je jakąś miksturką; pod bokiem właśnie u&nbsp;Finkego było do skosztowania to i&nbsp;owo remedium. Próba ta z&nbsp;pewnym taktem, po amatorsku, odbywana zajęła niemało czasu; słońce już od godziny przeszło ziemski horyzont opuściło, kiedy p. Pius ostatnimi kroplami z&nbsp;ostatniej butelki egzorcyzmował afektacje tłustego bigosu.

Mr. Ernest Bryll, a&nbsp;20th-century poet, gave an even more direct answer to the question of what to write of the national bigos. He thinks of it as a&nbsp;``dangerous“dangerous, heavy dish, {{…...}}, a &nbsp;mixture of everything, but also hacking people to pieces"pieces”.<ref>{{Cyt

Which this sick nation, over a &nbsp;thousand years,

| As you can see, the constitution is as unbalanced and vague, its language as sloppy, as sloppy are the minds of the MPs. On a &nbsp;general note, I’ve got to tell you that this sloppy language makes our constitution somewhat akin to paltry bigos made from rotten ham, half-rotten fatback and half-cured sauerkraut; so that each paragraph and article may and should be read completely on its own, without linking it with any other article. Naturally, the rotten ham is for the president, the half-rotten fatback is for the cabinet, and the parliament is left with the half-cured sauerkraut. As you can see, there’s nothing their stomachs can do about it and what comes out is stench, so that it reeks all along Country Street [ulica Wiejska, where the Polish parliament is located]. And the only way out of this chaos is to rewrite the constitution in a &nbsp;decent way. What’s more, nobody has the right to interpret the constitution. Interpretation is forbidden – so the government is left with nothing but bigos.

| oryg = Jak pan widzi, panie pośle, układ konstytucji jest tak chwiejny i nieokreślony, napisana jest tak niechlujnie, jak niechlujnym jest umysł panów posłów. W ogóle powiedzieć panu muszę, że ta niechlujna pisanina czyni z naszej konstytucji coś w rodzaju kiepskiego bigosu, w który obok zgniłej szynki pakują nadgniłą słoninkę i kładą to obok nie dokiszonej kapusty; tak, że można i należy każdy paragraf i artykuł brać zupełnie osobno, nie wiążąc go {{…...}} z żadnym innym artykułem. Naturalnie, zgniła szynka jest dla Pana Prezydenta, nadgniła słonina dla {{…...}} rządu, no a &nbsp;posłom zostaje nie dokiszona kapusta. Jak pan rozumie, żołądki wtedy nie mogą nic zrobić i wychodzi z tego smród, tak, że ulica Wiejska cała śmierdzi — proszę pana. I wyjście z tego chaosu jest możliwe tylko przez zmianę Konstytucji i napisanie jej w przyzwoity sposób. Dodam do tego, że nikt nie ma prawa interpretować konstytucji. Interpretacja jest zakazana — i wobec tego państwu pozostaje tylko bigos.

| So far, I’ve been under the false impression that the Polish national dish was bigos, an exquisite stew of cabbageheads, bitter hearts and virulent liver, a &nbsp;dish full of sourness and pungent smells. Someone would always “cook bigos” [i.e., make a &nbsp;mess] for someone else, then they would slap one another in the face, in a &nbsp;newspaper or in a &nbsp;café, and life, replete with rosy cheeks, temperament and fulsomeness, was beautiful. It saddens me, though, to see that tradition is fading away, as is the noble dish of bigos, and it is the Polish-style beef tongue that now reigns supreme on the Polish menu. Bigos was an exuberant dish, announcing itself through its scent from afar, juicy and vigorous. Tongue in the Polish style is more intricate, sweetened with almonds and raisins; it is, indeed, the dumbest part of a &nbsp;thoughtless beast, but the sweetness of its seasoning is ineffably appetising.

| oryg = Dotąd mi się niesłusznie zdawało, że narodową potrawą polską jest bigos, wytworna potrawa z kapuścianych głów, gorzkich serc i jadowitej wątroby, potrawa pełna kwasów i przejmujących zapachów. Przecież ktoś komuś zawsze „narobił bigosu”, potem sobie dali po pysku albo w gazecie, albo w kawiarni i życie, pełne rumieńców, temperamentu i bujności, było piękne. Widzę jednak ze smutkiem, że tradycja wietrzeje i wietrzeje bigos, szlachecka potrawa, a &nbsp;na polskim jadłospisie pyszni się – ozór po polsku. Bigos był potrawą zamaszystą, wonią już zdaleka się oznajmiającą, pełną soków i wigoru; ozór po polsku jest już bardziej wymyślną, zaprawioną na słodko, z migdałami i rodzynkami; jest to wprawdzie najgłupsza część bezmyślnego bydlęcia, lecz słodycz przyprawy jest nad wyraz smakowita.

And now it’s time for a&nbsp;little curiosity. Have you ever heard of ''bigos z wiwatem'' (pronounced: {{pron|bee|gawss}} {{pron|zvee|vah|tem}}), or ``bigos “bigos with a cheer"&nbsp;cheer”?

| Hunter’s bigos was served at hunts, as well as bigos with a &nbsp;cheer (pre-cooked bigos was reheated in a &nbsp;pot whose cover was tightly sealed with dough; a &nbsp;loud “explosion” of the lid due to pressure was a &nbsp;sign that the bigos was ready).

| oryg = Na polowaniach podawano bigos myśliwski, a &nbsp;także bigos z wiwatem (ugotowany wcześniej podgrzewano w naczyniu z pokrywą oblepioną ciastem; „wystrzelenie” pokrywki pod wpływem ciśnienia oznaczało, że trzeba już jeść).

However, I’ve been unable to find any mention of the ``bigos “bigos with a cheer" &nbsp;cheer” in pre-Internet sources. You could say, of course, that I could have asked some of those people who wrote or talked about it. Well, I tried, but to no avail. It would turn out that either the source has escaped that person’s memory or that it’s simply a&nbsp;fact so obvious that no citations are necessary. Besides, you can find information about bigos with a&nbsp;cheer everywhere, I’ve been told; just grab any 19th-century cookbook that comes to hand. Well, it is true that old recipës do mention a&nbsp;method of cooking where the pot is sealed with dough. Ćwierczakiewiczowa advises to cook the ``English meatloaf" “English meatloaf” in such a&nbsp;way,<ref>{{Cyt

}}</ref> while Maria Gruszecka uses this method to prepare a&nbsp;``meat essence" “meat essence” for the sick.<ref>{{Cyt

}}</ref> But still no sight of bigos cooked in a&nbsp;sealed pot, let alone a&nbsp;recipë where a&nbsp;lid blowing off the pot would be a&nbsp;desired effect rather than accident. Nor was I able to find the phrase ''``bigos “bigos z wiwatem"wiwatem”'' anywhere I looked.

What I did discover was that this peculiar kind of bigos not only doesn’t seem to be mentioned in pre-Internet sources, but it’s also absent in online sources that are older than 26 November 2006. So what happened on the particular day? This is when Tomasz Steifer, a&nbsp;painter and heraldist, [https://pl.wikipedia.org/w/index.php?title=Bigos&diff=5477053&oldid=5246284 added the following information to the ``Bigos" “Bigos” article] in Polish Wikipedia:

| Old Polish cuisine, especially at hunts, knew bigos with a &nbsp;cheer, in which the pre-cooked dish was reheated in a &nbsp;pot with its cover tightly sealed with dough. A &nbsp;loud “explosion” of the cover caused by the pressure meant that the dish was ready for consumption.

The only recipë I’m aware of that could be described as ``bigos “bigos with a cheer" &nbsp;cheer” (although this appellation is not used in the source) is a&nbsp;hint, given by Castellan Adam Grodziecki in his 17th-century manuscript, for a&nbsp;rather bawdy and somewhat primitive prank. It’s bigos with a&nbsp;cheer that you can smell!

| Mix some ant eggs {{…...}} into bigos {{…...}} or anything else, {{…...}} so whoever eats it, the bench underneath him will surely creak and it will go into your nose.

| oryg = Mrówczych jajec {{…...}} namieszać w bigos, {{…...}} albo w co inszego, {{…...}} kto będzie jadł tym, pewnie będzie ława trzeszczała pod nim, da się czuć, ale w nos.

Whether it’s actual ant eggs or a&nbsp;folk name for the seeds of some carminative plant, is not certain. Prof. Jarosław Dumanowski suspects that ``ant eggs" “ant eggs” may refer to common knotgrass.<ref>Dumanowski, ''op. cit.''</ref>

Finally, let’s return to ''Pan Tadeusz'' one more time, because I’ve also come across the argument that ``bigos “bigos with a cheer" &nbsp;cheer” is mentioned in this epic poem. Indeed, the words ''``bigos"“bigos”'' and ''``wiwat"“wiwat”'' (``cheer" “cheer” or ``hurrah"“hurrah”, from Latin ''``vivat"“vivat”'', ``long live"“long live”) even appear in the same verse. But who’s doing the cheering here – and three times at that? Is it the lid (loudly blowing off) or the hunters raiding the pot (cheering out of joy that the bigos is ready)? I will let you read and decide for yourself.

Steam, as if from a &nbsp;dormant volcano’s deep crater.</poem>

[[File:Bigos zwwk.jpg|thumb|250px|And this is my own bigos – this time with sauerkraut, which I've I’ve seasoned with the following ingredients: onion, black pepper, allspice, bay leaves, marjoram, juniper, smoked chili pepper, cumin, cloves, saffron, dried bay boletes, prunes, honey, dry red wine, tomato paste.]]As quoted above, Henryk Sienkiewicz and Zygmunt Gloger enjoyed bigos in 1882, while travelling to the vast primaeval Białowieża Forest in what is now eastern Poland. In 2015, two hairy Englishmen, David Myers and Simon King, relived this experience, except they rode motorbikes instead of horses. Here’s a&nbsp;video of them cooking bigos (which, for some reason, they pronounce ``bigosh"“bigosh”) in the midst of the same forest.