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{{data|25 November 2019}}
{{Z wizytą w Soplicowie}}
This is another post in a series about food in ''Pan Tadeusz'', the Napoleonic-era Polish national epic by Adam Mickiewicz. While wandering around Europe after his exile from Russian-ruled Poland, Mickiewicz always kept in his travelling library an "old, worn cookbook", which he would read from time to time "with great pleasure", hoping to one day give a "truly Polish-Lithuanian banquet" according to "the ancient recipesrecipës".<ref>Excerpts quoted from a letter by Antoni Edward Odyniec, Mickiewicz's travel companion, dated 28 April 1830, quoted in: {{Cyt
| nazwisko = Jarosińska
| imię = Izabela
There's another interesting difference, though. On the third day, the cold borscht was "whitened", or clouded with sour cream, but on the first and second days, it wasn't. Why? One possible explanation would be that the first two days were Friday and Saturday, that is, lean days. In Polish tradition, dairy products, as well as meat, were proscribed on lean days. It was only on Sunday that the same cold borscht was served again, but this time, enhanced with the luxurious additive. Except that if the Soplicas fasted on Saturday, then they must have done it only in the afternoon, because [[Epic Cooking: Breakfast at Judge Soplica's|for breakfast they'd had not only cream, but even smoked goose breasts, beef tongues, ham and steaks]]! This may be explained away only by the poet's inconsistency.
So how do you prepare this whitened Lithuanian cold borscht? Here's a recipe recipë from ''The Lithuanian Cook'', a Polish-language cookbook by Wincentyna Zawadzka. The first edition was published two decades after Mickiewicz had penned ''Pan Tadeusz'', but I suppose the recipe recipë would have been quite similar in his times. Heck, even today Lithuanian cold borscht is still made in pretty much the same fashion.
{{ Cytat
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[[File:Szparagi w occie.jpg|thumb|upright=.5|Asparagus which I pickled in a fashion inspired by Syrenius's reciperecipë]]"Disturbed, shaken, uncertain," we begin to doubt the realism of the epic's setting. But no, "such master errs not!"<ref>Mickiewicz, ''op. cit.'', Book 12, verse 710</ref> It's perfectly possible to defend the presence of asparagus in early September. After all, the poet didn't specify that it was fresh asparagus. And the art of pickling the vegetable had been known in Poland for ages. Here's a recipe recipë for vinegar-cured asparagus from a 17th-century herbal written by a Polish Renaissance botanist, Prof. Simon Syrenius (Szymon Syreński):
{{ Cytat
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Very well, but how do you combine these pickles with chicken and crayfish into one dish? Let's consult ''The Lithuanian Cook'' once again. We can find there a recipe recipë for "chicken with mayonnaise", elegantly garnished with, that's right, asparagus and crayfish (and cauliflower to boot).
[[File:Chłodnik, raki i szparagi.jpg|thumb|upright|Vodka, cold borscht, crayfish and pickled asparagus]]
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Naturally, if you use pickled asparagus, then don't add too much vinegar into this dish. This quite sour course would have been paired with sweet Malaga wine. And if you've got too much asparagus and crayfish on your hands, then you may also add them to your cold borscht, as you could see in the recipe recipë for the first-course dish.
== Third Course ==
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So, not much. All we know is that gherkins or cucumbers were served on the side. But what about the meat? We're going to have to complete the picture with our own imagination. After a rather light poultry course, I suppose it's time for something more substantial. And as August and September are mutton season, then why not have some ram meat? Let's take the first recipe recipë for mutton that we can find in ''The Lithuanian Cook'':
{{ Cytat
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And, from the same book, a recipe recipë for "stewed cucumbers to be served with mutton":
{{ Cytat
| rok = 1830
| strony = 33
}}</ref> but it seems to be true for other Slavic peoples as well. Even so, there must have always been those who tried to balance the sourness with something sweet, be it honey or fruit juices. And so did ''kisiel'' eventually evolve into a sweet, fruit-flavoured dish. Finally, in the 19th century, oatmeal gave way to potato starch and thus the ''kisiel'' we know today was born. The recipe recipë for apple-flavoured ''kisiel'' you can read below, taken from ''The Lithuanian Cook'', is already a relatively modern one; it contains potato starch and sugar, and no fermentation is necessary.
{{ Cytat
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And finally, just to make the dessert a tad more diverse and make use of some other autumn fruits, let's add one more recipe recipë from the same source, this one for pear compote. In modern Polish, "''kompot''" refers to a popular watery drink made from fruits boiled with sugar. In the 19th century, though, the meaning was closer to the French original, that is, a thick and very sweet fruit syrup. In fact, you could simply buy a tin of pears in syrup, pour them into bowls, add some spices and the effect would be almost the same.
{{ Cytat
