Larder and Freezers Are Full

So what of the booty from my shopping trek in Chicago?

The cheesecakes are long gone and were quite tasty. The meatballs from Serrelli's were good. Their sauce was really fine as it wasn't at all sweet. It tasted like marinara sauce should – like tomatoes. The Italian beef got polished off earlier this week. That stuff is like crack. Here are some other tasty things.

Firstly there's this carrot pound cake that I got at Andy's.



The stuff is moist and buttery and oh so good! Also in the realm of sweets:





I got the rum cordials at Delicatessen Meyer and they complemented the rum balls very well indeed. The top candy bar was chocolate filled with hazelnut butter and was given to us free at Andy's. I don't know why it is, but Polish grocery stores, including Alex Polish American Deli here in Madison, give away free candy bars at the check-out. This is definitely something that other ethnic grocers should emulate. The Dr. Chocolate was given to me by my mom. It came from Australia and was excellent dark chocolate. It gave fast relief to my chocolate cravings.





Mmmm…domowa…If memory serves, domowa is made with beef as well as pork and is just tasty as all get-out.




Wiejska (vee-ES-ka) generally has ground veal added to it and is of a larger diameter than the domowa. This stuff is probably closest to the American kielbasa that you'd find on grocery store shelves here in town. Remember "kielbasa" is Polish for sausage and is not really a variety.




Jalowcowa (ja-WOK-so-va) is made with juniper berries and, quite frankly, this is my favorite so far. Then again, I've only ever eaten about 7 or 8 types of kielbasa and, with dozens of variations, I've got a long way to go. Aside from the addition of juniper berries, the main differences between the sausage that I buy at Andy's (which is where Alex Polish American Deli here in Madison gets its sausage) and the stuff you'll find on the supermarket shelf are texture and smokiness. Andy's tends to grind the meat more coarsely than companies like Hillshire Farms and this gives their sausage a very different mouthfeel. In addition, American commercial kielbasa tends to be smoked less than the stuff at Andy's. This is a matter of personal preference so I leave it to the eater to decide how much smoke she likes with her garlic, pepper, and marjoram. One last difference is that the stuff at the supermarket tends to be saltier.



This is a hunk of smoked pork loin. Jason and I split a whole loin. I am still trying to get this eaten and I think I'm going to have to start putting it in my breakfast cereal to make sure it disappears from the refrigerator.



More kvas.



Since there was no bacon & pork loaf to be found at Andy's I got a couple tins of other processed meats. Here's what the one on the right, a breakfast sausage, looks like:



I fried it up and slapped it on some rye bread. The best way I can describe it is as a cross between SPAM and the sage-laced breakfast sausage we Americans are familiar with.



I have tried neither of these yet and only recently found out what the stuff on the left was. There isn't much on the label in English so I turned to Julia, a former co-worker who is Russian. She told me that it is a plum sauce: "It's tkemali, used a lot by Georgian kitchen. I love it!!! One of my fav…Used good with meat - like meat dumplings or even with meat broth soup or just with meat."



More sweets.



This is zalewajka which, I was told by a very tall and very beautiful Polish woman, is basically Polish cream of potato soup. I also bought some pickle soup which I think is going to be my dinner tonight along with smoked pork loin.



That's a close-up of Salat Wiejska. While various salads can be found in a jar here in Madison at places such as Alex's and Woodman's, it pales in comparison to the fresh stuff. You're looking at cabbage, celery, green onion, and carrot all in a very tasty vinegar dressing. Oh, and of course there's dill too. I don't think Poles serve a vegetable without dill. Stevie thought this stuff was fantastic and I agree with him.



Lastly there's beer. Andy's has a good selection of beers from Poland as well as Czechoslovakia, Ukraine, and other Slavic countries. They tend to be lagers – crisp with a modicum of bitterness and often times some yeast is left in the mix. For folks familiar with local brews, a rough approximation is New Glarus' Yokel.

I've been using some of the sausage lately in Cajun food. I made gumbo a couple weekends ago and then jambalaya on Fat Tuesday but have plenty more to go. Looking at the pictures above, I again get a hankering to make my own sausage. I swear that someone I know has a meat grinder attachment for a Kitchen Aid. The sausage stuffing one is quite cheap so I can just buy that. I've got some of the Polish sausage seasoning from Penzey's and think it's pretty good. If anyone wants to help me out by holding onto some pig intestine one of these days, please let me know.