Prymitywna Kuchnia is back in blog form too. Not that it ever disappeared, but it hasn’t published anything for ages. In fact, nothing this year. Which isn’t entirely true either, because it has been publishing elsewhere. Somewhere you all know perfectly well: Instagram. Somehow, though, Prymitywna hasn’t made much of a splash there. Here, there are more than 30–40 thousand of you a month, depending on the time of year; over there, barely 100 followers. And there’s genuinely good stuff over there. On the Prymitywna Kuchnia Instagram profile, you’ll find lovely dishes, the occasional recipe, and stories with ideas for nice, usually simple breakfasts, lunches and dinners. Things I often don’t have time to wrap in a hefty blog introduction — or simply don’t have time to turn into a post, which takes rather longer than posting on Insta. Sometimes a whole blog post just wouldn’t make sense: a simple smoothie, for instance, but not an obvious one. A fresh fig smoothie, say. Do you know what you can make with fresh figs? Well, you’ll find out there, in a story or a permanent post.
So do follow my Instagram account. Perhaps we can get it moving a bit. Have a look, see whether it’s worth it, and let me know — preferably by following. I also promise to post more here at last. Not because I’ve suddenly got more time, but because this blog deserves its current treatment about as much as Poland deserves the Polish “New Deal” (Nowy Ład).
Today, the first post of 2021 — yes, really — without a heavyweight introduction. More of a promotional one (remember Instagram), but with a very decent bigos to make up for it. It isn’t quick, although it’s considerably quicker than the oven-baked version you’ve already seen on the blog. Have a look at the Instagram post too, to see how it looks and how I suggest serving it. Recommended.
View this post on Instagram.
At a glance:
Preparation time: 2 hours 30 minutes
Serves: several people — roughly 8 portions like the ones in the photographs
Calories: quite respectable for a helping of bigos
Ingredients for a fairly spicy bigos:
- 400 g sauerkraut
- half a medium onion
- 100 g spicy chorizo (the one from Biedronka is pretty decent; it does the job)
- 100 g smoked chicken sausage (you can get it in Lidl; it’s rather good and low in calories, with fewer than 200 kcal per 100 g)
- 250 ml dry red wine
- a handful of dried porcini mushrooms
- 10 prunes
- half a handful of sultanas
- 2 containers of tomato purée (280 g; I use Mutti, which I think is the best)
- 4 bay leaves
- 5 allspice berries
- half a teaspoon of smoked paprika
- a teaspoon of sweet paprika
- half a teaspoon of freshly ground black pepper
- a level tablespoon of salt (but you’ll have to judge that to suit your own taste)
- a tablespoon of olive oil
How to make bigos with chorizo, raisins and prunes:
This bigos needs a little time, but making it is actually fairly straightforward. You just have to stir the pot every now and then.
I started by rinsing the previously chopped sauerkraut in water. I left it soaking for roughly 20 minutes. While it soaked, I peeled the skin off the chorizo — its casing, in other words; we don’t want that in the bigos — cut it in half lengthways, then into little half-moons. I did the same with the chicken sausage. I chopped the onion finely. In a large pot, I heated a tablespoon of olive oil and fried the onion and chorizo for roughly 5–8 minutes. The chicken sausage is delicate — even its name says so — and goes in later. Then I added the sauerkraut and the spices, all of them: bay leaves, allspice, sweet and smoked paprika, pepper and salt. I mixed everything thoroughly and kept frying over a medium “flame”: setting 5 on my induction hob’s 1–9 scale. This is the stage where you need to stir quite frequently.
After roughly 3–5 minutes, I poured in 100 ml of red wine and stirred again. While the sauerkraut cooked in the wine, I boiled the kettle and poured boiling water over the mushrooms in one glass and the finely chopped prunes and sultanas in another. After 2–3 minutes, I drained both the prunes and sultanas and the mushrooms, then added them to the sauerkraut. Another stir. I poured in about 80 ml of wine and added the tomato purée. I mixed everything very thoroughly and fried it for roughly 8–10 minutes, stirring often. Finally, once the wine added earlier had evaporated, I poured in the rest, stirred, covered the pot and turned the “flame” down low: setting 2 on that same 1–9 induction scale. Now comes the slow braising stage, which takes roughly 2 hours. During that time, give the pot a good stir about every 15 minutes and keep an eye on it so it doesn’t catch. After that, remove the lid, turn the heat up slightly — setting 3 out of 1–9 on my hob — and reduce the remaining sauce to a minimum. The bigos is then ready to serve, perhaps as I did, with a raw cucumber salad (have a look on Instagram for the details) on a slice of pumpernickel. Enjoy 🙂
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