2015-01-29: Secrets Revealed, Techniques Attempted

Linguistic Achievements: Cigarettes

One of the fun things about working weird hours is needing cigarettes, milk, coffee, beer or whatever at funny hours and going to the shops to get them without my official translator. I must look and smell dreadful most of the time and due to brain drain my grasp of Polish is weaker than usual.
They used to get quite exasperated with me.

Luuuuucke Strike Mentol z Kulka (The kulka is a little capsule of menthol in the filter you can crush to adjust the mentholiness of the cigarette)

I think I must have grown on them. They are now correcting my Polish and speaking carefully and slowly. This morning I bought cigarettes and they knew what I meant and only had to make a small correction to what I said.

Rating: 6/10 (Plus I didn't hold up the queue like that whiny cow from across the road)

Cats are called Kot. Small cats can be called Kotek. The "ek" is a diminutive. For some reason I decided that "ka" was a diminutive as well and thought we were making Kopyt today because they are big versions of the Kopytka from the 27th. They are called Pyzy. I wonder what language "ka" is a diminutive in (oh just checked, it is a diminutive in Polish but only for some things, Polish is a very simple language to learn).

Food And Beverage Review: Pyzy (Potato Dumplings, stuffed with meat)

Low temp fry some mince and some onion separately. No seasonings I could taste. Onions to the completely soft and translucent stage with lid on so the water stays, meat is not browned, just grey. When time to use mix together.

Cold boiled potato put through mincer. I think this is why the egg I use in gnocci is not needed for this as the mincer breaks more of the starch cells giving a wetter result. I think this is secret the first.

If making some vegetarian ones mix half the quark with about an equal amount of potato as a stuffing (I think, I didn't pay much attention to such silly choices)

Add plain white flour, roughly 2/3rds ratio to the potato. There was a bit of a gasp when this was occurring as it might have been a bit much. In the end it was not. Better to be safe though as taking flour out will be tricky. Add about a cup of  potato flour

Mixing was not kneading like bread, bit more gentle and poky. A bit more aggressive towards the end, about 5 minutes mixing.

A small handful of dough

A spoonful of meat / onion mixture.

Roll up the edges

Fold over the top

Patching / Sealing can be done with a dusting of flour

Individuals will have differing speeds; some people are lightning fast...

Some people make it look really hard and take a long time. Theirs might be the best though, hard to tell as they have no makers seal.

Drop in simmering water for about 12 minutes

Meanwhile add smalec (rendered pork back fat with bit of pork in it) to the onions, do not drain the onions watery juice.

Decent spoonful of fat / onion over the top and test.

Rating: 8.5/10 (I managed 4 of these and needed a lie down)

Tourist Advice: Snow (falling variety)

For travellers with minimal experience of snow on a day to day fashion I have advice:
When you see something on the ground and wonder where it came from don't look up. You won't learn anything. You'll just get cold eyeballs.

Rating: 6.5/10 (I feel I am learning and I will stop doing this eventually)