Polish bigos – a classic recipe with fresh and sauerkraut

Bigos is a traditional Polish dish based on meat and cabbage. At the same time, real bigus is as different from ordinary stewed cabbage with meat as imperial stout is not like Zhigulevskoe. This is an amazing, undoubtedly festive dish with an ancient, very interesting history, an unusual set of products and a complex recipe. Complex, but at the same time – quite reproducible at home. Well, let’s learn!

According to the classic recipe, bigos is made from a mixture of fresh and sauerkraut, with a variety of meat ingredients, smoked meats, dried fruits and alcohol – wine or beer. But just combining all this in a cauldron is not enough – there are a lot of nuances in cooking, the observance of each of which has a positive effect on the result. No wonder, because the dish is old, the recipe has been perfected by Polish chefs for centuries, until it reached perfection. This is not Ukrainian borscht, which is different for every hostess – everything must be done according to science. Although a certain amount of fantasy is still allowed – where without it?

Who and when came up with bigos is not exactly known. The Poles prepared something with this name already in the 1682th century, which is confirmed by written sources. Back then, they didn’t put cabbage in bigos – it was made from finely chopped meat, especially game, fish, and even crayfish. The recipes are described in the books “Compendium Ferculorum” by Stanisław Cherniecki (1783) or “The Perfect Cook” by Wojciech Wiełondko (XNUMX). The then bigus would hardly have been to the taste of a modern gourmet – the meat was fairly seasoned with lemon juice, sugar and dried fruits, and the amount of hot spices was simply furious – baroque cuisine, what can I say!

Without what you can not cook bigos according to the classic recipe?

Like any other dish, bigus needs some basic set of products. In my opinion, the main thing that forms the taste of this dish:

• Cabbage. Be sure to mix fresh and pickled – otherwise nothing! Fresh, properly fried, cabbage will give sweetness, a characteristic aroma, a dark, slightly caramel color, and sauerkraut will give sourness.
• Meat component. Of course, vegetarian bigos is nonsense. There should be meat in it, and in abundance: 1 part of meat products for one and a half parts of cabbage. The best choice: pork pulp, veal, smoked meats (smoked pork ribs are ideal, chicken is a little worse), sausages: from Krakow sausage or hunting sausages to blood and even sausages or sausages. In general, it is believed that the more types of meat in bigos, the better it is. At least three meat products. My tried and tested basic set is: pork, smoked leg and black pudding.
• prunesdefinitely smoked! I will repeat the words of one Moscow chef read in the net: “no prunes – no bigos!”. In addition to prunes, other dried fruits can be added to the dish: smoked pears, dried apricots, raisins.
• Spice. The classic seasonings for bigos are, in general, the basic set of spices in the “European style”. Required: cumin. Optional: fennel, coriander, rosemary, thyme, sage, dill, bay leaf, cloves, cardamom. Of course, peppers: black, red, white, allspice. A little paprika would do the trick for a brighter color.
• Alcohol. The standard option is red wine. But it all depends on your imagination – I prefer dark beer bigos, you can use wheat beer, white wine, Madeira, even cognac! But some kind of alcohol is necessary – both for aroma, and for proper acidity, and so that the cabbage is more tender in taste.

And one more important thing you will need – time. Bigus is not a quick dish. It doesn’t rush. Get ready to spend a couple of hours cooking, and maybe more. Plus – before tasting bigos, you need to brew for another hour. This is what – in the old days, bigus was considered ready only on the third day: after cooking, it was put out for the night in frost, the next day it was heated up and stewed again, after that – again in the cold, again warming up and again cold. Of course, in our time, “throwing bigos in front of pigs” is an overkill, but it won’t hurt to brew a ready-made dish.

There are hundreds of species of bigos. In addition to the traditional (“old Polish”) recipes, there are recipes in German (with sausages), in Kielceva or Swietokrzyzh (only with sauerkraut), in Belarusian (without sauerkraut) and in Lithuanian (with soaked or pickled apples). Hunting bigos is made with game – hazel grouse, pheasants, quails, and juniper berries, robber bigos – with finely chopped lard and a small amount of meat. To all this splendor, you can count several hundred related dishes, such as Segedinsky goulash with baked cabbage and sour cream wine sauce.

Traditional Polish bigos

So, we are preparing bigos in the old Polish style, from sauerkraut and fresh cabbage with pork, chicken and black blood. In the photo below, the ingredients that I used for my bigos (meat was not included in the frame).

As already mentioned, smoked chicken is not the best option, bigos is better with pork ribs. But – what to do! – normal ribs (not boiled-smoked, but hot, even better – cold smoked) are not always on sale. It is better to choose meat that is not of the highest grade – it should contain inclusions of connective tissue, maybe even bones – so the broth will be tastier and richer, and the pieces of pork will definitely not boil during cooking.

Step 1. Preparation

Almost everything that goes into bigos is pre-fried. In order not to make the dish too greasy, it is better to use a small amount of sunflower oil for this, cabbage can generally be fried in a dry frying pan with a non-stick coating. I use a large metal cauldron for cooking. This is the most correct option, since the “all in one pan” principle is generally the most typical for Eastern European cooking.

1. Meat cut into pieces the size of a matchbox. If the pork is tough or you are using beef, you can stew it a little after frying. But usually this is not required – in an hour and a half, while the bigos is stewed, the meat will become soft anyway.
2. Add chopped smoked meats to the meat, fry over high heat. I put the chicken leg together with the bones – this way the dish becomes tastier, and in the process of cooking the bones soften so much that they can be eaten whole.
3. We cut the onion into rings or half rings, send it to the cauldron and fry until golden brown.
4. First you need to prepare both types of cabbage. Fresh – chop or cut thinly, sprinkle with salt and knead well with your hands or a rolling pin on a board. It is especially important not to skip this step if you are using coarse, tough winter cabbage. Sauerkraut needs to be squeezed and cut, leave the brine – it will still come in handy.
5. First, add fresh cabbage to the cauldron, fry until the color changes and a characteristic aroma appears, with light caramel notes. Add sauerkraut and fry again – now you need to carefully monitor so that it does not burn.
6. Add some salt, paprika, parsley. We fill our mash with beer and the brine remaining from the cabbage – the liquid should completely or almost completely cover the vegetables, if not enough – add a little water. We wait until it boils, stir, reduce the heat to a minimum, cover with a lid. That’s it, not the next hour we are completely free!

It is believed that the taste of bigos was finally formed already in the XNUMXth century, by the time of the partitions of Poland. The importance of this national dish for the Polish people cannot be overestimated. For example, the proverb “rąbać Tatarz na bigosy drobne”, “chopping the Tatars into small bigos” means someone’s militant attitude, “narobić bigosu” means “do things”. In general, “bigus” is usually called something finely chopped, and also – contemptuously – something yesterday, not the first freshness. In the film Anatomy of Love by Roman Zaluzsky, the protagonist, tasting the dish, says to the heroine of Barbara Brylskaya – “Bardzo dobry jest bigos!”, Which is translated into Russian as “You did it very tasty!”.

Step 2. Quenching

To properly prepare bigos, you should not rush. Before proceeding to the last steps, the cabbage should be completely ready – to become absolutely soft, tender in texture. This can take less than an hour, and much more – it depends on the cabbage itself, temperature and much more.

1. Finely chop prunes. You can throw a few whole berries into the cauldron for beauty.
2. We cut the blood sausage into thick circles and fry in a separate frying pan on both sides – it acquires a beautiful, almost black color.
3. We prepare spices – cumin and coriander grains and other large spices can be heated in a dry frying pan to enhance the aroma, and then chopped.
4. We send blood, prunes and spices to the boiler, mix thoroughly. Bigos is left to stew for some 10-15 minutes.
5. At this time, peel and chop the garlic. We prepare lemon and sugar – you may have to adjust the acidity of the dish.
6. That’s it, it’s time to take the first test! Add what you think the dish lacks – salt, pepper (better to use red). If there is not enough acidity, add juice from half a lemon, if it is too much, add half a tablespoon of sugar. Not enough spices? You have the last chance to enrich the taste of bigus with additional spices! We throw garlic, let the dish gurgle for another 2-3 minutes.

Almost ready bigos should be closed with a lid and allowed to stand for at least an hour. If you have enough time and patience, you can simply take it out to a cold balcony, and the very next day, warm it up and serve it to the table, it will be even tastier.

Step 3. Feeding

Our dish is a self-sufficient thing, it is not supposed to be served with bigos. Although I have seen recipes for bigus with rice – perhaps this makes sense if the food turned out to be too fatty and some kind of sorbent with a neutral taste is needed. Otherwise, a few pieces of black bread are enough – the Poles like to eat bigus with Radziwillovsky or Narochansky, but Borodinsky, Belovezhsky, preferably pure rye, are quite suitable – it has a characteristic sourness that perfectly sets off the taste of cabbage. Additionally, you can serve pickles – cucumbers, mushrooms, pickled hot peppers. Well, of course, fresh herbs – dill, parsley – sprinkle just before serving.

But with alcoholic accompaniment – there is room for the richest imagination! Bigus prepared according to the classic recipe goes well with many European vodkas – bison, Ukrainian pepper, Borodino tincture. But the best choice is, of course, Polish starka! If you want something lighter – take a dark or rye beer, always with a pronounced bitterness and a bright hop aroma.