Polish food

Today I ate a lot. First I went to the 9th Malopolska Festival of Flavors. It was in a little square called Plac Wolnica in Kazimierz, part of Cracow. There were lots of booths where you could sample and buy food from all over southern Poland. This is actually a contest to pick the best food in this southern part of Poland called Malopolska. I sampled some good food like krupnik soup, white cheese, something that looked like smoked string cheese (from sheep, I think), sweet roll with chocolate inside, bread with butter, black currant kompot (drink) and sour cabbage (kapusta kiszona). The food exhibits included booths with cheese, smoked meats, honey, bread, jam, eggs, pierogi and soup. The booths looked nice. Here are some pictures. 

Here is a table at the entrance showing the various foods you could find there.

Here is a cheese booth. The golden, molded cheese is called "osypki". That kind of cheese is popular down south in Zakopane. I remember trying it once. It is pretty dry. There is a thin smoked string cheese. Also a block of very white cheese.

The next picture shows a barrel meat smoker and a booth with smoked meats. "Wedliny" means smoked meats.

Next I met up with my friends Maja and Grzegorz for lunch. We ate huge "zapiekanki" at a place called Endzior in Plac Nowy in Kazimierz, Cracow. Zapiekanki is street food. It is food on a toasted baguette. I had on mine yellow cheese, mushrooms, kielbasa, fried onions and garlic sauce. It was tasty. According to Maja this is the best place in Cracow for zapiekanki. The line was quite long. We ordered at a window in the circular building in the center of Plac Nowy.

Then we went to a garden cafe in Kazimierz and ordered drinks. I had what they call "limoniada" (not quite like our lemonade. It is more sour.) This drink had mint in it.

Later we went for ice cream in Starowislna street, across the street from #70. The sign simply said "lody" (ice cream). Again we waited in line. It was really good homemade ice cream. I had chocolate with walnuts, wild blueberry and strawberry. You order and pay and get the ice cream at a counter.

That was all the food I could manage in 1 day, tasty as it all was.

I wanted to add that a few days ago I had a hot chocolate ("czekolada na goraco") with a friend at Cafe Czekolada on Bracka street. It was not at all like our hot chocolate in the US. It was very thick with no milk added. It was almost the consistency of pudding. Like melted chocolate. If you want an American hot chocolate you must order something with the word "kakaowa" (cocoa) in it.

I also recently ate a kebab (Polish street food) for 10 zloty ($3.30). It was tasty. I ordered it with chicken. Beef was an option. They added lettuce, cucumbers, onion, corn and a creamy garlic sauce. In Poland it is often served in a pita type bread (though their word  for it is "bulka" which means more like a roll than a pita).