Best Family Favorite Czech Recipes

Owning a deep fryer means the sky is the limit to the amount of different tasty items one can fry up. The process of deep frying can be quite cumbersome given the mess and the ability to only get a few turns out of one batch of cooking oil. Eventually the used oil has to get discarded and you have to start all over again. This leads me to the worst part of the deep frying process, the cleanup. I currently use a cool daddy deep fryer by Presto. My favorite frying items include fried chicken (Paula Den recipe), buffalo wings, donuts (paczki), and occasional fried potatoes. There are many copy cat oven baked substitute recipes for these items that simply do not measure up the deep fried method. I have no reservations cooking with oil with regards to the odor, the grease, or the heat. I actually have a deep fry table in my garage set up for special frying occurrences. My hang up with deep frying is all in the cleaning. Removing the Used Oil in Deep Frying Once the oil has been pushe

Things are starting to heat up as summer draws near. Warmer temps once again mean using the oven less and opting for the stove and outdoor grill. Before it gets too hot, I need to enjoy a few more heavy Czech meals until the autumn season brings forth cooler temperatures. One dish that comes to mind is Czech Gulas also known as goulash, or gulash. Gulas is a stew meat dish that has effectively worked its way around eastern and central Europe with slight variations found across every country. I have seen Gulas on Czech and Polish menus at restaurants in the States that bear distinguishable differences. The main variances have been in the thickness of the sauce as well as the color.   Some goulash will appear more “paprika red” while others appear more brown like Stroganoff.   Goulash also can be served over a variety of side dishes whether it is egg noodles, boiled potatoes, mashed potatoes, or dumplings (knedliky). I prefer this dish over egg noodles, but will never pass up the opportu

Throughout the chaos of baking, salad preparation, or any kind of preparation with produce, it will not be surprising to realize kitchen counters can become quite messy. This unfortunate realization hits even harder when one such as myself has white laminated countertops in the kitchen. In my case, that is a dangerous combination whenever I prepare berries, gelatins, or even make the kids a pitcher of kool –aid as was the case last weekend assembling a fruit salad for my youngest son’s birthday party. Simply attacking the countertops with hot dish detergent water on a washcloth will not be enough to successfully remove the stains. There are several alternatives to restoring a white counter that has become stained from berries or any other strong dyed food. 1.        Mr. Clean Magic Eraser – This has to be one of the best things to hit households since sliced bread. After they dye has contaminated the surface, do you best to dab the moist stain with folded over paper towel, being caref

It’s a nice Saturday or Sunday late afternoon and you have grand visions of cooking up a nice thin Schnitzel, Swiss Steak, or even a stuffed Chicken breast or Kiev. All common themes here involve pounding the living daylights out of the meat. There is just one problem after you bring the meat home from the supermarket; you don’t possess a meat mallet. Uh oh, now what?? Don’t give in to despair and order a pizza just yet, there are several alternatives to tenderizing meat without a meat mallet. Here are my top five substitutions for meat mallets: 1.        Rolling Pin – This is my standby meat mallet. I often will use this to pound out chicken breasts, pork tenderloin, and round steak. Simply place the meat between two pieces of wax paper and place on the counter. Give the meat a good working over until desired thickness. Despite the use of wax paper, remember to give the rolling pin a good sterile cleaning afterwards as the wax paper eventually rips and will contaminate the pin upo

It's been a busy two days before Easter getting things done. One of the eastern european christian traditions we follow every year is the baking of the Easter lambs. I went ahead and made them yesterday and they turned out tasty as usual. My recipe for this treat can be found under my Czech recipe listings on the right side of this blog. Pound cake is an interesting dessert as the cake does not call for any rising agents such as baking powder or soda. The recipe is so simple when you consider it's name and the ingredients.."Pound standing for pound of butter, pound of sugar, pound of eggs, and pound of flour. I have never taken the time to measure each item to confirm if that is really true. I don't really eat too much pound cake throughout the year, so preparing the Easter lamb pound cakes in this metal mold really makes the holiday even more fun. This is a tradition my wife and I will hopefully have success passing along to our children. A couple of tricks to remembe

Soups and stews always seem to be a great way to take the sting out of a cold winter day. Chicken and dumplings and liver dumpling soup are some of my favorite kettle or dutch-oven prepared soups. I also have another fun soup to make that uses a different cooking method. I like to prepare beef barley soup with the ever popular crock pot. Those that have surfed this blog long enough know that when I get away from Czech recipes, I like to resort to posting a slow cooker meal or something fun on the grill. Well, low and behold……here is one more. The recipe below provides a rather generous quantity given I have family of five and I like to have enough for follow up meals. If you would like to give this one a go, simply cut the recipe ingredients in half. The choice of beef cut is also at your discretion, as I highly recommend beef short ribs if not using a chuck roast. Round steak will also work. Crock Pot Beef Barley Soup 3 lb chuck roast, trimmed of fat and cut into small stew size

Several key sweet treats come to mind with Christmas. Czech baking is about as good as it gets when it comes to Christmas dessert trays or cookie platters. Several Czech sweets seem to be close cousins of some Christmas cookies, pastries, and breads of those sampled from German, Austrian, Polish, and Hungarian cookbooks.   They are all pretty darn good and I shall list those common Czech sweets one might find at a Czech Christmas table……at least in my family. 1.        Houska – There seems to be an ongoing debate on baking and Czech message boards about the Christmas bread that consists of braided sweet dough with dried fruits and slivered almonds. Some consider this bread a Houska while others call it Vanocka.   I cannot say yea or nay to what the actual name is. There are some that refer to smaller unsweetened table bread or roll as being a Houska while stating that Vanocka is the sweetened variety. My Czech grandparents and Teta referred to the sweet dough as Houska, so that is