Polish Food Series "Sweet Things"

114. "Sweet Things" are plentiful in Poland and our favorites were the delicious cakes.

"Sharlotka" is a lovely apple cake/pie/pastry you will see in many bakeries and restaurants. We came to understand that Sharlotka is as various as the bakers who make it. Everyone has their own recipe and will prepare or serve it differently. I learned that Sharlotka is actually a Russian dessert and means "Apple Pie or Cake". Because people are transient throughout Europe, many of the foods have been adapted into the Polish diet from Russia, Ukraine, Germany and other neighboring countries. These foods have taken on a variety of names and variations of preparation.

This is Sharlotka that we had in a yummy coffee shop called "i Coffee". It was a delicious mix of an apple pie and cake. In our motel restaurant the Sharlotka was served with chocolate sauce drizzled across the cake. Another restaurant served it with cream while yet another a small scoop of ice cream.

In a bakery in Zamosc we spotted this same dessert but look how very different it is. You will spot it in the bottom right corner and the name is "Szarlotkie".

The desserts are not super sweet like some American desserts can be.

While in Zamosc, we were excited to have ice cream.
There was a little shop off the square where they sold soft serve and hard ice cream.

The texture of the ice cream was more like smooth sorbet.

And the soft serve was creamy and delicious.

In the ice cream shop I decided to choose a pastry instead with a kawa.

I chose a cherry pastry. It was not very sweet but the dough tasted delicious!

I made Sharlotka when we returned home and it was so very different from what we had in Poland...but delicious. It is a very simple recipe. If you Google "Sharlotka" you will see the varied choices of recipes and types.

Sharlotka

Recipe origin: Russia

Ingredients

• 1 cup flour
• 1 cup sugar
• 3 eggs
• 3 tart apples, such as Granny Smith

Procedure

1. Preheat oven to 350°F.
2. Combine flour, sugar, and eggs, beating well to completely dissolve the sugar.
3. Wash the apples, peel and cut them into quarters, and cut away the core and seeds.
4. Cut the apples into thin slices.
5. Grease a round cake pan and dust it lightly with flour.
6. Arrange all apple slices on the bottom of the pan.
7. Pour the batter mixture over the apples, spreading it gently with a rubber spatula.
8. Bake for 25 minutes until a toothpick, inserted into the center of the cake, comes out dry and the cake is beginning to pull away from the edges of the pan.
9. Cool 10 minutes on a wire rack. Run a knife around the edges of the pan, and place a serving plate over the pan. Invert the pan (turn the pan upside-down) onto the serving plate. May be served warm or at room temperature.

"Surely the apple is the noblest of fruits."

~ Henry David Thoreau

"If the only way we judged hunger was how full the stomach is, no one would ever have dessert."

~ Mark Friedman