Bigos

About This Recipe

Bigos is Poland's most celebrated dish and its most complex — a slow-cooked combination of sauerkraut, fresh cabbage, multiple meats, mushrooms, and tomatoes that improves with every reheating. Polish cooks say bigos must be cooked at least twice, but ideally three times. The dish has been central to Polish culture since the medieval period and appears in Adam Mickiewicz's epic poem Pan Tadeusz (1834), where the bigos scene is one of Polish literature's most quoted food descriptions.

Ingredients

Serves 8

• 500 gsauerkraut(rinsed and roughly chopped)
• 500 gfresh white cabbage(shredded)
• 400 gkielbasa sausage(sliced)
• 300 gpork shoulder(cubed)
• 200 gbacon lardons
• 30 gdried porcini mushrooms(soaked in 300ml water)
• 400 gcanned tomatoes
• 200 mldry red wine
• 2 mediumonions(diced)
• 4 allspice berries
• 2 wholebay leaves
• 1 tspblack pepper
• 1 tspsalt

Instructions

1. 1

   Soak mushrooms

   Soak dried mushrooms in 300ml hot water for 30 minutes. Reserve the liquid. Slice the mushrooms.

2. 2

   Brown the meats

   Fry bacon in a large pot until crispy. Add pork shoulder and brown. Remove meats.

3. 3

   Sauté onions

   In the same pot, fry onions until golden. Add sliced kielbasa.

4. 4

   Combine everything

   Add sauerkraut, fresh cabbage, tomatoes, mushrooms and their liquid (strained), red wine, allspice, bay leaves, and browned meats.

5. 5

   Slow cook

   Bring to boil, then simmer 90 minutes–2 hours. Season with salt and pepper. The flavor improves for 2–3 days.

Variations

• •

  Add game meat (venison, boar) for the traditional hunter's version

• •

  Add dried plums for sweetness

Storage

Improves for 3 days refrigerated. Freeze up to 3 months. Each reheating deepens the flavor.

Frequently Asked Questions