Kaitlyn's Babcia's Pączki

Pączki recipes, but not Babcia's pączki recipe
Babcia's recipe is a family secret; however, here are two versions of a pączki recipe that Kaitlyn says look legit.

She likes this recipe from Seasons & Suppers because it includes the measurements by weight:
Seasons & Suppers Authentic Polish Pączki Recipe

She likes this recipe from The Spruce Eats because it has booze in it, which helps:
The Spruce Eats Traditional Polish Pączki

My friend Kaitlyn
I'm currently reading a book called The Gift, and it occurs to me, early one morning, that's my friendship with Kaitlyn: a gift. Something that appears in your life unexpectedly. Something you can't really earn. And it feels a little magical, whether you're getting advice, encouragement, or just good ol' fashioned enabling.

If we're being honest, though, it's not infrequent that you receive baked goods and other treats. And the reaction to those treats is generally outrage and concern that there aren't enough people to turn to and exclaim oh my god have you tried this yet?!!?!

Kaitlyn is in our kitchen today, gifting us with her presence, some stories, and her Babcia's Pączki.

Vocab
Babcia (Bab-cha)
Grandmother, generally; Kaitlyn's grandmother specifically, except for the brief moment we reference Kaitlyn's Babcia's babcia.

Dziadziuś (jah-Joosh)
Grandfather, generally; Kaitlyn's specifically.

Pączki (Pownch-key)
Polish donuts, traditionally enjoyed on and around Fat Tuesday.

Babcia the Escape Artist
Here's the thing about Kaitlyn's Babcia: you can't box the woman in. You can try, you will most likely fail.

As a kid in Poland, when Kaitlyn's Babcia was feeling quite upset, she'd often escape her home and run down to her babcia's house. That's where Babcia first learned to bake -- hanging in the soothing of her own babcia's kitchen until it was time to head back home.

As a young girl, Babcia's mother dreamed of her becoming a teacher. At the time in Poland, which was a Communist country at this point, kids would go learn their future profession around the age of 12 or 13; according to Babcia's mom, that profession would be teaching. So, around 12 or 13, Babcia was sent off to a boarding school in a different town to become a teacher. At some point later, Babcia's mom jumped on a train to visit and found out Babcia was no longer at the boarding school for future teachers. The almost-or-barely teen-aged Babcia had different dreams and unenrolled herself from teaching school, reenrolled herself in a math school, and was secretly living with her aunt.

Finally, while there are some other amazing stories we'll skip for time, here's my favorite. In present-ish day America, Babcia is now a babcia aged person, her grandkids are adults, Dziadziuś has passed away. Babcia has a broken hip and is away from her home in in-patient rehab -- she doesn't like it one bit. Babcia hatches a plan. She waits until her daughter is out of the country on vacation and convinces a cleaning lady to sneak her out of the facility when the time is right. Babcia manages to get her hands on her house keys. And she's only foiled when Kaitlyn gets wind of the plan and shuts it down, deciding busting out of hip rehab (any rehab, really...) probably isn't the best plan for long-term health.

So that's a little bit about Babcia. Her energy is independence, it's a little chaotic, it's unapologetic, and I honestly love it.

The Origins of the Recipe
Kaitlyn's Babcia and Dziadziuś moved to the US from Poland in the 70s, when Kaitlyn's mom would have still been a little kid. It was a tough decision -- Babcia lived in a village full of her siblings and nieces and nephews. But food was hard to come by in Poland, and they had their little kid to consider, so they decided to move.

After traveling through Greece and a stay in Italy, they eventually settled down in Michigan where Dziadziuś worked at GM. Once Kaitlyn's mom left for college, Babcia picked up a part-time job at a Dom Polski^[1] helping people secure visa and get packages & mail between the US and Poland.

Every year, around Fat Tuesday, Dom Polski would throw a huge party and there would be pączki. Massive quantities of pączki. One handwritten, half-in-Polish recipe Kaitlyn showed me started off with 5 lbs of flour.^[2]

It was while working at Dom Polski that Babcia began making pączki every year, and she just never stopped. She decreased the amount she made, but she made them without fail. Every year, friends and family around the country knew to expect a box from Babcia, full of pączki.

Kaitlyn knows two distinct things about receiving those packages: 1) the distinct scent that wafts out while opening the box, and 2) there will always be too many pączki... certainly more than people should actually eat in short order. Thankfully, they freeze well.

So that's how it generally went for a while -- Babcia and Dziadziuś in Michigan, grandkid Kaitlyn and Family setting down in Illinois. Once Dziadziuś retired at GM, he and Babcia moved to Illinois to be closer to their family. And once Kaitlyn came to Minnesota for school, she ended up sticking around. But always, every year, there were pączki as far as the Fat Tuesday could see.

Kaitlyn gets a recipe
In early 2020,^[3] Kaitlyn's Dziadziuś became very ill and Babcia was too busy caring for him to make her annual batch of pączki to send around the country.

Kaitlyn, a wonderful baker in her own right, offered to step in and help. Babcia, normally very protective of her recipes, offered the family secret to Kaitlyn.

Kaitlyn set about baking pączki that year, and it was a mitigated disaster.

The dough was too sticky to handle, the dough wouldn't cut into the proper shape, she didn't have the correct filling.

After three separate calls to Babcia to save the pączki, Kaitlyn ended up giving up and attempted to bake the dough into something else. The dough spilled over the sides of the baking dish and caught fire in the oven. (But the fire was contained, hence, luckily, a mitigated disaster.)

Kaitlyn gets the real recipe
A couple of years go by with Babcia returning to her pączki sending ways. Craving a chance at redemption, Kaitlyn decides to give things another shot. She wants to master the recipe, this time with the help of the expert, herself. She takes some time around Fat Tuesday and drives to Illinois to hang out with Babcia, so they can make pączki together.

That trip was when Kaitlyn realized the real reason her pączki making was a mitigated disaster: Kaitlyn didn't have the real recipe.

Babcia was very unaccustomed to sharing her recipes. And learning how to bake as she did -- in her own babcia's house in a village in Poland -- the recipe, the real recipe, didn't live on paper. Frankly, it didn't even live in her conscious mind. The real recipe was all muscle memory.

As they baked together, Kaitlyn scribbled out sticky notes and affixed them to the printed recipe she had. The number of eggs in the recipe? Off. Amounts of liquid in the recipe? Wrong. Types of liquid in the recipe?? More than indicated. Special dough handling methods? Not mentioned at all.

Certainly Babcia's decades of practice makes a difference in how well her pączki turn out... having the correct recipe really helps, though. ¯\(ツ)/¯

Kaitlyn feels grateful
As Kaitlyn and I flip through a recipe book that holds, among other things, the heavily post-it noted pączki recipe, we also see pictures of a young Kaitlyn standing next to her Babcia, who's wearing a Mickey Mouse sweatshirt. Soon after we see pictures of an adult Kaitlyn standing next to her Babcia, who happens to be wearing the exact same Mickey Mouse sweatshirt, still looking crisp after all these years. (This fact is apropos of nothing; I have no meaningful metaphors... I just think it's adorable and worth mentioning.)

Kaitlyn feels lucky to have a strong bond with her family and culture through Polish food. When I ask, she says the food is very much a part of her. It's gotten into her bones, and her sweet Babcia is a huge reason for that.

She notes that most people in America never have an opportunity to make recipes with the family members who made the same recipes back in their home country, and she's grateful she gets to experience it.