Three elements of one dinner

The Silesian Sunday dinner, in dialect łobiod, consists according to Culture.pl of three elements: braised beef roulade, Silesian dumplings and red cabbage. Silesians are often credited with precisely this set as a regional dish, and the first course is usually nudelzupa, that is, chicken broth with noodles. The cuisine of Upper Silesia has drawn for centuries on Polish, Czech, Austrian and German influences, so many of its dishes have close counterparts among the neighbours.

The individual parts of this set have their own history and their own disputes over names. It is worth taking them apart one by one.

Roulade: the counterpart of zrazy

According to Culture.pl, rolada is the Silesian version of a dish that is called zrazy in the rest of Poland. The text links its beginnings to the tables of the Polish-Lithuanian nobility and recalls that recipes for zrazy were written down in the 18th century by Paul Tremo, cook at the court of Stanisław August Poniatowski. A traditional Silesian roulade is beef rolled around a filling of mustard, bacon, onion and pickled cucumber. The meat should be well tenderised, and the roulades are first fried, then braised in a deep pot, and a sauce is made from the juices in the pan.

Research cited in the same text indicates that roulade was known in Silesia as early as the interwar period. Beef was expensive then, so it was prepared for the biggest celebrations, especially weddings. Ethnographic research from the 1960s in the village of Dąbrówka Wielka recorded that as much as 300 kilograms of beef could go on two days of a wedding, for minced-meat cutlets or roulades. In time, with the growing prosperity linked to mining, roulade also reached christenings, communions and festive dinners. After the Second World War, together with noodle broth, it became according to Culture.pl an iconic Sunday dinner, and in many homes it remains almost obligatory when guests come.

Silesian dumplings: the dimple and two colours

Silesian dumplings are dumplings made of boiled potatoes and potato starch in a volume ratio of 4:1 or 3:1, shaped into strongly flattened balls with a dimple and cooked in salted boiling water. When ready they are usually about 4-5 centimetres wide and 2.5 centimetres high. The dimple, made with a finger, has two functions: it holds the sauce and helps the dumpling cook evenly. Because the flour here is potato starch, the dish is gluten-free, as Culture.pl notes.

There are many names: white dumplings, biołe, guminowe, gumione, kartofelmelklezy and gumiklyjzy. Silesian dumplings appear on the list of traditional products of the Silesian Voivodeship and, separately, of Opole Voivodeship. In Upper Silesia there are also black dumplings, also called iron, grey or grated dumplings, made from raw grated potatoes. The dark colour is obtained by leaving the grated potatoes for several hours, or the shaped dumplings for even a whole day. The white and the black are served at dinner on separate platters.

Legends about dumplings

Several tales circulate around the dumplings. According to one, written down by Culture.pl, a peasant called Konrad from the village of Zielony Dąb, now part of Wrocław, lost his late wife, who made the best dumplings in the village. She appeared to him in a dream and promised a cauldron that would fill itself, if he always left one dumpling at the bottom. The last dumpling was supposed to turn into stone on the gate of the Church of St Giles, called the Dumpling Gate. Another tale dates the dumplings to 1241 and links them to Racibórz: women were said to have thrown them like ammunition at the Mongols besieging the town. These are legends, not historical facts.

Red cabbage

The third component is modro kapusta. In Upper Silesia this is both the dialect name for red cabbage and for the dish made from it: shredded cabbage is cooked with fried bacon, vinegar, pepper and onion, raw or softened, are added, and it is lightly sweetened. Traditionally it is eaten with roulade and dumplings. The dish was entered in 2007 on the list of traditional products of Opole Voivodeship.

Red cabbage links Silesian cuisine with that of Greater Poland, where red cabbage with apples, onion and raisins accompanies duck and pampuchy, and with Czech cuisine. Culture.pl regards it as a Central European classic. That is why a dinner that is considered so Silesian consists of elements that have relatives across the whole region.