Growing up Polish in the UK
An aspect I want my blogs, recipes and social media posts to capture is the diversity of food and the different stories forged from different backgrounds. In my case, I’m Polish. I was born in Poland and my family moved to the UK when I was 5 years old. When I was young, my older sister and I would often go back to our Grandparents back in Poland for summer holidays.
I have many memories from Poland. Going to church with my Grandma and watching her go up to the altar and get the sacramental bread, walking in the evenings to the nearby store with my Uncle and getting Kabanos, or the time I had an entire medium pizza all to myself after my family and I visited the swimming pools. To me, certain foods, rituals and memories are very personal and meaningful.
After the move to the UK, my household maintained our Polish traditional meals. Poland back then was very traditional, and there were few ways other cultures impacted us. Going to school in the UK, where my class was very diverse, I had much more exposure to other cultures and meals. School lunches, the foods available in shops and my friends from various backgrounds all allowed me to learn and experience a wider world of food. There are so many fascinating differences between England and Poland regarding food. For example, the lead-up to and the Christmas dinner.
Traditionally in Poland, we would celebrate St Nicholas Day (6th December) where small gifts would be exchanged, provided by St Nicholas. I do not have too many memories of this, but I know we observed it. Gearing up to Christmas day, which is the 24th in Poland, we clean the house, decorate and prepare our meals. Christmas dinner is a little different in every home, so I will speak on my family’s traditions. At Christmas dinner (which we call Wigilia) we would often break bread with those with us before sitting down to eat, telling them what we wish for them in the coming year. We eat Carp, a type of fish as our main protein because during advent you’re not supposed to eat meat. Although my family does not really observe many of the rules of advent, we still maintain the meat-free rule on Christmas Day. One year when I was young, my parents and I went to the local market in Poland and picked out our live fish. We kept them in our bathtub, swimming around and I had lots of fun playing with them. Almost everything on the dinner table at Christmas is made from scratch. The pierogi, krokiety, salad and cakes are all homemade.
Now as an adult, I continue to embrace my Polish and English sides. Over the past two years, my English boyfriend and I would observe Polish Christmas dinner with my parents on the 24th and then the English Christmas dinner at his family’s home on the 25th. I still make homemade traditional meals, and there’s nothing better and home-y than the smell of freshly fried onions on steaming hot cheese and potato-filled pierogi.
I hope you enjoyed this post and it urges you to learn from and embrace other cultures and their traditions.