my nunna’s
HUNGARIAN PALASCINTA
T
o start off, I come from a very Hungarian rich culture. My Poppop and Nunna were both born in Hungary and they both left at a very young age. When my Poppop was still alive, him and my Nunna would cook a lot of different Hungarian foods that they had in their childhood. They wanted to pass it on to all of my family including palacsinta. My father, who is 100% Hungarian, would tell me how when he grew up, his father (my Poppop) would cook a bunch of Hungarian foods. When he would talk about them it would just make my mouth water. When my Poppop passed away several years ago, my Nunna vowed to always make the foods that they made together as a tribute to him. My Nunna means the world to my family and me because of all the things that she does to help out around the house. She would always help with my younger brother Mikey, by folding laundry, and helping out with the cleaning. She is very old school and is someone that will always put other people before herself, especially at Sunday dinners at her house. She will make sure everyone is fed and full, and then will eat after us by herself. Sunday dinners are something that we had at my Nunna and Poppop’s house when he was alive, and we will still try and continue that tradition now, even when he is no longer with us.
My Nunna’s palacsinta is something that she makes about twice a year, but she never tells me when she will make it. It is like two random surprises throughout the year, that I definitely love looking forward too. Palacsinta is like a very thin pancake, it is made like a crêpe and you can stuff it with jelly, eggs, berries, or whatever you prefer. You can even eat it by itself if you wanted to. You can have this meal at any time of the day, considering what you would put in it. What makes this meal so special to me is that while my Nunna is making it, she will talk to me about her childhood of living in Hungary. I love hearing about it every time because of how interesting and different it was back in the 1930s and I like hearing about how she raised my dad and his three brothers and sisters. She always tells me different stories every time she makes it. My Nunna would tell me how she remembers being a little girl and being able to hear gunshots throughout the village that she lived in, which was the beginning of World War II. She also tells me how she would hear bombs going off, blowing up some of the houses that Jewish people lived in. She managed to escape Hungary during the beginning of the war and was put on a boat by herself going to Ellis Island, where she was going to meet her aunt and grandmother, whom she never met before. She went
to school in New York City and hated every moment of it because she was a foreigner who didn’t speak English and already saw blood shed. She would also talk about how she would go up to Connecticut with her family where she would work on a farm all summer long. After she would tell me this she would ask, “Now, how would you like to work on a farm all summer long?” Every time I would just laugh and say, “No, thank you!” She told me that one day she would want to go back to her village in Hungary and document everything that she lived through. She always wanted us to try and visit her birth country, but never got a chance. I got the opportunity to go with my Nunna, my mother, and my cousin to visit Budapest, Hungary, which is her favorite city in Hungary. She loved being able to show us all the history and different foods around Hungary. We got to see a cave bunker from World War I, which was used as a hospital for wounded soldiers. To add, I was able to meet many different Toths (being my last name), which is the equivalent to Smith in the U.S. This was really awesome to me because I do not know many Toths, so being able to meet so many was pretty amazing. We also got to eat at her cousin’s restaurant, which is an authentic Hungarian restaurant. It was out of this world being able to eat the Hungarian foods that my Nunna cooked for me in Hungary. It was truly one of the greatest moments of my life being able to say that I got to go to Hungary, which I had heard
so much about from my Poppop; I really wished he were there with us. When my Nunna is done cooking the palacsinta, my father and mother come home and we all sit down as a family and dine on the palacsinta together. We like filling up our palacsinta with different jellies, eggs, and meats. We always talk about life and how our day had been. My family has this tradition that we like to play while we eat and it is called “Highs and Lows.” We say our ‘high’ of the day and then we say our ‘low’ of the day. The game is so funny because of my little six year old brother. He is a huge football fan and he always loves watching the games with my father and me. My brother liked to look up scores for each game so that he could talk to us about them. He would say that his ‘low’ of the day was that the professional football team called, the Seattle Seahawks, lost their game (which is his favorite team). After he would say that everyone would just laugh and laugh. It was so funny that a six year old would say this for his ‘low’ of the day instead of something like his crayon broke while he was drawing. It would make us laugh so hard that our sides started to hurt.
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{ palacsinta
INGREDIENTS 2 cups flour 3 cups milk 5 whole eggs
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{apple filling
INGREDIENTS ½ cup sugar 1 teaspoon salt 1 teaspoon vanilla
01 In a medium bowl beat eggs and sugar until
frothy, add salt and 1½ cups milk. 02 Beat in flour slowly until smooth, add remaining milk. Batter should be very thin, with little to no chunks. 03 Butter griddle over medium to low heat, pour ¼ cup of batter in griddle and swish around until the entire bottom of pan is covered. 04 When top of the batter bubbles, turn over and cook for a few seconds longer. Remove and keep warm. After each, always butter the griddle well. Serve with favorite filling or apple filling.
8 large apples ¾ cup sugar ¾ stick of butter
01 Wash and pare all apples. Core, halve, and thinly slice them. 02 Melt butter in a heavy skillet, add sliced apples and cover with sugar. 03 Cover skillet and steam for about 30 minutes, turning apples occasionally until soft. 04 Keep warm until ready to use. Makes enough filling for 8 or 10 inch palacsintas.