BIGOS (POLISH “HUNTER’S STEW”)
RECIPE: Bigos (Polish “Hunter’s Stew”)
This dish is best made a day ahead and refrigerated until service so that the flavors develop. It also can be prepared in a slow cooker. Also, it freezes well.
Ingredients
2 pounds sauerkraut (about 4 cups)
1 head Napa or Savoy cabbage, medium- to large-sized
Handful dried mushrooms, rehydrated in a small amount of boiling water
Vegetable oil
1 pound beef short ribs, meat removed from bones, or 3/4 pound beef chuck, cut into 1-inch (or slightly larger) chunks
3/4 pound pork shoulder, cut into 1-inch (or slightly larger) chunks
1/2 pound pork belly, unsmoked, cut into 1-inch (or slightly larger) chunks
3/4 pound smoked kielbasa sausage, thickly sliced
5 slices Canadian bacon, cut up into 1-inch pieces
1/2 pound lamb or venison loin, cut into 1-inch chunks (optional)
2 large onions, peeled and sliced
6 garlic cloves, minced
4 medium carrots, peeled and cut into 1/2-inch chunks
1 32-ounce canned diced tomatoes and their juice (or the equivalent in fresh, ripe tomatoes, peeled and chopped)
3 bay leaves
1 tablespoon dried thyme
Freshly ground black pepper
1 cup dried prunes
Dark rye or pumpernickel bread
Directions
Rinse the sauerkraut well in several changes of cool water and let drain, squeezing out excess water. Remove outer or wilting leaves from cabbage, core, and slice into shreds as if for cole slaw. Drain the rehydrated mushrooms, rinse and chop up. Strain the mushroom water of any grit and reserve.
In a commodious pot or Dutch oven, brown all the meats in batches in the vegetable oil, setting each batch aside, assuring not to crowd the pieces of meat as you brown them (you do not want them to steam themselves, but to develop nice brown, crisp crusts). Sweat the onions in the same pot (adding a smidge more oil, if necessary) just until they begin to brown, then add the garlic and carrots and sauté for a few minutes more. Add the tomatoes, scraping up anything brown along the bottom of the pot. Stir in the chopped up mushrooms, the reserved mushroom water, bay leaves, the thyme and several healthy grinds of black pepper.
The cooking of the bigos now takes up to 6 hours, at a slow and steady heat. So, decide whether to slowly cook the bigos as a stew on top of the stove, or in the oven in a large pot or casserole. In any case, you’ll need a cooking vessel large enough to accommodate all the meats, the sauerkraut, cabbage, onions and tomatoes, leaving an inch or more at the top for bubbling juices.
Assemble the bigos in layers: begin with all of the raw cabbage, then the drained sauerkraut, the meats (mixed together or not, it does not matter at this point, because you’ll stir up the bigos a few times as you cook along) and the onions and tomatoes. Cover the cooking pot and bring the bigos up to a slow simmer, either atop the stove and then placed in the oven, or merely atop the stove. Adjust the stove burner as necessary. If in the oven, the bigos cooks best for this long at 300-325 degrees. Stir up the bigos 3-4 times over a cooking period of 5-6 hours. Halfway through the cooking, taste the bigos for salt, adding if necessary (the sauerkraut, cured meats and tomatoes already may have done the job).
An hour before the bigos is done, stir in the dried prunes, and continue cooking. Some cooks assert that bigos is best cooked three or four days before serving, even being reheated and stirred up a bit each day. It’s certainly something that’s difficult to overcook. But its only truly bigos if it is cooked for a very long time, however it will be first enjoyed. And it is best served with slices of dark bread.