Pictures courtesy of Gieno Mientkiewicz
At a time when the food scene in Poland has been severely hit by COVID-19, a group of food professionals is trying to draw attention to a humble but symbolically important product: a cheese called twaróg, straddling tradition and innovation, artisanal production and industrial manufacture.
Outside of Poland, not many are familiar with twaróg, a white fresh cheese that plays an important role in domestic, everyday Polish cuisine. It is so common and widespread that most Poles would not pay too much attention to it, although they are likely to consume it routinely for breakfast, on sandwiches, and as an ingredient in many dishes. Polish food experts Gieno Mientkiewicz e Zbigniew Kmieć (the former a spokesman and advocate for Polish cheeses, the latter a sommelier and culinary consultant), have decided that it is time that this humble product gets the attention in their opinion it deserves and launched the initiative to proclaim June 2nd as Twaróg Day.
Twaróg, as Mr. Mientkiewicz explained to me, is made by heating milk acidified with lactic acid bacteria, which change its taste to sour. The curd is then cut and fermented, affecting the structure of proteins, fats, and sugars. The traditional process is undergoing some changes, especially due to the growing use of rennet, which makes the milk coagulation faster and leaves less protein in the whey. However, according to Mr. Mientkiewicz, the rennet-based version loses some of its health properties and shows different culinary characteristics. Twaróg is traditionally used to make pierogi, pancakes, cheesecake (sernik), pies, breakfast spreads, and gzik (twaróg paste served with warm potatoes), among the many regional variations. Twaróg can be further processed through drying, smoking, salting, and aging.
The Twaróg Day declaration was signed by many Polish food experts, ranging from chefs to entrepreneurs, critics, writers, and media personalities (full disclosure: I was also invited to sign the document, and I did). The effort is an interesting case of heritage making that is apparently developing outside the concept of food heritage as it usually presents itself, particularly within the framework of the UNESCO intangible cultural heritage. As a matter of fact, while tradition does appear, the word “heritage” in not even mentioned in the declaration, which I translate here in its entirety.
Proclamation of the establishment of the Twaróg Day.
We, the undersigned, understanding the symbolic role of twaróg in traditional, contemporary and future Polish cuisine, constitute June 2 as Twaróg Day.
We call on chefs, gourmets, cosmopolitans and patriots to study and meditate on a cheese that, without ceasing to be an everyday necessity, can rise to the heights of celebration and poetry.
On this day, we would like all of Poland and tourists and neighbors who esteem its cuisine to admire and consume twaróg in in its various forms and shapes with devotion and reverence.
We want curds to leave the shadows of mediocrity and frequent anonymity, to proudly bear the names of their creators, the places they came from, the time they were produced, the techniques of manufacturing and processing.
We want the Day of Twaróg, a symbol of the freshness of Polish culinary thought and purity of Polish nature, to contribute to the creation of canons for its production, consumption and assessment of its quality.
On this day, we want to reward people who, either producing or cooking with this cheese, writing or talking about it, increase its fame and pleasure for those who sit at a table where there will always be a place for it.
We establish June 2, St. Eugene, as Twaróg Day.
The noble patron of this day is an advocate of love, peace and devotion to the family. He will be the perfect guardian of this day.
There are many elements that are worth reflecting on as part of broader conversations and reflections about food heritage and heritage making. First of all, the promoters of the initiative are aware that what they are doing is meant to connect the past and the present of Polish cuisine to its future. It is not just about rediscovering or revaluating something from the old days: the goal is to assert a different way of thinking about food as a relevant component of Polish culture in the future (hence the remark about celebration and poetry). The mention of twaróg’s symbolic weight reminds us of this wider project, including the exploration and the rediscovery of the “purity of Polish nature,” which nevertheless could be read as a place outside time that maintains the essence of Polishness.
This new culinary culture that the declaration advocates is patriotic, aiming to put the Polish culinary traditions under the best light possible, but it also expects recognition abroad, from “cosmopolitans” and “tourists.” The sense that Polish cuisine has been undervalued and it is ready to shine is palpable. The choice of twaróg is particularly interesting because such product is not uniquely Polish, but can be found all over Central and Eastern Europe under names that range from tvaroh (Czeck Republic and Slovakia) to kvark (Russia Ukraine, Bulgaria, Sweden), which explains why sometimes it is known by the English name quark. This commonality suggests the need to avoid nationalism and exclusionary practices, which does not mean refusing patriotism and pride in one’s cultural identity.
The initiative is not predicated on historical recipes, grand dishes, or expensive ingredients, but on something that could be (erroneously) perceived as plain and bland, and that in some rural households is still produced domestically for family use. The declaration expresses the desire to find a common denominator for all those who enjoy twaróg, a “pleasure for those who sit at a table where there will always be a place for it.” However, the promoters wish that twaróg acquires some of the trappings that give value to other cheeses, such as the indication of the name of the producers and the place of origin. Particular relevance is also given to the methods of production. As a matter of fact, the declaration invokes the establishment of canons, a word that has recently acquired a certain weight in the Polish culinary landscape.
In fact, partly to mark the 100-year anniversary of national independence (which was celebrated in November 2019), and partly to promote products from Poland, the Ministry of Agriculture has started working toward the compilation of the Canon of Polish cuisine. After a few informal conversations with experts (I was invited too), a first list of recipes was officially launched on August 29th, 2019, at the Museum of King Jan III’s Palace in Wilanów, Warsaw. The goal of the Canon, as stated in the Ministry’s website, is to answer the question: “What is Polish cuisine?” The Ministry has now opened a round of consultations in order to further develop the idea. The reactions to the launch were quite positive among food professionals, who were overall excited about the fact that the government is finally taking food seriously, and not only in terms of yields, rural development, and economic output. However, it is noticeable that the initiative was launched by the Ministry of Agriculture and Rural Development, rather than the Ministry of Culture.
In general, references to a canon aim to capture and stabilize something essential and unchanging about a phenomenon, a set of works and rules defined by authoritative experts, possibly over generations. Think about the canon of Western Art or the canon of French Literature… The notion of canon also tends to exclude dissenting voices, introducing issues of hegemony and power in the choice of the elements that are included. Flexibility and inclusiveness do not seem to be high among the priorities behind the establishment of canons.
However, Mr. Mientkiewicz asserts that by canon the promoters mean a set of principles guiding the production of twaróg in order to improve its quality in terms of provenance of ingredients and techniques. In fact, they want to highlight the creative approaches of a new generation of chefs and producers, all while underlying twaróg’s history and cultural value. In other words, the traditional elements (fermentation, acidity, structure) are not there to be treated like museums pieces, frozen in time, but they are rather flexible instruments in the hands of new tastemakers, part of a broader project of elevation and diffusion of Polish cuisine. Old flavors can be translated into new ones that better align with a future in which Polish food will be able to hold its own among other visible (and respected) culinary traditions.
Here may lie the reason for the limited relevance of the concept of heritage in the contemporary renewal of Polish cuisine. Tradition and history have value, as long as they respond to current needs and trends, with an eye towards what’s coming next. Furthermore, the idea of heritage has been appropriated by the current government, which for instance changed the name of the Ministry of Culture into the Ministry of Culture and Heritage, as part of a vision of Poland that may be too conservative and nationalist for many among the new tastemakers, who are rather determined to remain open to the world.