Tuesday, October 18, 2011

Czech style dinner (Vegan MoFo Day 18)



Czechs are big on lunch. Lunch is usually the main meal of the day. Lunch is a big family gathering and a big deal during the weekends. During the work week, most Czechs eat warm and filling lunch and for dinner they have leftovers, sandwiches or quick and easy to prepare meals. One of the most common dinners are open-faced sandwiches or boiled sausages (bun-less hotdogs) aka párky. The way we eat hotdogs might be a bit strange to most Americans. We boil them or steam them and serve them on a plate with mustard, ketchup and sometimes horseradish sauce. We serve that with fresh bread on the side. Then we simply dip the hotdogs in the condiments. Sometimes if we feel "fancy" we use silverware.......
This is a dinner that takes less than 10 minutes to prepare. I still follow this Czech tradition, but I use vegan hotdogs.

I even use my vegan hotdogs to make sausage and potato goulash aka"buřtguláš".


I usually buy Lightlife Smart Dogs because they taste good, they are easy and quick to prepare and they are relatively cheap. My heating method is a little different than suggested on the packaging, but I found the hotdogs to have the best taste and to reach the perfect temperature this way. I put a few in a medium size sauce pan with just enough water to cover them all. Then I bring it to boil, lower the heat and simmer for 3-5 minutes until the hotdogs are cooked and warm. If I don't feel like doing all this, I bring some water to a boil in an electric hot water kettle, pour that over some hotdogs and cover for 3 minutes. This method works just fine. The only thing I am not thrilled about is the softness of these hot dogs, I wish that they were a little bit firmer.


8 comments:

  1. Have you tried Field Roast's Frankfurters? They are my favourite! The seasonings reminds me of lovecak.

    We eat this kind of dinner all of the time at home too! When I was a child, my parents didn't like parky, we would make burty or klobasy. I have aquired that habbit as well, so I stick to field roast. I think you will enjoy the texture of them!

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  2. @Ruby I haven't tried those yet. Thank you for the tip! Do you boil-steam them or do you fry them-grill them? I miss lovecak a lot! I also liked uherak and sekana. My family ate klobasy and burty. We added them to pasta or potatoes caseroles a lot. And burty were popular over real fire, grilled on a stick :-) I didn't like jitrnice though......

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  3. I like to grill them, and pan-fry them. We have cooked them over a fire while camping too! When you open them, they are lightly covered in oil which prevents them from burning and makes them crispy during the cooking process. I haven't tried boiling them. But I do put them over potatoes with onions and sauerkraut...delicious!

    I didn't like jitrnice either, it was too bloody in taste for me. Uherak I miss too! Field Roast also makes a meatloaf that is VERY similar to sekana (or at least my mom's version of it, she always put in a lot of garlic)! It is in the frozen foods section in Whole Foods :)

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  4. Here's their website, I think you can buy from them online. Not sure though.
    http://www.fieldroast.com/products.htm

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  5. @Ruby June- I love their "meatloaf" but I still need to find the sausages because all I could find were the Italian and Spicy Mexican versions.

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