Lingering in the gift shop of the Cather Foundation I spied a book I hadn't seen in many years. A book I most surely first saw at the Wilber Czech Festival, perhaps the greatest of all small town festivals. Even though it was inexpensive, I could never justify buying the book back then because I was in graduate school and dirt poor. On this late-April day in 2006 I was going to get the last copy in the store.
The Times ran a story a few days ago about Phyllis Pellman Good, the editor and publisher of the "Fix-It and Forget-It" series of cookbooks, the best-selling cookbooks in the country. She solicits recipes from women across the country, chooses the ones she likes, then has them tested by a number of volunteer home cooks. There's nothing much fancy about the food, just plain homestyle cooking for the most part.
"Favorite Recipes of the Nebraska Czechs" is very much in that style of cooking. First published in 1968, it is now on its tenth printing.
Read that title carefully. It doesn't say "Favorite Czech Recipes of Nebraskans" but "Favorite Recipes of Nebraska Czechs" and the book is exactly that: favorite recipes of the descendents of Nebraska's Czech settlers. There's plenty of recipes for kolache and kuba, jaternice and jelita ("if no blood oozes out, jelita is done."), saurkraut and dumplings to satisfy one's Czech food cravings. There's also midwestern cooking in all its 1960s glory: grasshopper pie, stroganoff supreme, cranberry marshmallow salad and six variations on hamburger casserole. I probably won't make any of the casseroles or vegetable dishes but many of the baked goods look mighty tempting to me.
Time to leave Nebraska and head toward the center.
no jelita for me.
Posted by: judy | 11 May 2006 at 09:56 AM
Too late, I mailed the package yesterday.
Posted by: Joe | 11 May 2006 at 06:38 PM
so how many czechs are there in nebraska?
Posted by: tien | 11 May 2006 at 07:50 PM
About 5% statewide, but they're mostly concentrated in the towns around Lincoln. Probably half of Wilber is of Czech ancestry.
Posted by: Joe | 11 May 2006 at 08:57 PM
Hey Joe,
I saw a post of yours on Gothamist about double parking at a market near you. I work with TA, and we're doing a study about double parked cars. After the last round of studies, and all the bad press the NYPD got, they started towing illegal vehicles. I'm curious what location you were referring to.
write back if you want at streets (at) transalt (dot) org
That goes for anyone else who sees a proliferation of illegally parked vehicles.
-matthew
Posted by: Matthew | 15 May 2006 at 09:45 AM