We’re recruiting for the Emperor’s Crumbs Army on facebook. Don’t worry, this isn’t the draft; it’s a place to exchange recipes, photos, suggestions and more. We’re even offering an incentive! Anyone who becomes a member of the group Emperors Crumbs Army will be entered to win a selection of  classic Czecho-Slovak treats.

The winner will enjoy crisp wafers with various fillings, the weird and wonderful “soy stick”, unforgettable “Romanca”, indulgent chocolate “Fidorka” and more. You can bet we’ll be stocking up on these delicacies ourselves when we pack our bags for the big move to the US next month. So raise your butter-knife high and join up! The winner will be selected on March 12th, 2010.

The second competition is a bit more involved but it is worth every effort. Try one of our recipes and make a photo or a video. Post it on any photo/video hosting site like flickr, smugmug, YouTube, or vimeo, add the tag emperorscrumbs.com, and in the description of the photo put a link to the recipe. You can enter as many photos/videos as you want, just link to your creations in a comment here so we know where to find them.  We will pick the best submission by March 19th. Along with the amazing and nutritious prize of a fabulous assortment of the best candies and wafers from Slovakia and Hungary, you and your artwork will enter history when we publish it here for everyone to admire!

It’s Carnival season around these parts – before Lent the shops are decorated, kids’ costumes are on the racks, and doughnuts – sišky, fánk, or vdolky, depending on where you are – seem to be frying up everywhere you turn. [Read more →]

Today we have a classic from Czech pubs. Utopenci is a jar of pickled hot dogs, onions and spices. It is a necessary addition to all czech pubs, usually to be found near the tap.

The name Utopenci has deep roots in the Czech soul and humor. Utopenci were invented 100 years ago by Mr.  Šamánek who owned a mill and a pub in Beroun. The pickled hot-dogs were very popular and his pub was famous throughout the country. As life has its irony, he drowned on day while fixing his mill’s wheel. Czechs love black humor and they named this classic Utopenci – Drowned men.

I decided to post this video, because it reflects the era of socialist pub culture, which spans the late 50’s until mid 90’s of the past century. This is the period when the pub was the gathering place of ordinary Czech men, and a very important institution where the men had to fight for social positions and made their most important life decisions. At 3:30 pm the men came home after a hard day’s work, and after a well-deserved lunch they would set off to the pub. They had to rush, because the pubs were open only until 9  pm. As soon as the last round was called (usually known by the fact that the smoke in the air could be cut by a dull knife)  they had a hard “orientational” walk home where they would be shouted at and beaten by pasta-roller wielding Czech women – the wives.  This song reflects the hardship of the Czech men. In this video you could see the hard fight for social acceptance, and of course the original beer tap which was in use in all pubs in Czechoslovakia for almost 50 years. As a sign of the sour future to come, the main character helps himself to utopenci. During this presentation you will be able to see how the air thickens as a sign that time is running out and slowly they have to start the journey home.

Print recipe

Utopenci – Drowned Men

There are plenty of variations for utopenci. Originally, utopenci were not spciy so you can leave out the chili. The very basic recipe is the first 10 ingredients. After that you can use your imigination – some people add mustard or mustard seeds, horse radish, pickled cucumbers, Worcester sauce, olives etc. I have added tomatoes because Katy likes pickled tomatoes so why not?

Ingredients

• 2.5 cups water
• 1.5 cups 8% white vinegar
• 10 whole pepper corns
• 4pc allspice
• 1 bay leaf
• 2 pounds of thick hot-dogs
• 1 tsp salt
• 1/2 tsp sugar
• 5 cloves garlic
• 4-5 big onions
• 2 chilies
• 10 cherry tomatoes
• 2 cups of sauerkraut

Method

• Mix the water, vinegar, salt, sugar and the spices and bring them to boil. Boil them for 2 minutes and then let the liquid cool.
• Peel the hot-dogs, chop the onions into circles. Peel the tomatoes. The trick with tomatoes is to put them into boiling water for 20 sec. After that it is very easy to pop them out of their skin.
• Prepare a 4.2 pint (2liter) jar. Start to layer onions, garlic, hot-dogs, sauerkraut, chilies. You can do few layers. On the top I have put the tomatoes.
• Once the vinegary liquid is lukewarm, pour it into the jar. Shake the jar in order to get rid of bubbles. Do not leave out the spices and put them into the jar. Seal the jar and put it into a cool place or fridge for 2 weeks. If you are going crazy you can eat them in one week, but two weeks is the etiquette. In the fridge they will take longer to mature.
• Serve with rustic bread and plenty of pilsner. Do not forget to invite me over.

The most important thing is drink responsibly ( I know, you think blablablabla). But really, this is the best tip. As you get older, hangovers get worse, so you will learn to drink responsible eventually. But what to do if you accidentally drink more than you planned? [Read more →]

It is time to drink yourself to death in order to celebrate the new year. At least that’s what we do in central Europe. Along with huge amounts of alcohol we also serve plenty of food and we blow ourselves up with firecrackers and fireworks.  We have a  saying: “as it is on New Year’s Day, so it will be all year”. Maybe that is why Hungary has one of the highest suicide rates and Slovaks and Czechs are heavy drinkers. [Read more →]