Wikipedia defines a “kolache” as a “a type of pastry that holds a dollop of fruit rimmed by a fluffy pillow of supple dough.” Well said, but the real thing is so much better than the definition.
My wife’s great grandparents arrived in Central Texas from the Czech Republic around 1890. They came seeking new farmlands and they arrived with old recipes. In the small Czech village of Verovice in the province of Moravia, they had baked kolaches as a special treat for weddings. In the new country, the times were hard and the work long. They needed a treat to brighten the days and encourage their labors between weddings. So, on the weekends, the families would bake kolaches on Saturday and share them with relatives and friends on Sunday. They’d sit together, kolaches in hand, smile, laugh and remember the old with the new. Like any good memory, the kolache caught on, became a part of the expanding communities, was tasted and accepted enthusiastically by the neighbors, and earned a special place in the hearts and on the tables of the citizens of the growing State of Texas.
Except . . . she took the recipe with her!
When my wife’s mother died in September, she left without having written down the family kolache recipe. The seven daughters and four sons were in a dismay. Something must be done. It is generally recognized that one cannot go long in the State of Texas without the bite of a good kolache. Something had to be done and done quickly.
A couple of Saturdays ago, the First Annual Kolache Recipe Recreation and General Family Bakeoff was commenced at an early hour in the Building next to the House at the old family farm.
The newly devised secret recipes were written down and arranged next to the ingredients being mixed.
Uncle Joe and Brother Charles had purchased a new commercial oven and a heavy duty restaurant mixer to assist the efforts of the family throngs rushing into the Building to help and observe.
The first batch was concocted and carefully placed in the electronic mixer.
Removed, the precious dough was hand-kneaded under the close supervision of seasoned veterans.
To rise, the rounded globules rested in assorted pans between the heat of the oven and the warmth of the stove to allow the dough to double and triple in size.
Fillings were patiently prepared from the peaches of Grandma’s old tree next to the house and the ground poppy seeds you see here from the home-grown poppies she had hand harvested herself – all with plenty of butter to go in, on and over everything (butter is the great comfort and sure secret of the friendly family kolache).
The risen dough is pinched into balls that are flattened. Fingers push a depression into the middle of each. Fillings are spooned into the shallow cavities, and the pastry sheets of prepared kolaches are lined on the tables to await their turn . . .
. . . to slide into the oven for the bake and watch and wait.
Extracted burning hot with just a touch of brown, more butter is sladled onto the tops and around the sides to relax the the fruit fillings and glisten the rims of the pillowed dough.
Transferred to cool on paper towels, the tables are massed with baked kolaches by the 100’s!!!! On that one day, the army of relatives baked some 600 kolaches, around 50 dozens with all manners of fillings, toppings, stuffings and cinnamon swirls.
In the midst of that plenty, the great joy is not the many, but the single warm beautiful kolache in hand waiting for the first welcome bite home.
Yes, the consensus was, every kolache from every kolache recipe was the best ever and must be made, tried and eaten again the coming year at the Second Annual Kolache Recipe Recreation and General Family Bakeoff.
Thank you, Mom, Grandma, Great Grandmother — you are the best.
We couldn’t have done it without you.
See you all, next year,
Grandpa Jim