There is a city in Poland that has gained fame and fame thanks to gingerbread – this city is Thorn (Toruń). It is there that the most delicious and beautiful gingerbreads have been made for a long time, which are the pride of this city to this day.
It is not known who and when mixed the rye flour with honey and spices. Maybe it happened by accident, or maybe, as the legend says, it was helped by a bee.
It is known, however, that in Thorn, there were many masters who baked these delicacies in ancient times. The story goes that among them there was one whose pastries were unmatched, they were considered the tastiest and most interesting, because they could be found in various forms. The baker, on the other hand, a very modest and good man, enjoyed respect and great recognition from the townspeople of Thorn.
One day the baker got sick. He was unable to work, and his house was running out of money. So when poverty began to threaten them, he asked his daughter Katarzyna for help. It was his only daughter whom he loved more than life, and she had great love for her father. So she did not refuse him when he asked her to start baking gingerbread herself. Katarzyna often accompanied her father while making gingerbread, so this work did not cause her any major problems. All the activities that her father did while preparing the dough and baking itself were familiar to her. So she went straight to work.
When the dough was ready, she lit a fire in a special oven. When she wanted to start shaping the dough, it turned out that there were no wooden gingerbread forms anywhere, which her father had carved himself. She looked for them everywhere, looked in every nook and cranny, but she couldn’t find them. It was impossible for her to make new molds herself. Wood carving is a difficult job, especially for a little girl. So Katarzyna came up with a great idea after a while. She took a tin cup and placed it on the dough and pressed round medallions out of it. She put them in the oven, having previously arranged six of them next to each other. After a short time the smell of gingerbread wafted through the room.
The time has come to get the gingerbread cookies out of the oven. When she put them on the table, she was terrified. The gingerbreads clump together to form a strange shape. She was afraid that nobody would buy such cookies. It turned out, however, that her pastries were tastier even than those baked by the old master. The shape appealed to people who bought all the gingerbread cookies.
People wondered what is the recipe for such delicious taste of these cookies. An old Thorn vendor said that the secret to the delicious taste of Katarzyna’s baked goods was to add to the basic ingredients her heart and the love she had for her sick father. These gingerbreads taste just as delicious to this day, and their name “Katarzyna” comes from that Katarzyna and her legend.
Very good post