Hi, I'm Chris Fenimore.

Those of you who have been watching these shows probably remember that I'm a transplant to Pittsburgh from Brooklyn, New York.

I came here in 1985 to work for WQED, and I knew within a few weeks that I could never go back.

What I realized was that one of the most appealing characteristics of this city is its sense of tradition, whether that's in sports, the work ethic, cultural, religious or culinary.

This is a city with a history and heritage that is always happy to celebrate.

Now just say the words “City Chicken” and every single person will regale you with a different story.

Lots of those stories have to do with picnics at Kennywood or family reunions or church picnics.

I had never heard of the dish until I moved here.

Now I have stories of my own.

So many of our family favorite recipes are mainstays at family gatherings, you know?

With Aunt Mabel always brings this, and Uncle George always makes that.

Well, our next guest, Chris Bobick, has a recipe that falls right into that category.

Your family used to get together every summer, right?

At the local amusement park, everybody's favorite place to go in the summer.

Yeah.

And, wed get together a big picnic, and they'd make hot dogs and hamburgers and, you know, the usual picnic food.

But my Chu-Cha Julia every year always made City Chicken sticks.

Back it up.

What do you call her?

Chu-Cha.

Chu-Cha?

What is that?

It's Polish.

Polish for?

Aunt.

Aunt.

Chu-cha.

Chu-cha.

Julia would always make city chicken sticks for us.

For the, for the picnic at Kennywood.

Okay, so this.

This picnic was not complete without Chu-Cha Julias City chicken.

Right?

Okay, now we know where the recipe came from.

Tell us what ingredients we need.

Well, we have, veal and pork cut into cubes.

Now, in the book, in the in the recipe that I sent in, it says that you should cook it for, like, one and a quarter to 1.5 hours.

And I got to tell you, if it's extremely lean, like this is, it's going to be dried out.

Yeah.

Only go, like, 45 minutes.

Especially when you say cook it.

How how are we cooking it for 45 minutes.

Well, first it's going to be breaded and browned in the skillet.

Oh I see, you mean at the end.

Don't cook it for as long as it says.

Because its going to be baked.

Right?

Right.

It's going to be baked.

Don't pre cook it.

No.

Don't bake it for as long as it says.

If you're using very very lean meat which this is very lean.

Okay.

Anyway this is the, the sticks.

Usually I would soak these in water, as you would for, like, using them on a grill.

And the only reason for doing that, they're not going to burn, but, they prevent splintering.

I didn't know that all these years, when you you.

You soak these in water?

Yeah.

Yeah.

Might have never burned or anything, so I didn't think they had to be wet.

But you're right.

They do splinter.

They won't splinter if you soak.

This whole day's been worthwhile for me.

And, this is my little, spice mixture.

It's simply, garlic powder, onion powder, black pepper, a little bit of salt and, Hungarian paprika.

Mostly even parts.

Yeah, with just a little less salt.

Right.

For health reasons or just because it's the salt overpowers it.

I just don't like a lot of salt.

Okay, but I do.

Oh, well, that's why we have.

This.

Okay, okay.

And don't get me yet.

You watch, we have, a sweet onion.

This happens to be a Mayan onion.

And, you cut it into, you try to peel off gently peel off.

It'll come off in layers like that.

And then you just cut it into, little sort of pieces, about an inch or so.

Okay.

And, and then, we'll have an egg.

This is mixed with a little bit of canola oil.

We'll beat that up.

Want to beat?

I can beat.

Okay.

This is Italian seasoned breadcrumbs.

Italian seasoned breadcrumbs.

Right.

Any brand will do.

Okay.

But don't tell my husband that.

Okay.

And, this is flour.

Okay?

It's going to take a little flour on it, and, and.

Oh, you always have to eat your city chicken cold.

Oh, really?

Oh, sure.

Because it was at a picnic.

It was at a picnic?

Yes.

And you got to have potato salad with it.

Yeah.

Because you're at a picnic.

Right.

So, All right, we're mixed canola oil and egg.

Okay, so we're just going to alternate the cubes on the stick and placing a little piece of onion in between.

And usually on this side wooden skewer.

You can put maybe five cubes.

Now I have cut these cubes rather small.

When Chu-Cha Julia made them.

They were like that.

That's why it took an hour and a quarter hour, hour and a half to bake them.

Gotcha.

But I've made these smaller, they just seem to be more enjoyable that way.

Then we're going to, You do it.

Okay.

Because I haven't made this before.

Well, here, do you want to?

I can skewer, sure.

Okay.

We're going to dip them in the egg and oil.

Well, season them with this little spice mixture that I told you about.

Yeah.

And that therein is the secret to what makes this taste different from other recipes.

It's not just breadcrumbs.

It's got this seasoning.

And then we flour it lightly.

It doesn't have to be, you know, be real particular about that.

I'll flip them over.

Oh yeah.

That's what innately I thought you needed more flour than that.

But it's not.

No.

Because they're going to go in the breadcrumbs too.

Oh right right.

Okay.

Well then back in the egg.

Were going to wet them again.

Egg and canola oil Just a little bit of canola oil.

Maybe this is only one egg because we're making such a small quantity.

And that would only require maybe a tablespoon.

But you want to shake those out?

Yeah.

Or can you roll them, or do you have to shake?

It's it's easier if you shake it.

Okay.

Gets it all over it.

Better got it.

And then put it in the frying pan, put it in very hot oil.

Yeah.

I lost an onion on the end.

And we'll see.

Oh, yeah.

The shaking definitely makes more sense.

This is not a difficult thing to do.

This is you know, Chris loves to talk about recipes that are good for kids.

And this is one of those that takes a lot of construction that would be great for kids.

Yeah, they can help you put it together.

The main thing is, cutting up the meat, right?

You know, it's time consuming for sure.

And also, you want to trim it if it has any, you know, any, visible extra fat on the ends.

You can you can trim that off.

Okay.

We're done with those things.

So now it just is cooking it says yes.

Right.

Yes.

Well yeah.

And then we'll just, let them get brown on each side, turn them brown again on another side.

Turn them once they're all browned on all sides.

Then you put them in a casserole dish on crumpled foil.

That.

That's my cousin Ronnie.

Chu-Cha Julias son.

Okay.

This is news to me.

Crumple the foil.

It allows it allows heat to get all the way around it and it doesn't get wet on one side.

I know what you're talking about.

That getting wet on one side.

And then it kind of sticking and the skin comes off as you pull it.

Wow, a crumpled foil.

Oh my.

Between the wedding, the skewers and the crumpled foil, I have really learned something new today.

Okay, so we're not going to have time to wait for these to fully cook, but let's say that we have, what would we do next?

Just take them out and you take them out of the oil and put them on them on the crumpled thing cover like that.

So it's draining and it's not sticking.

Right.

And then cover it, put it in the oven.

For how long?

Oh, this is where you said, yeah, if you're using very lean meat and small cubes, maybe half an hour to 45 minutes, if you're using meat that is, well, marbleized and in larger chunks it's going to take an hour and a quarter maybe.

Okay.

And then you take them out and they're ready to go.

Right?

Correct.

And you eat them on the stick.

You eat them with potato salad.

Chris knows something good when he smells it.

Here, I just plates and forks.

I don't need a plan.

I don't need a plate.

I just have the skewers.

That's how we ate them at Kennywood.

Okay.

At the park, right?

Yeah.

When?

When you.

You've got to have potatoes.

I'm going to have potato salad, that I need a plate for it because I don't eat potatoes salad, I haven't stooped to eating potato salad with my hands yet.

but, it tastes just like chicken.

Maybe the day will come.

I can't believe it's not.

And here's salt and pepper.

I don't any more salt and pepper.

This is very good.

It's very easy to eat, I can see, why this is great picnic food.

You can walk around it with people.

Beer in one hand.

Chicken in the other.

Yeah.

It's different.

The kids like it.

I'm going to the jackrabbit.

There are lots of variations of this recipe, but Chris Bobick makes a pretty authentic version.

Or so I'm told.

This next recipe is also as authentic as it gets.

When we did our show on Eastern European cooking, Marijka Jula shared her recipe for that Easter specialty Pascha Bread.

She really is a master and you have to listen carefully to get all her little tricks and tips.

It's not just about the ingredients and the results are as beautiful as they are tasty.

Ukraine being, the breadbasket of Europe, bread is an essential part to any part of what they do.

This we greet people with.

This particular bread is used for Christmas time.

There is straw to represent the stable.

Here is the swaddling cloth.

This is the Christ child.

And then this becomes the star.

And you find this on the tables in Ukrainian homes in Western Europe for Christmas.

All right.

So this is called a Kolach Now what we would like to show you today is something called a Pascha.

Paschas are used for Easter.

They are always round and they're always decorated with some kind of a cross on top.

So we are going to show you the tricks of the trade of how to decorate an actual Pascha.

Okay, okay, we have the dough made, but we're actually going to put everything together and show you how it's done.

What's interesting is that, in in the recipe that, Marijka sent in, you talked about this dough being one that used to be fairly labor intensive, but the recipe that you included is one that you can make in a bread machine.

Exactly, exactly.

I have, being working people now, these days, what we do is we try to simplify recipes and use them.

It's very nice.

You put the ingredients into the bread, put it on for two hours, go do something else, and you come back and your dough is ready.

And it's quite consistent most of the time.

Really.

Yes, I was fascinated by it because we've done a show on on bread before and, and we got into bread machines, but now they're really prevalent.

They're not, they're fairly economical.

You can buy one.

Theyre not a whole lot of money And, it's a useful tool if you were going to be making or going to try to make these kinds of breads, because then you don't have to concentrate on that portion of it.

Exactly, exactly.

I'm going to put this to the side so that we put it to the side.

We have already started to put some things together here.

We use I use an enamel pan.

A lot of these are heirlooms from from older relatives or whatever.

It's it's a nice pan.

It's got a consistent heat in it.

Being conscious of calories these days.

Also, I use Pam to spray it rather than putting butter like we used to.

Butter was the preferred, usually.

Yes.

Okay, okay.

To, prepare the pan now, in a Pascha what the Ukrainian people do is they have aromatic spices, which is cinnamon and nutmeg and cloves and all of those good things.

And in the bottom of the pan, you take them, you take the spices and you make a cross.

And this is to represent the myrrh bearing women who came to anoint the body of Christ.

So that is put in the bottom of the pan before we start.

All right.

Okay.

The symbolism starts right at the bottom of the pan very much okay.

Until the end.

And then you have a piece of dough.

I've already form this, but you take the piece of dough and you just work it into a wheel and you put it in the bottom of your pan.

Most people think the dough is temperamental and it's not.

You can sit here and you can press it and you can do all sorts of things and you can work with it.

Okay.

So that is the bottom of your Pascha here.

Okay.

We're going to make a braid that goes around the outside.

Okay.

And these are too long.

Everything starts with a snake.

As you can see.

And when you go to to make the braid you twist from the center of the dough rather than one end.

If you start with one end and go to the other, it's very skinny.

On one end it becomes very fat on the other.

So you start from one side and the other, and you do it this way and it will stretch for you a little bit, too.

It's not.

It's not as temperamental as most people think.

Okay.

And then you're going to put it inside the pan.

And of course yours fits perfectly.

It's with a lot of practice.

I have a feeling you've done this before.

Many, many times.

Okay.

So that is set in here.

And again we pressing it down a little bit because we don't want it to get too high because once it bakes it will split and it will go this way.

You know one of the things and I don't know that we stress it enough to watch you do it.

Again, you've done this many, many times.

People sometimes get discouraged when they try these things, and it doesn't come out perfect the very first time that they do it.

You mustn't be discouraged.

What you have to do is just keep doing it.

And you know, it wouldn't be terrible to just make some dough and practice making shapes.

And if none of them turn out, it's fine.

It's still fine, because that's what you need is is to just to get to understand the feel of it.

Exactly.

And the feel of the dough and how, what you can do with it and whatever.

I must laugh though.

I have a story to tell you.

When I was doing the home show, I was making some demonstration breads and I was making them all week.

They weren't coming out, they weren't coming out.

My husband goes, well show them one that doesn't come out, okay.

But I found out after a few times my yeast wasn't.

It was already starting to go bad.

So once I bought the new yeast, everything was something.

And something comes back out.

Well, and you can't really tell in this stage.

It was once it was baked, it was doing some very strange things.

Okay.

So here we're going to make a cross.

So that's the cross and that's the cross.

And just like we used to do with those little potholders we used to make.

Remember when we were kids?

Oh yeah.

You're going to sort of fold it.

Okay.

Criss cross.

That's the way we used to make the lanyard, you know.

Exactly.

So this is a lot of things we remember from when we were kids.

Okay.

And then you bring these around this way and you just tuck them in.

Tuck them all.

Okay.

Come on.

This way.

And, boy, it would be hard to describe that.

I'm glad that we're able to actually watch you do it, Marijka.

Because, you know, to to to describe this in the recipe, it is sometimes a little difficult.

You need a diagram or something.

And just like anything else, just keep pressing it.

You keep on pressing it now will you?

We would let this raise for a little bit okay.

But miracle of television.

Okay.

Before I would put this into an oven though okay.

After it's raised a little bit again patting it down a little bit, I go through and I put some holes with a skewer.

They used to do this with a straw from a broom.

Okay.

In the old country.

All right.

And you put some holes in here.

And again, that's to take some of the air out of the center.

So that it doesnt So it doesn't pop out and it doesn't crack.

And so I assume that helps the design to stay in because otherwise the design might just become a blur.

You know, just it will round itself out.

Dough has a tendency to to, to join with itself.

Another little trick of the trade okay, I'm not going to do this also because we don't have a really enough time because I want to show you how to make the little birds and these little pinecones.

Okay.

You would egg this to begin with.

And before you put it in the oven, and this is after many tries of all sorts of different things.

You put a collar around the bread this way with a piece of foil, and then I reuse this foil over and over again, depending on how many.

I make as many as 20 Paschas over Easter time.

So yeah.

Okay.

And what you do is you put a collar around here and what that does, it helps to distribute the heat.

And when it raises again it's not going to raise this way and crack in the center.

It'll keep the heat even all the way around.

So you put the little collar on and then you put it in the oven.

Now, the bread in Ukraine used to be baked in ovens outside where you put the firewood in, and then you would pull the firewood out.

So when you first bake Pascha, you bake it at 400 degrees for ten minutes, and then you lower the temperature to 350, because that's what the old ovens used to do.

And when you pulled out the wood, they would gradually cool.

And that's how they would bake the Pascha out in the outdoor ovens.

And they noticed that in your recipe you had that the temperature you a certain temperature.

And after a few minutes you lower and lower.

Yes.

Okay.

Depending on what kind of bread you making.

Great.

Okay.

Now Ukrainians also do wedding breads rather than having a wedding cake, you have a wedding bread, and usually wedding breads are decorated with little doves.

Little birds.

Okay.

Just like this.

Okay.

And little pinecones okay.

Like that.

And they are not too tough to make.

Okay, I'm going to give you one of these.

All right.

Fine.

It's starting to dry out a little bit under these lights.

Okay.

How much how long.

Okay.

Just, just enough so that you can actually tie a knot.

This is a process of tying a knot.

All right, so you're going to take your your piece here, okay.

And you're literally going to take it and pretend like you're going to make a knot in it.

Okay.

Here's the little head for the bird.

There it is.

Your head is small.

That's all right again, it comes with practice.

And then the other head that comes from the bottom that becomes the tail of the bird.

Mine looks like a tortoise or something.

Yes.

See?

There we go.

Hold your head up high, young man.

There we go.

Okay.

And then you let them raise a little bit, and then you just bake them in the oven, usually for about 20 minutes or so.

And you put, you put an egg wash on top of them.

Okay.

This was pretty easy too.

These are those little pinecones.

They look they look hard but they're not very hard at all.

Here's your piece.

You get to do one of these too.

Okay.

And actually you just start.

Everything starts with a rope.

Except this time we're going to flatten it okay.

And then you're going to make little slits.

Remember like you did the lanterns and things when we were in elementary school for Halloween okay.

But you don't cut all the way to the end.

All right.

Okay.

Now, where did you learn how to do all of this, Marijka?

Well, actually, I started with my mother.

She came from Ukraine after World War two.

And then just doing a lot of research and talking with my brother in law, who also bakes a lot of bread and, a lot of books and things like that, that we that we have.

And just practicing a lot.

Okay.

And there we go on end and then you pinch the end and there's your little pinecone.

Yeah.

You say.

There we go.

See, you could do it.

Were going to get you baking Paschas and, And then.

Okay.

Pinch the botoom?

You just pinch the end a little bit just so it stays together.

Okay.

There we go.

Yeah.

Okay.

Looks pretty good.

Looks pretty good.

Okay, we'll be able to tell the difference.

So basically that's those are the tricks of the trade, to do with the Paschas.

Again, here's one that I started out in the studio before.

Ready almost ready to bake again.

Before we go to bake it, we go to press it down a little bit, so nothing's going to happen with it.

You're going to put the skewer in it a little bit on a collar.

Okay.

This is the same.

This is the same procedure as we showed you before.

Just kind of like in the in the indentations through the center, just to let out some of the air that's still in there.

And then we're going to bake them.

Yes.

We are.

There we go.

Now you have some that are done.

Yes.

I'm going to put this on the back.

These are again they have they have risen up considerably.

Actually these these were made in that small pan.

So they do actually rise up quite a bit.

They actually you know come up from the center.

Now this one has the braid, this one has a braid.

This one.

You do not have to put a braid on it.

The only thing on a Pascha or a Pascha should have is it should have a cross on it.

Okay.

Because the Ukrainians then take the bread to church, with all sorts of other Easter food, and they have it blessed.

And that's what they have for Easter morning.

Yeah.

Because you're not supposed to cook on Easter.

You cook days beforehand, but you don't cook on Easter.

Right.

And, you say about the blessing now they actually do this on the south side, right?

Yes.

Or is it done in other places?

Oh, in South Side, in Carnegie, wherever we find a Ukrainian church and, people bring traditional food, but they also bring food that they are comfortable with having for their meals.

Also, we have non Ukrainians coming to our church to have spaghetti sauce blasting and other things.

Okay.

Because it's part of an Easter tradition.

Yeah.

Now but you said that you don't cook on cook on Easter.

Easter is a whole very holy day.

So that so that everything has to be either eaten cold.

Yes, exactly.

Okay.

We have kielbasa, we have ham, we have all sorts of, and the bread is made and the bread is made.

And that's what you have for your meal.

Marijka, that is terrific.

Thank you so much for those.

Just those little tips were wonderful about making the birds and the pine cones.

I'm gonna go home and try to make some and look a little bit.

Is, is that you practice?

I got to practice.

It's wonderful to watch an artist at work.

Well, thanks for being with us.

And as we always say, we do it for you, but we can't do it without you.

Keep watching.

Did you ever have one of those recipes that calls for blanched almonds?

And all you have are almonds with the skins on them?

Well, actually, blanching an almond is no great problem.

All you need is some boiling water, and you just put the almonds with the skins in them into the boiling water.

I won't do all of them, but put those in there and stir them around for a second or two, and it will loosen the skins on the almonds so that you can snap them right off.

And I'm always looking for jobs that are great to do with kids in the kitchen.

And this was one of my early jobs, when my mom would be making cookies that used the almonds that had to be blanched, and so she would set me up at the kitchen table and I would have this job, not the part of boiling, but the the part of taking the skins off some of these boiled almonds.

Let's put some into the cold water.

This is where my job would start.

And all you do is slip the skin right off of it and you have a nice blanched almond.

Then you can toast those, put them in cookies.

Okay, there we go.

Whoops.

Left some skin on there okay.

And that's how you make blanched almonds.

Couldn't be easier.

And it's a great job for a kid in the kitchen.

And that's a QED Cooks kitchen tip.

Lots of recipes both sweet and savory, called for an ingredient called the zest of a lemon, lime an orange, usually it's a zest from a citrus fruit.

My suggestion and my tip is to go out and get yourself a microplane.

Or it just doesn't get any easier.

Since they invented these rasps as they were the sort of taken from the world of carpentry.

And you can use them because of their very fine teeth to just go along and scrape the outside portion of the lemon of the lemon skin, and that is the zest.

It's before you get to the white inner part, which is referred to as the pith of the lemon.

And so you just want the outside, that zest that.

And you can see how easy that is.

And if you don't happen to have one, the old fashioned method, the old chef's method is to take a very sharp vegetable peeler and just take the outside of that lemon peel, none of the white if you can avoid it.

And take a few of those strips.

And as you can see, there's there's none of that white part.

It's just the yellow part.

And then you chop it very finely in one direction into julienne strips.

And then you turn those strips sideways.

Make sure you get a nice little bundle and chop them the other way.

And that will give you pieces fine enough to be considered lemon zest for your recipe.

Can go through that a couple more times just to make sure it's really fine.

It gives a wonderful, delicious, explosive flavor of lemon or lime or orange to your recipe.

And if you have the micro planer, it's easy peasy.

But if you have to, you know the right way to make a lemon zest.

And that's a tip from the QED Cooks Kitchen.