Customer Reviews

Ukrainian Cooking for Today's Modern Kitchen - Christmas Eve Cooking DVD

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The host, Chef Pavlo Czerwoniak takes you step by step through all twelve dishes of the traditional Ukrainian Christmas Eve dinner. His approach is both traditional and modern. Using conveniences of today's kitchen, but not at the expense of the final result. His manner is friendly and calm, and he instills a sense that this seemingly daunting undertaking is within your ability, one step at a time. He colors the instruction with some personal anecdotes, and the presentation is relaxed and never rushed, which is remarkable considering the number of dishes prepared on this DVD. Mr. Czerwoniak is obviously a natural teacher, and he explains everything about Ukrainian cooking you wish you had learned from your mother or your grandmother, and even subtly communicates his love of the culture. It truly feels as if you are simply visiting in his kitchen as he shows you how to prepare the recipes. He doesn't belabor the measurements, preferring to show technique and sequence, and relying on the printed DVD insert to spell out exact quantities. I like this approach, as many cooking DVDs require you to view with a notepad and remote and remote in hand and you scramble to write down 2 tablespoons of this, and four cups of finely chopped that.
As a lifelong cook and fan of Ukrainian cuisine, I've prepared most of these recipes many times, however, I was still able to pick up some pointers. His recipe for varenyky dough in the food processor is a gem. I've never made varenyky dough so quickly, easily, and with such consistently good results. Seriously, 5 minutes and you've got a ball of perfectly conditioned dough in your hand. The time and effort savings on that alone is worth the price of the DVD. The pickled herring salad looks interesting and will be on our menu this Christmas. His braided bread looks exactly like my mother's.
Not every recipe is exactly to my taste. As the Chef says, there are as many recipes for these dishes as there are Ukrainian Grandmothers. I personally don't care for fish in aspic, but I acknowledge that it is extremely traditional and belongs on the DVD. I also feel he chops the mushrooms too finely for the mushroom gravy and I feel that the cabbage filling for varenyky ought to have more texture. But really, if you've spent any time among Ukrainian cooks, you will realize just how remarkable it is that I have so few and so minor quibbles with the recipes and presentation.
Hopefully Ukraivin will consider producing a series of videos in this line exploring the little-known, but magnificent culinary traditions of Ukraine.