Vegan Krupicová Kaše

Krupicová Kaše is a Czech porridge, consisting of milky semolina topped with copious amounts of butter, chocolate, cocoa powder and icing sugar. It can be eaten for breakfast or dessert and is also a popular baby food!

Preparation time: 1 hour	Cooking time: 10 minutes
Serves: 2	Difficulty: Easy

Ingredients

For the porridge:

• 500ml/5dl/just under a pt/just over 2 cups of milk
• 50g/2 oz/4½ tablespoons of semolina
• A pinch of salt

For the topping:

• 30g/1 oz/2 tablespoons of plant based margarine
• 8g/¼ oz/a tablespoon of cocoa
• 10g/⅓ oz/a tablespoon of grated chocolate
• A pinch of cinnamon
• 16g/½ oz/2 tablespoons of icing sugar

Special Equipment

• A large mixing bowl
• A whisk
• A large saucepan
• A sieve
• Bowls, to serve

Method

1. Pour the milk into a large mixing bowl with the salt and semolina. Briefly whisk everything together, then put the bowl in the fridge for an hour.
2. Pour the milk mixture into a large saucepan. Place the pan on the hob over a low-medium heat and slowly bring it to the boil, stirring it very regularly with the whisk as it heats up so lumps don’t form.
3. Allow it to simmer for five minutes, whisking constantly while it cooks.
4. Remove the pan from the heat and beat in half of the margarine, making sure it’s been fully absorbed.
5. Divide the porridge between two bowls.
6. Top the bowls of porridge with the remaining butter. Then sieve the cocoa and cinnamon over the porridge before sprinkling over the grated chocolate and icing sugar.
7. Dobrou chuť!

Tips

• Make sure you leave the semolina and milk to sit for an hour before cooking, and that you stir the mixture regularly when it’s heating up on the hob, so that lumps don’t form.
• You don’t have to stick to chocolate, cocoa and cinnamon as toppings- you can also try using rum, fresh or dried fruit, nuts, biscuits, honey, and/or lemon juice.

Background

Home: Czechia
Pronunciation: (Krupitsovah kashe)
Relatives: Krupicová kaša (Slovakia), Griș cu Lapte (Romania), Tejbegríz (Hungary), Manų Košė (Lithuania), Grießbrei (Germany), Semolina Pudding (UK), Vispipuuro (Finland), Guryev (Russia)

History

Porridge has been eaten for millennia, in various forms and in many different human societies. It’s believed cereals were first cultivated in Syria at least 9,000 years ago, and that they were soon being domesticated and harvested by multiple civilizations around the world. As a result porridge became an integral part many ancients peoples’ diets.

Semolina porridges and puddings are known to have been eaten in Europe since at least Roman times: an early recipe for semolina porridge was included in the Apicus, a collection of Roman recipes first compiled in the 1st century AD. The recipe calls for the semolina to be boiled with almonds and raisins and topped with nuts, fruits and cake crumbs.

Porridges are ubiquitous to central and eastern European cuisine today: the region boasts many different national and transnational varieties of buckwheat, wheat, barley, millet, rye and oat porridge. These include many versions of semolina porridge, which is popular in Czechia, Slovakia, Germany, Romania, Hungary, Lithuania and Russia. The Czech version, Krupicová Kaše, can be eaten for dessert or breakfast and is often fed to babies and toddlers.