Here's my latest column for the Charleston Gazette-Mail:
As January’s New Year’s resolutions of moderation dwindle, February ushers in the season of indulgence — mainly in the form of paczki.
Paczki — dense, yeast-raised doughnuts filled with jam or custard — begin filling bakery windows across the northern part of Appalachia in the weeks leading up to Lent.
Richer than standard American doughnuts and historically fried in lard, paczki originated in Polish Catholic households as a way to use up eggs, sugar, butter and fat before the Lenten fast.
Paczki followed the Eastern European immigration into the Ohio Valley in the late 19th and early 20th centuries. That’s when Polish, Slovak, Hungarian and Croatian workers arrived to fill jobs in steel mills, coal mines, glass factories and river-based industries — bringing with them food traditions from their home lands.
Paczki were not designed as everyday sweets but as practical, seasonal foods. Their traditional fillings — prune butter, apricot jam and other preserved fruits — reflect Old World preservation methods that are not unlike those in Appalachia. Both foodways developed under similar constraints: long winters, limited access to fresh ingredients and an emphasis on using what was available before spoilage or fasting periods.
Over time, paczki consumption extended beyond Polish American households. In some Northern Panhandle communities, paczki became a regional marker of late winter rather than an ethnic specialty, appearing alongside fish fries, pierogi sales and other Lenten traditions.
Similar pastries appear in Germany as “Berliners,” in Italy as “chiacchiere” or “bomboloni,” in France as “beignets,” and in the United Kingdom as Shrove Tuesday pancakes. In each case, the foods serve the same functional purpose: using perishable, calorie-dense ingredients before the Lenten fast.
The recurrence of these pastries across cultures underscores that paczki are part of a shared culinary response to religious observance rather than an isolated ethnic tradition.
Paczki have also evolved as they found their way through church dinners, community picnics and neighborhood gatherings — at least in name.
In Polish, the word is pronounced roughly POHNCH-kee, with the “cz” producing a soft “ch” sound and the “ki” ending clearly articulated. In much of the Upper Ohio Valley, anglicized versions — such as PAUNCH-kee or PUNCH-kee — became common as the pastry moved from small, Polish bakeries into mainstream grocery stores.
Paczki persist not as a trend, but as evidence of how the northern edge of Appalachia has long functioned as a cultural crossroads. Unlike other parts of Appalachia where paczki remain relatively unfamiliar, this region absorbed the tradition early, folding it into an already hybrid food identity shaped by migration and industry.
What looks like a donut with a Polish accent is, in this region, a reminder that Appalachia’s table has always been set by many hands.
