Vibrational Wigilia (Polish Christmas) FEAST
Seven spectacular recipes to celebrate our first ever Conscious Christmas together
Every Christmas, I get intense cravings for barszsc, pierogi, and herring. Who can blame me? I have eaten these (and more) traditional foods every single Christmas eve since year one.
Wigilia (vee-geel-ee-a) is a Polish Christmas eve tradition. Derived from the Latin term “vigil”, this special supper traditionally begins when the first star appears in the sky on December 24th. It is meatless in honor of the animals that kept Jesus warm. Most of the dishes contain fish, which is not considered “meat”.
This year for the first time ever, I am making my own version of this traditional meal by picking several of my favorite Wigilia dishes, making tweaks to suit our current lifestyle, and adding a vibrational spin of course. For the vibrational component, I used our set of Solfeggio tuning forks and sacred geometry images.
I started with the 396 Hz fork for the 1st course and worked my way up to 852 Hz based on the order each dish was (supposed to be) served in- hopefully achieving a chakra balancing effect (we ended up just devouring everything at the same time). Each was tune forked 3 times for about 10 seconds each. I did not actually touch the food with the tuning fork, I simply held it about 3 inches above.
Several of the dishes were stored in glass jars atop either a Vesica Piscis image or a 3d Seed of Life image. We had some special wooden coasters made with these images, however, regular printer paper images covered in plastic would work just as well.
Much should be said about Solfeggio, but I’ll just give a brief rundown of the frequencies, associated chakras and effects.
396 Hz - Root (Red) - Liberation of guilt/fear, grounding
417 Hz - Sacral (orange) - Renewal, creativity
528 Hz - Solar Plexus (yellow) - Miracles & DNA repair
639 Hz - Heart (green) - Balance, love, relationships
741 Hz - Throat (blue) - Self expression, inspiration, truth
852 Hz - Third eye (purple) - Intuition
Since water holds memory, the idea is that the higher water content foods will be able to imprint the geometric image/ hold the frequencies of the forks, resulting in greater harmony in the body once the foods are consumed (as within, so without).
At first, this was just going to be a fun project/trip down memory lane for me. But when I introduced the idea of adding a vibrational aspect, Nathan was all on board and excited as well.
I challenged myself to make each recipe entirely free of any dairy, meat or fish. Also, I am not using beets or potatoes- both very common Wigilia ingredients- due to our preferences.
Here’s a quick table of contents to give an overview of the vibrational aspect applied to each dish…
Barszsc & Uszka
396 hz, Seed of Life
Fried Pierogi
417 Hz
Polish Salad
639 Hz
Homemade Rye bread
528 Hz
Avocado “butter”
528 Hz, Seed of Life
Eggplant and wild oyster mushroom “Herring”
741 Hz & 639 Hz, Vesica Piscis
Sweet potato pie
852 Hz, Vesica Picsis
1. Barszsc (Bar-shch)
This is a deep red, flavorful soup made almost entirely of beets, almost always served as a first course at Wigilia with dumplings (uszka) floating in each bowl.
A few weeks ago, Nathan made us a tea with orange peels, turkey tail mushrooms and pine needles. I thought it could make a great broth to emulate the rich, slightly pungent flavor of barszt, and so I froze some of it in ice cube trays until I was ready to use it.
Two days before Christmas Eve, I defrosted the tea and cooked it in the cast iron with some compost scraps, (onion skin, banana peels, etc.) tomato, a dash of oil, lemon juice and a bay leaf. It actually imitates the authentic beet flavor quite well. I tune forked it with 396 Hz (root chakra) and stored it in a glass jar on a Seed of Life coaster.
Ingredients:
-4 cups compost scraps
-1/2 gallon pine, turkey tail, orange peel tea
-2 cups water
-2 tomatoes
-1 Tbs salt
-1 Tbs oil
-2 Tbs lemon juice
-Bay leaf
Here’s how:
Combine all ingredients except oil and lemon juice in a dutch oven or large pot and bring to a boil. Simmer for 20 mins. Strain into a jar and add lemon juice and oil last.
Uszka (oosh-ka)
The uszka and pierogi were the most fun and most time consuming out of all these recipes. This is a great time to get the whole family involved, all hands on deck.
Uszka and pierogi are basically the same thing, just shaped differently. They are both dumplings made with simple dough and various fillings. Uszka are generally always made with a mushroom filling, while pierogi have a wider variety of sweet/savory fillings.
Traditional Uszka/pierogi dough is made with only wheat flour and water. However, I decided to level it up by adding some Rye flour and turkey tail mushroom tea to the dough.
For the filling, I had some frozen honey mushrooms which I foraged this past October. Then I just started throwing whatever I had on hand into the dutch oven with the mushrooms and the result was absolutely delicious. Flax seeds serve as the egg replacement to bind it all together.
Honey mushrooms are delicious and full of antioxidants, they are somewhat similar to shiitake in flavor and texture.
Honey mushroom key identifiers:
Brown/tan cap 2-5in diameter, with dark brown flecks on cap center.
White/ cream colored gills
White spore print
Some species of honey have a ring on the stem, some are ringless.
Grows August- November in clusters on bases of trees or over buried wood throughout North America.
Honey’s should be cooked thoroughly. Honey is somewhat similar in appearance to the deadly Galerina mushroom, so if you are new to foraging, it is extremely important to take a spore print by cutting off the stem and leave the cap face down for a few hours to make sure the print is white. Deadly Galerina has a rusty brown spore print and does not grow in clusters like honey does.
Uszka Ingredients:
Dough:
2 cups wheat flour
¼ cup rye flour
2 Tbs oil
About 1 cup or more turkey tail tea (can use water or other liquid instead)
Pinch of salt
The filling:
2 cups cooked honey mushrooms (can be substituted by Shiitake or portabella)
2 cups green cabbage, finely shredded
5 cloves garlic
2 Tbs oil
1 small onion
2 Tbs flax seed meal
2 Tbs applesauce
1 Tbs salt
1 tsp mustard seed
1 tsp oregano
2 tsp red chili pepper
2 Tbs vinegar
Assembling the Uszka:
For the dough, place all the flour on a clean countertop surface and add the oil and salt. Begin to mix with your hands while slowly adding some liquid (about ¼ cup or so). Keep kneading the dough with your hands and adding liquid until you get a smooth soft dough that does not stick the countertop. Place your dough in plastic bag to prevent it from drying, if you are not going to use it right away. Store in plastic wrap in fridge for up to a week.
For the filling, finely chop all ingredients and add to dutch oven or large pot. Cover and cook on medium heat stiring occasionally for about 20 minutes. Remove from the heat. Can also be stored in fridge for up to a week, or frozen for longer.
To assemble the Uszka, ensure the filling is completely cool and the dough should be room temperature. Roll out the dough as thin as you can, making a big rectangle or circle. Use a knife to cut the rolled out dough into small 2 in squares.
Place about ½ tsp of filling into each square and fold in half into a triangle. Pressing and sealing the dough with your fingers. You may need to moisten the edges of the dough with some water to help it stick. Press 2 points of the triangle together.
I got tired of making the same shape over and over so I went rouge and started making fun shapes.
To cook the uszka:
Once you have uszka assembled, bring a large pot of water to a boil. Splash some oil into the boiling water to prevent sticking. Once water is at a rolling boil, drop uszka into the water (about 8-15 at one time depending on the size of the pot). Once uszka look puffy and rise to the surface of the water, they are done. This should take about 1-2 minutes. Do not overcook. Use a large spoon to scoop out the cooked uszka and set aside to cool.
To serve, place some uszka in each bowl and pour hot barszcz over them.
2. Pierogi
I made the pierogi weeks in advance and had them in the freezer ready to go. I chose two different fillings. The cabbage & mushroom pierogi is the closest recipe to traditional Wigilia on this whole post. I made them basically exactly as I remembered them, and they are delicious. As far as flavor, there really is no substitute for the bolete mushrooms, but any dried mushroom could be used instead if necessary.
The spicy plantain is my take on potato & cheese pierogi, which is arguably the most popular pierogi flavor. Plantain is the potato replacement, olive oil makes it taste slightly cheesy, and the pepper makes it more interesting.
Assembling the pierogi can be a tedious process if you are alone, but it becomes a fun activity if you get some family members or kids involved!
Dough:
3 cups all-purpose flour
2 Tbs oil
1 tsp salt
1 cup or more water (or other liquid)
Spicy plantain filling:
3 green plantains
1 or 2 Jalapeño peppers
1 Tbs olive oil
1 tsp salt
Boil the green plantains until soft, set aside and let cool, saving the water used in the boiling process. Once plantains are cool, peel off and discard skins. Blend the skinned plantains in a food processor with the remaining ingredients. Add some of the boiled water slowly until the consistency is smooth. Set aside.
Cabbage and mushroom filling:
2 cups finely shredded cabbage
2 cups sauerkraut
½ cup dried bolete mushrooms
1 tsp salt
Combine all ingredients into dutch oven or pot (with a lid) cook on med heat, stiring occasionally until bubbling. Cover, and reduce to simmer for about 20 mins. Turn off the heat, set aside.
To assemble the Pierogi:
The process is almost identical the the Uszka recipe except for instead of cutting the dough into squares, use a large cup, jar, or circle shaped cookie cutter to cut the dough into circles. Make as many circles as you can, then gather up the remaining pieces of dough into a ball. Roll out the dough again and cut out more circles. Repeat the process until you have no dough left.
Once the fillings have cooled, add a small teaspoon of filling into each dough circle, and fold the circle in half. Seal the dough with your fingers.
To cook the pierogi:
Once you have pierogi assembled, bring a large pot of water to a boil. Splash some oil into the boiling water to prevent sticking. Once water is at a rolling boil, drop pierogi into the water (about 8-15 at one time depending on the size of the pot). Once pierogi look puffy and rise to the surface of the water, they are done. This should take about 1-2 minutes. Do not overcook. Use a large spoon to scoop out the cooked pierogi and set aside to cool. At this point you can place the cooked pierogi in a bag and freeze for later if desired. Pan fry the pierogi until golden brown before serving.
3. Polish Salad
This salad is so good and so simple. It can be eaten on its own, or on top of Rye bread with the Herring.
Ingredients:
1 cup sauerkraut
¾ cup very finely shredded cabbage
3 small sized apples (preferably various varieties)
½ finely chopped red onion
2 Tbs olive oil
2 Tbs lemon juice
1 tsp or more salt
Here’s how:
Combine all ingredients in a bowl and mix well. Set in the fridge for at least 24 hours before serving to let all the flavors develop.
4. Homemade Rye bread
½ cup wheat flour
1 ½ cup white rye flour
2 cups dark rye
2 cups pine needle tea
2 Tbs oil
1 Tbs salt
2 tsp dry active yeast
Mix warm pine needle tea, yeast and ½ cup wheat flour together, let sit in warm area. At this point, I tune forked the mixture with 528 Hz.
After letting it sit for 15 minutes. Clear off a counter top.
Add the dark rye flour, white rye flour, oil and salt into the bowl. Once it gets to hard to mix with a spoon, turn out the dough on the counter top and knead carefully with both hands. Until all flour is incorporated. Keep adding white rye flour 1-2 Tbs at a time until the dough is a smooth ball and you can knead it without it sticking to the counter.
Shape the dough into two “loaf” shapes and place on a greased cast iron or baking sheet, leaving plenty of room between the loaves for rising. Place in the 100F for an hour to let rise. I do this by preheating the oven to 150F, putting the bread inside and turning off the oven.
Bake at 350F for about 20-30 minutes.
5. Avocado “butter”
Because the bread would be kind of bland on its own, I wanted to make a tasty buttery spread. Once blended, I applied the 528 Hz fork and set it on a seed of life coaster in the fridge.
2 Avocados
½ lemon, juiced
½ tsp salt
1 Tbs olive oil
Blend all ingredients in a food processor, pour into a jar and refrigerate.
6. Eggplant and wild oyster mushroom “Herring”
Herring is an oily fish that usually comes pickled and marinated. It’s extremely popular at polish Christmas Eve and I used to love it with Rye bread. I struggled for a while on how I was gonna make a replacement. I decided to try to pickle some eggplant to mimic the taste and texture of the fish. Luckily, just a few days before Christmas I stopped at a quick hiking spot on and found some wild oyster mushroom! This was just what I needed for a herring replacement. This mushroom has a perfectly chewy meaty texture and pickles very well. I pickled the eggplant and the oyster separately to see how they compare. These were served along with the salad and the bread. Oyster mushroom was beyond any doubt the winner. They were both tune forked with 741 and 639 Hz and set atop vesica picses coasters in the fridge.
Ingredients:
1 cup eggplant or oyster mushroom, chopped and well cooked.
2 Tbs vinegar
2 Tbs olive oil
1 tsp salt
Directions:
In a small jar, combine vinegar oil, salt and stir. Add the cooked eggplant or mushroom and stir. Cover and store in the fridge for 24 hours before serving.
7. Sweet Potato Pie
I am most excited about this dessert because it ties everything together. I didn’t want this to be just about my past memories and polish culture, I wanted to incorporate some of Nathan’s history as well. Both of his grandmothers used to make him sweet potato pie and he loved it. He has stayed far away from it for years now because of the sugar.
My goal was to make a very simple and delicious, basically healthy sweet potato pie. Its free of refined sugar, dairy, egg and gluten.
For the crust, I used the leftover pulp from when I make almond milk. However, you could easily use almond flour or another nut instead.
Crust:
2 cups Almond pulp
3 Tbs Honey
2 Tbs coconut oil, melted
Pinch salt
Filling:
2 or 3 Sweet potatoes, boiled
4 Tbs honey
2 Tbs coconut oil, melted
2 tsp ground cinnamon
½ tsp cardamom
Pinch salt
Blend all the ingredients for the crust in a food processor, and press into a spring-form or parchment lined pan. Once the boiled sweet potatoes have cooled, remove the skins and place into the food processor along with the rest of the filling ingredients and pour on top of the crust. Stays good in fridge for about 7 days or can be frozen. I used the 852 Hz fork on it before putting it in the fridge.
Thank you so much for reading!
Wishing you all a happy holidays and all the best for the new year.
-Julia