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"The bigos is being cooked. No words can tell
The wonder of its colour, taste and smell.
Mere words and rhymes are jingling sounds, whose sense
No city stomach really comprehends.
For Lithuanian food and song you ought
To have good health and country life and sport.

But bigos e'en without such sauce is good,
Of vegetables curiously brewed.
The basis of it is sliced sauerkraut,
Which, as they say, just walks into the mouth;
Enclosed within a cauldron, its moist breast
Lies on the choicest meat in slices pressed.
There it is parboiled till the heat draws out
The living juices from the cauldron's spout,
And all the air is fragrant with the smell.

'Twas ready now. With thrice repeated yell
The huntsmen armed with spoons attacked the stew.
The copper roared and forth the vapour flew.
The bigos disappeared like camphor oil;
Only the pots were left to seethe and boil
Like craters of extinct volcanoes still."

- Translation by Kenneth R. Mackenzie. Published by the Polish Cultural Foundation, 1986.

"Bigos is being cooked in every kettle.
In human language it is hard to settle
The marvels of its odour, hue and taste;
In poetry's description one has traced
Only the clinking words and clanking rhymes;
No city stomach to its rapture climbs.
To savour Lithuanian songs and cooks,
One must have health, reside in country nooks
And be returning from a hunting party.
Even without such sauce to make one hearty,

This bigos is no ordinary dish,
For it is aptly framed to meet your wish.
Founded upon good cabbage, sliced and sour,
Which, as men say, by its own zest and power
Melts in one's mouth, it settles in a pot
And in its dewy bosom folds a lot
Of the best portions of selected meat;
Scullions parboil it then, until the heat
Draws from its substance all the living juices,
And, from the pot's edge, boiling fluid sluices
And all the Air is fragrant with its scent.

The bigos was soon done. With armament

Of spoons, with triple shout, the hunting gang
Assailed the kettle; then the copper rang;
The steams burst forth; by hungry valour banished,
The bigos flew away, like camphor vanished;
Only the steams remained, the pots' curators,
As in extinct volcanoes' smoking craters."

- Translation by Watson Kirkconnell. First published by The Polish Institute of Arts and Sciences of America, New York, 1962

If you have not read "Pan Tadeusz", this is the ideal spot to start. Take a seat in one of our leather armchairs by our roaring fire, order a Krupnik from the bar and read through the first chapter. You won't regret it!