Monday, February 28, 2000
Polish celebrate heritage, paczki
Holinko honored for contributions
BY SARA J. BENNETT
The Cincinnati Enquirer
McNicholas High football teammates Jeremy Huber and Neal Nieberding compete in a paczki-eating contest.
(Gary Landers photo)
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Before blessing the traditional fruit-filled Polish pastries at Sunday's sixth annual paczki celebration, the Rev. Mike Paraniuk gave thanks for Herbert Holinko.
Dr. Holinko, a supporter of Polish causes, helped start Greater Cincinnati's yearly promotion of paczki (pronounced “POONCH-key”). The Anderson Township resident died Thursday of heart failure, but the pastry celebration went on in his honor.
“Look at all of us together today and thank Herb for that,” Father Paraniuk, chaplain of the Polish-American Society of Greater Cincinnati, told the crowd. “He brought us together not just to celebrate life, but to do it with the greatest food on the entire Earth — the Polish paczki.”
Paczki is a round, fruit-filled pastry eaten prior to Lent. In Poland, the paczki tradition recalls a time when lard, eggs and other perishables had to be consumed before Lenten fasting.
Paczki is most popular around Fat Tuesday, which falls on March 7 this year.
Today, a national push is on to make paczki as important to Fat Tuesday as pumpkin pie is to Thanksgiving.
Hundreds of people packed Beechmont Mall Sunday for the paczki celebration sponsored by Cincinnati's Polish-American community and Greater Cincinnati's Retail Bakers Association.
An estimated 15,000 to 17,000 people of Polish descent live in the Cincinnati area.
A parade snaked through the mall, with people tossing Mardi Gras beads and waving banners touting bakeries that sell paczki.
Polish dancers did the polka in sequined vests.
Football players from six high schools crammed their mouths with paczki in a contest to see who could eat the most in two minutes.
Afterward, there was paczki for all. Folks devoured the pastries in an orgy of custard, smeary strawberry filling, drippy raspberry jam, and moist crumbly crust that left pow dered sugar on everyone's lips.
Dr. Holinko would have approved, wife Betty said from a seat of honor with her six children.“He's smiling on us now,” Mrs. Holinko said. “He wanted to be here even if he had to be in a wheelchair.”
Dr. Holinko was president of the Polish-American Society. He founded the WOBO-FM (88.7)Polish Melodies program.
He and his wife helped start the Paczki Executive Committee of Cincinnati's Retail Bakers Association six years ago.
The paczki push is a national phenomenon, too. Carl Richardson, chairman of the Retail Bak ers Association's National Paczki Promotional Board, traveled to Beechmont Mall from Detroit for Sunday's event.
Paczki is a $300 million-a-year business for bakers and bakery suppliers, Mr. Richardson said.
Paczki sales are up, too, local bakery owners say. They can be found at most bakeries and grocery stores.
Folks interested in sampling a paczki should remember two things, Mr. Richardson said.
Each pastry has 500 calories. And, most important, he said, “You don't have to be Polish to polish off a paczki.”
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