Bakery Window · Fat Thursday Icon

Pączki (Polish Filled Doughnuts)

Photo via Pexels/Unsplash — free for commercial use

On Fat Thursday alone, Poland eats an estimated 100 million pączki — about three for every person in the country.

Pączki are deep-fried Polish doughnuts made from an egg-rich yeast dough, piped full of rose-hip jam or custard after frying, then dusted with powdered sugar or striped with icing. Bakeries stack them in the window and sell them by the dozen straight over the counter, especially on Fat Thursday.

Why it's made this way: Poland eats an estimated 100 million pączki on Tłusty Czwartek (Fat Thursday) alone — a custom that began as a way to use up the household's lard, sugar, and eggs before Lent's fasting began.