A little while ago, we had a guest here at Hungry Pumpkin: Martina from Brno in the Czech Republic. As we like to acquaint ourselves with other cultures (especially through food), we asked her what some traditional Czech dishes are, and she suggested bramboraky to us. If you type this into google it leads to an explanation of “potato pancakes” and a link to the U.S. Department of Agriculture website (here) that describes the nutritional value and shows the content as being 72% potato, 12% egg, 7% onion, 7% margarine, 2% flour, and 1% salt. Funnily, the word “bramboraky” never actually appears on this page.

Bramboraky is a traditional Czech dish prepared by frying dough made from grating raw potatoes, flour, eggs, spices (typically garlic and marjoram), and sometimes milk. They are served warm, and are either eaten alone or accompanied by cabbage and smoked meat. The name of the dish is derived from the word “brambory,” the Czech word for potatoes. Almost identical dishes exist under different names in other European countries, including Germany and Austria (kartoffelpuffer), the Netherlands (aardappelpannekoek), Russia and Belorussia (draniki), Hungary (tócsni), Poland (placki ziemniaczane), Slovakia (placky). There is even a Yiddish word (latka) to refer to them due to the Jewish population of Europe! Similar dishes (although made only from potatoes and thus lacking eggs and flour) are known in Switzerland (rüsti), Korea (gamja-jeon), and the English-speaking world (hash browns). Last (but not least!), there is also the Spanish potato tortilla, which is slightly thicker and uses potato sliced into pieces or grated into larger chunks than those of the previous dishes.
Here at Hungry Pumpkin, we have (of course) prepared a vegan and gluten-free version of bramboraky. Flax was used instead of eggs, and the regular flour from wheat was replaced with buckwheat and chickpea flour to avoid gluten. In the name of innovation, we also made another change: rather than using garlic and marjoram in the dough, we instead made a pesto-like sauce to go on the dish. This was served as our main dish, and we prepared a vegetable soup and mixed summer salad to round out our lunch.
Recipe, preparation and price of the food
Quantity(g or ml) |
Price for 4 person (EUR) |
||
Soup |
|
|
|
Onions |
100 |
0,17 |
|
Zucchini |
500 |
0,4 |
|
Carrots |
100 |
0,08 |
|
Olive oil |
15 |
0,09 |
|
Tartary buckwheat |
30 |
0,22 |
|
Main dish |
|||
Chickpea flour |
130 |
0,93 |
|
Buckwheat flour |
120 |
0,33 |
|
Flax flour |
7 |
0,14 |
|
Salt |
2 |
0 |
|
Potato |
40 |
0,04 |
|
Aqua |
60 |
0 |
|
Olive oil |
35 |
0,21 |
|
Salad |
|||
Tomato |
500 |
0,9 |
|
Peppers |
200 |
0,38 |
|
Onion |
60 |
0,1 |
|
Cucumber |
180 |
0,21 |
|
Olives |
150 |
0,56 |
|
Salt |
3 |
0 |
|
Olive oil |
20 |
0,12 |
|
Together |
4,75 |
||
First, we prepared a simple, creamy vegetable soup. We roasted our zucchini, onion, and carrots with oil before adding water and seasoning and cooking for 15 minutes. For the bramboraky, we mixed buckwheat, chickpea, and flax flour in a bowl before adding water and salt to form dough, as if for pancakes. We then added in our finely grated potatoes. Traditionally, bramboraky would be round and small (about 10cm in diameter), and though this means that we could fit three at a time on our pan, the whole surface would not be utilised. Since we do love to keep our carbon footprint as low as possible, we made them larger and used the entire pan’s surface and then served them in slices. Thank goodness there are no rules in cooking!
For our salad, we mixed up tomatoes, cucumbers, and peppers before seasoning with olive oil, making what was basically a Greek salad without cheese.
Once again we had vegetables from our garden to use up, so our cost for this lunch was quite low. If we account for the market value of the vegetables, however, the lunch is still quite reasonable, coming in at 4.75€. That being said, the price of any lunch is very dependent on the season and the foods used. Always shop local and in-season to keep those prices (and your carbon footprint) lower.
Nutrition value
With lunch consumed quantity |
% From daily needs |
||
Energy |
514,49 |
kcal |
25,7 |
Proteins |
16,74 |
g |
29,9 |
Total fats |
22,50 |
g |
51,1 |
Carbohydrates |
68,15 |
g |
|
Starch |
36,23 |
g |
|
Sugar |
16,24 |
g |
|
Fibers |
14,14 |
g |
56,6 |
Calcium (Ca) |
116,70 |
mg |
11,7 |
Iron (Fe) |
4,65 |
mg |
46,5 |
Magnesium (Mg) |
209,28 |
mg |
52,3 |
Phosphorus (P) |
360,28 |
mg |
51,5 |
Potassium (K) |
1486,74 |
mg |
74,3 |
Sodium (Na) |
847,16 |
mg |
154 |
Zinc (Zn) |
3,02 |
mg |
30,2 |
Copper (Cu) |
0,78 |
mg |
86,8 |
Manganese (Mn) |
1,84 |
mg |
80,1 |
Selenium (Se) |
6,06 |
µg |
12,1 |
Vitamin A |
294,67 |
µg |
29,5 |
Vitamin E |
4,81 |
mg |
32 |
Vitamin D |
0,00 |
µg |
0 |
Vitamin C |
90,31 |
mg |
90,3 |
Thiamin (B1) |
0,50 |
mg |
38,5 |
Riboflavin (B2) |
0,33 |
mg |
21,8 |
Niacin (B3) |
4,95 |
mg |
34,1 |
Pantothenic acid (B5) |
1,14 |
mg |
19 |
Vitamin B6 |
0,94 |
mg |
63 |
Folic acid (B9) |
237,37 |
µg |
59,3 |
Vitamin B12 |
0,00 |
µg |
0 |
Vitamin K |
43,96 |
µg |
62,8 |
As with all of our lunches, we once more managed to provide 25% of the calorie requirement for an average person. In doing so, we consumed slightly more protein (29.9%) than our goal. This protein mostly came from the chickpea flour, zucchini, and tomatoes. Buckwheat and chickpea flour also provided high levels of fibre, giving us 56.6% of our daily requirement just in this one meal. We also met our goals for almost all vitamins and minerals, just falling slightly short on selenium, B5, and B2. As with all vegan food, we did not get vitamin B12 or D with the meal (thank goodness for supplements!).
For a more detailed view of our calculations or for any other questions feel free to write to us at hungry.pumpkin.blog@gmail.com!
Have a nice sunny week!
The Hungry Pumpkin Team
