Bigos Stew and Dumplings

in this episode, we embark on a journey into the heartwarming tale of "Bigos Stew and Dumpligs" Set against the backdrop of the 1960s, this poignant narrative follows the lives of two unlikely friends,  as they navigate the trials and triumphs of growing up in a changing world.

From their humble beginnings as schoolboys bonding over comics and music to the heights of musical stardom and culinary pursuits, their friendship endures through every twist and turn. Together, they confront societal divisions, navigate personal struggles, and celebrate each other's successes. But does fame have its price?

Transcript

Bigos Stew and Dumplings.

Henrick and I first met at Sacred Heart Primary school. It was 1953 and we were five years old. The headteacher Sister Hewitt sat us both together at the front of the class. I was there because I was so shortsighted and would have preferred to sit at the back by the window so I could look out on the playground. School bored me. My attention span was shorter than my school trousers and I preferred the anonymity of the back row. Today, I would have a classroom assistant allocated to me because of my dyslexia but dyslexia hadn’t been invented then and so I was just one of the thicko’s that headmistress Sister Hewitt would constantly express her disappointment in.

Henrik was pleased to be at the front because he wanted to learn. He was a clever kid and seemed to know the answer to everything. He had jet black hair and a Polish surname that I would never be able to spell properly. He told me he lived with his Mother and that his Dad had been a Polish Air Force pilot who was killed in the war. It was only later I realised that like me, he was born in 1948, meaning the war had been over for at least two years when he was conceived. I didn't know much about conception at the time except Sister Hewitt told us that Jesus was an immaculate conception but I didn't understand that either. 

We both loved comics and would talk about the Eagle, which was our favourite, especially Dan Dare’s adventures fighting the Mighty Mekon. Neither of us was very good at sports. I was clumsy, he was totally uninterested. He ended up going to the Grammar School and I went to the Technical College. Education was strictly divided in those days. Newcastle was a huge engineering hub. The massive Armstrong Munitions factory was spread along the west part of the city and along its banks  to the east were shipyard after shipyard. They were all fed with the Iron ore that came down from the hills around and coal that was dug out from below. 

Everything was based on the needs of industry. Clever kids went to the grammar school. They would be the managers, designers and engineers, we were the factory fodder who would build the ships and tanks, smelt the steel and together make the Burghers of the city wealthy.

We lived only a few streets apart and I would often spend my weekends at his house. Our small terrace house was overcrowded with my brothers and sisters, he was an only child living with his mother. She worked for the local council, I’m not sure what she did there. He also lived with his Grandma who did the cooking. Her specialty was a  Bigos (beegoss) stew with dumplings. It was nothing like the stews my mother used to make which were made with chewy beef. It was hot and spicy with pork, pepper, garlic and paprika and something I later found out was sauerkraut. Babka, that’s what he called his grandmother, had a strange accent and her english wasnt very good and at first she was hard to understand. I liked her. She taught me to cook. It turned out that I wasn’t bad at cooking. Babka said I had a nose for it. She would say don’t taste it first, smell it. She would then ask me to identify the different ingredients, taught me how to build layers of flavour and when I got it right she would praise me and kiss me on the head and call me her  Myszko (Misscof) . She said she was proud of me and so far in my life no one, not even my own mother had ever done that. Babka knew what she was doing, and her recipes would definitely make her proud as well. Borscht, or beetroot soup, were always on the menu, along with mashed potato–stuffed dumplings called pierogi. She also taught me a thousand things to do with a cabbage from stuffed rolls to an egg noodle and bacon sauté. Kielbasa, the king of smoked sausages, was also a must. Alongside recipes she taught me a little of her language, one word at a time.

That was my weekend, I would go to his place and Babka and I would cook. Henrik would practise his guitar and when he was eleven his mother bought him a second hand upright piano. It didn’t take him long to master that as well. I loved the fact he filled the house with the sound of the guitar or the piano although at first he was a bit rubbish. 

On Saturday mornings we would get the bus into the city centre and go to the music shop and there he would buy sheet music with his pocket money. They had a large Steinway grand piano in the window of the store and he would sometimes play it. Eddie who ran the shop would encourage him to play and Henrik loved to show off. The adults were always saying nice things to him and he lapped it up.  One Saturday we arrived to find the piano had gone and in its place was a long bench filled with boxes of 45 inch records and a little booth where you could put on headphones and listen to the music. The two of us would cram into the booth. He would listen on one side of the headphones and I was on the other. Soon, the talk changed from comics to records. This was the 60s and our world was changing. In 1963 we were both fourteen when we first heard “Please Please Me” by the Beatles. We both looked at each other and we both grinned so hard I thought our ears would fall off. 

After the store we would go to Eldon Square. It was a grassy area in the heart of the city. All the young people would gather there. Sometimes people would bring guitars and we would sing along to Cliff Richard, Buddy Holly and of course the Beatles songs. One Saturday he brought his guitar down as well. Immediately I could see he was a cut above the others and soon the crowd would gather around him and everyone would join in the singing. I had never heard him sing before and he actually had a great voice. It boomed out and even with twenty other kids singing his voice soared above them. One day he sang a song called “Today is the Beginning” I had never heard it before and neither had anyone else. It was a bit like a Beatles song with a bit of Buddy Holly thrown in. The crowd lapped it up and there was a huge round of applause when he finished. All the girls crowded around him wanting to know whose song it was.He told them he had written it. They were definitely impressed.

As we got the bus back home and I asked him if it really was his song and he said yes it was and he had written a lot more, It was soon after that he went to University and we lost touch for a while. I went to the local catering college and eventually passed my exams and got a job in the kitchens of a local hotel. It was hard work and the hours were long but I loved it. The buzz of the kitchens, the energy and the comradiee of the chefs was amazing. I was really lucky as the head chef was French and he took a real shine to me. He liked my attitude and asked who taught me to cook like that and I told him about Babka. From that moment on he took me under his wing and eventually I became the sous chef in one of the best restaurants in Newcastle. 

I met my wife there as well. She ran the front of house, her name was Anna and she was from Poland. I impressed her with my polish but when I said I was Babka’s little  Myszko (Misscof), she laughed and I asked her what was funny as it meant “good boy” she told me it meant “little mouse”. I didn’t mind though and after that it was her pet name for me. We were married 12 months after we met in the Catholic Cathedral in Newcastle. We had such a brilliant day. As it was a Monday and the restaurant was closed, the Chef let me have it for the reception. Anna’s family came from Poland and with Babka the woman took over the kitchen and made a banquet for us I will never forget. 

Polish food had a reputation for being basic peasant food but when it comes to showing off at a wedding their food can stand alongside the best I have ever tasted. The party began with cold appetisers - cheese and meats, pate and herring, and a vegetable tray. An hour later came - pork loin, grilled meats, smoked fish, roast chicken and even some tripe. Later, when we all thought we couldn’t eat anymore, Babka's  Bigos (beegoss) stew with dumplings arrived to a loud cheer and applause from Anna’s family. My family was also impressed. They got along really well with Anna and my Dad said he liked her because “she kept me on a tight lead”. Although my Mother never showed her feelings much she did say how beautiful Anna looked and she was glad I had smartened myself up but I could see in her face she was happy for me and that meant a lot to me. 

It was some years later when Henrik turned up at my door. He said he had dropped out of University and gone to America and joined a band. They had recorded an album at the famous Abbey Road studios. The album was called “Today was the Beginning” and he had just got the first copy and we played it together. It was in a plain sleeve and there was no track list. Despite the fact we were very different, his lyrics spoke of a changing world, the fear we all felt of the future. It was chilling and not always easy to listen to. You felt as if he knew your secret thoughts and had written songs about it. It was unlike anything I had ever heard before and I loved it. So did everyone else. It was a huge worldwide hit.

I still have that copy. I asked him to sign it for me and he laughed and said no but in the end he did. Later I had it framed and it hung on the living room wall in our house for years afterwards. It’s  hung up in my office now and is probably worth a fortune but I would never sell it. Listening to that album, that day was the last time I would see him for five years.

After that I would only see him on Top of the Pops, on the TV or in the newspapers after some bust up at a party or photographs of the endless stream of girlfriends. He also changed his name to something easier to pronounce. He was Henry now. I wrote to him often but he never replied. I had invited him to the wedding but he never came. When my son was born I asked Anna if it was ok to call him Henrik and she said yes. It’s a good Polish name, she said. I wrote to Henry and told him and asked if he would be his godfather and come to the christening. No one was more surprised than me when he turned up. He was so skinny and had a gaunt haunted look about him. His skin was sallow and he didn’t look well at all. 

In the small hours of the morning we talked. He said his  life seemed out of control, constantly touring, recording and interviews. He knew he took far too many drugs but it seemed like the only way to keep going. I asked him why he had to keep going like that when it was probably killing him. He didn’t answer for a while. Then he said no one had ever asked me that question before. Then he added that It feels obvious but at the moment you have no choice.

He said he envied my life and was so pleased and honoured to be Henrick’s godfather. I asked him to stay with us for a while and get some medical help. He nodded and said he would think about it.

When we got up in the morning he was gone.

A year or so later, I saw in the press that the band had split up and he was in rehab somewhere. I got a long letter full of apologies and promises that he will make it up to me. From then on we pretty much wrote to each other once a month. I kept all the letters. He became just like his old self. For the next thirty years he would come over to see us. He loved to stay and the kids loved him. He never performed in public again but he would often get his guitar out and sing to the kids. 

He released a couple of studio albums and nearly every great name in music recorded one of his songs: Dolly, Johnny Cash, Sting, loads of them. He had a studio in his beach side house in the Bahamas. There he would write and people would come to record tracks but every summer he would take two weeks off and for the next thirty years he would come over to see us. He loved to stay and the kids loved him. Sometimes we would go to the Bahamas to see him. He got his strength back and it showed in his songs. They may have lost the edgy lyrics of his youth that were on the first album but the tenderness and feeling that came through in his later work were so beautiful, when I listened to them I would sometimes cry.

Six months ago his housekeeper went to wake him when he didn’t come down for his morning coffee. He had died in his sleep. He was seventy years old. The coroner's inquest said it was heart failure. I guess the years of drug abuse had taken its toll. He had never married and had no children. His house and all his future royalties were donated to a charity he ran with Dolly Parton to help educate the children of the West Indies in particular to encourage and support music teaching across the islands.

The rest of his estate went to me with a large proportion in trust for Henrick and his sister Emma to be used for their education. The rest I used to start up our own restaurant. Anna is in front of house and I run the brigade in the kitchen. I named it “Wisnesky” in memory of my friend. We served traditional Polish food but with a British twist. The food is seasonal but there is always a  Bigos (beegoss) stew on the menu.

Henrick Wisnesky (Henry Wise) 1948-2018