Polish Cuisine (Polish: kuchnia polska) is a mixture of Slavic and foreign culinary traditions. Born as a mixture of various culinary traditions, both of various regions of Poland and surrounding cultures, it uses a fair variety of ingredients. It is rich in meat, especially pork, cabbage (for example in the dish bigos), and spices, as well as different kinds of noodles and dumplings, the most notable of which are the pierogi. It is related to other Slavic cuisines in usage of kasza and other cereals, but was also under the heavy influence of Turkic, Germanic, Hungarian, Jewish, French, Italian or colonial cuisines of the past. Generally speaking, Polish cuisine is substantial. Poles allow themselves a generous amount of time to enjoy their meals, with some meals taking a number of days to prepare in their entirety.A typical lunch is usually composed of at least three courses, starting with a soup, such as barszcz (beet) or żurek (sour rye meal mash), followed perhaps in a restaurant by an appetizer of salmon or herring (prepared in either cream, oil, or vinegar). Other popular appetizers are various meats, vegetables or fish in aspic. The main course may be the national dish, bigos (cabbage with pieces of meat, mostly pork) or kotlet schabowy (breaded pork cutlet). Meals often conclude with a dessert such as ice cream (lody), makowiec (poppy seed cake), or drożdżówka, a type of yeast cake. Other Polish specialities include chłodnik (a chilled beet or fruit soup for hot days), golonka (pork knuckles cooked with vegetables), kołduny (meat dumplings), zrazy (stuffed slices of beef), salceson and flaczki (tripe). Many dishes contain quark.