Abstract: The issue addressed in the following text has been the subject of research for a long time now, but it has only relatively recently become an element of practical management, as local and regional cuisine is increasingly oft en used for marketing, tourism product development and for supporting regional and local entrepreneurship. The text is divided into two parts: in the first part, the author presents a brief history of Polish cuisine. The second part focuses on the contemporary usage of culinary heritage in many contexts, including regional policy.

Key words: culinary heritage, management, regional policy, food and wine studies, regional development

When perusing a restaurant menu for a dish that could be recommended to a foreigner as typically Polish, we may find a few staples such as kotlet schabowy (a pork breaded cutlet), żur or żurek (sour rye soup) or bigos (meat and sauerkraut stew). Then, a question comes to mind about which dish is the most characteristic of Polish cuisine, which is a tradition or part of the heritage, for how long certain traditions been around and how certain foods with long traditions have evolved over the years or centuries. This issue has been the subject of research for a long time now, but it has only relatively recently become an element of practical management, as local and regional cuisine is increasingly oft en used for marketing, tourism product development and for supporting regional and local entrepreneurship.

The aforementioned pork breaded cutlet has various marketing names and is served with different extras that are to make a particular cutlet stand out from the crowd of other chops prepared according to the same recipe. It may be served “under the blanket” of cheese or mushrooms, with gravy, or with garlic butter, the latter being particularly popular today. In principle, however, it is prepared in the same fashion across the country – it is a fried piece of pork coated with breadcrumbs. It, most probably, dates back to the 19th century and is certainly mentioned in one of the most well-known cookbooks of that period. The book's author, Lucyna Ćwierciakiewiczowa, allows for both breadcrumbing a piece of meat with the obligatory bone (today, the bone is typically removed) or frying it without such coating.