This weekend Montgomery celebrates the kolacky and Holy Trinity Catholic Church in Litomysl sells their very popular buchty.  It's the 84th year for Kolacky Days and the 47th Summer Festival in Liomysl.  For years I have attended both celebrations and really didn't see a huge difference between the two delicious treats so I thought once and for all I would find out.  You can help me with this because I don't believe everything I read.

The Merriam-Webster dictionary defines kolacky as a variant of kolach and simply defines it as, "a bun made of rich sweet yeast-leavened dough filled with jam or fruit pulp."  It says kolacky is the plural along with kolaches.  Organizers for both events this weekend explained to KDHL listeners during broadcasts of AM MInnesota Thursday and Friday what they believe is the difference.  For sure they are related.

The difference as I understand are the fully enclosed buns are buchty and the open faced are kolacky.  The words are the plural version of buchta and kolach.  Buchta is Czech for "small roll" or "small cake."

However Dictionary.com says a kolache is, "a sweet bun filled with jam or pulped fruit."  Wikipedia says  it's, "a type of pastry that holds a portion of fruit, surrounded by a puffy cushion of supple dough."  Which tells me it's not open-faced.

Jim Mladek, former Mayor of Montgomery told us on today's AM Minnesota program the kolacky were originally open-faced but when workers had them in their lunch boxes the fruit would be all over when the box was moved so they added the small layer of pastry to the top to keep the fruit inside.

Kolo means "circle" or "wheel" in Czech and that describes their shape originally.  tasteofprague.com describes both (kolacky and buchty) coming from the Czech Republic.

Kolacky from Franke's Bakery Montgomery, Mn. Photo by Gordy Kosfeld
Kolacky from Franke's Bakery Montgomery, Mn. Photo by Gordy Kosfeld
loading...
Buchty from Holy Trinity Catholic Church Litomysl, Mn. Photo by Gordy Kosfeld
Buchty from Holy Trinity Catholic Church Litomysl, Mn. Photo by Gordy Kosfeld
loading...

When in Montgomery I stopped by Frankie's Bakery for their famous kolacky (apple is my favorite) and when I was in Litomysl Thursday they were nice enough to give me some apricot buchty to take home.  I took pictures of each at the radio station.

Franke's Bakery Montgomery, Mn. "Kolacky Capital of the World." Photo by Gordy Kosfeld
Franke's Bakery Montgomery, Mn. "Kolacky Capital of the World." Photo by Gordy Kosfeld
loading...
Holy Trinity Catholic Church Litomysl, Mn. photo by Gordy Kosfeld
Holy Trinity Catholic Church Litomysl, Mn. photo by Gordy Kosfeld
loading...

More From KRFO-AM