Summer festival spotlight: Kolacky Days
Montgomery residents participate in the Kolacky Days bohemian tractor pulling event.
Maureen Franek
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Minnesota Now is continuing our summer festival spotlight series by heading south of the Twin Cities to the town of Montgomery in Le Sueur County.
This week marks the 90th anniversary of the town’s weeklong festival, Kolacky Days. Montgomery has a strong Czech background and Kolackys are a Czech pastry that is served at the festival. Looking at the list of events, it seems like they have combined five festivals into one.
Organizer Maureen Frankek joined MPR News host Cathy Wurzer to explain.
Use the audio player above to listen to the full conversation.
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Audio transcript
[POLKA MUSIC PLAYING] (SINGING) Give me a ya
Ya
Ya
Ya
Ya
Ya
Ya, you betcha
Them high life--
CATHY WURZER: [LAUGHS]
OK, going from Isaac to polka is pretty funny. And I love polka. We had to play some polka music ahead of our next segment. We are continuing our Summer Festival Spotlight Series by heading south of the Twin Cities. This week marks the 90th anniversary of Kolacky Days. It's a week-long festival in the Southern Minnesota town of Montgomery. That's in Le Sueur County.
Montgomery has a strong Czech background. I am a huge fan of kolaches. They are a Czech pastry that's served at the festival.
Looking at this list of events for this festival, it seems like they've combined, gosh, five festivals into one. To explain, Maureen Franke is-- Franek. Excuse me, Maureen Franek is here. She's an organizer of the festival. Maureen, did I get your name right? I hope I did.
MAUREEN FRANEK: You sure did. Yes. First when you said, Franke, I am not a Franke, but Franke's Bakery is the one that makes our delicious kolaches for the weekend.
CATHY WURZER: Exactly. And that's what I was-- I was going to ask you about that, because, I mean, Franke's been around for 1,000 years, right? I mean, that is the place I go to get my kolaches.
MAUREEN FRANEK: Yes. Yes, they have been around for a long time. Well over 100 years.
CATHY WURZER: Wow. So tell me about Kolacky Days. I mean, this is the 90th Kolacky Days Festival. How did this whole thing get started?
MAUREEN FRANEK: Well, it started back in 1929. And it was actually started as a harvest festival just to celebrate the end of the harvest and just a gathering. And they said if they made these kolaches, that they would get a lot of people that would come and attend. And they were certainly right about that.
The community club is the one that puts on the organization, or that puts on the festival. And our organization has been around for 101 years this year. So we're pretty proud of that, that an all volunteer group has been putting on this festival for 90 years.
CATHY WURZER: Gosh, so for folks not familiar with a kolache, there's been some debate about the pronunciation of the word, I know, depending on your cultural background. I am Polish with some Czech. So how do you pronounce them?
MAUREEN FRANEK: You are saying it right. It is kolache.
CATHY WURZER: Now, and how do you describe a kolache to someone who's never tasted them?
MAUREEN FRANEK: A kolache is made with kind of a sweet dough. So it's kind of like a dinner roll, but it has a filling in it. And the traditional fillings always were poppy seed, prune, apricot. And then apple came along quite a few years ago. And then just recently, it seems like it's just exploded into just about every flavor. There's a strawberry cream cheese, and blueberry, and even a jalapeño cream cheese one. And there's a lot of delicious flavors. So it's a little bit of a sweet roll with a filling in it.
CATHY WURZER: And do you have a favorite filling?
MAUREEN FRANEK: Well, personally, I love the poppy seed. I didn't try one until about 10 years ago, to be honest with you, but I love it. It's a real kind of a sweet filling in there. And that is actually my favorite. My second favorite is blueberry.
CATHY WURZER: Oh, for goodness sakes. Now, the poppy seed, I just can't go for it. I'm more of a apricot person, really.
MAUREEN FRANEK: OK.
CATHY WURZER: And then raspberries are not bad either, so good. I'm glad we
MAUREEN FRANEK: Raspberry has been-- raspberry has been the latest craze. We sell them all weekend long in the park, and last year we could not keep up with the raspberries. That's what everybody wanted.
CATHY WURZER: Yep. Yep. Pretty popular stuff. OK, so what are you doing for the 90th anniversary? You've got a ton of different events for Kolacky Days. So beyond eating kolaches, I see you've got the-- is this, what, the National Championship of Prune Spitting? What is that?
MAUREEN FRANEK: Yes.
[LAUGHS]
It is. And that just started a couple of years ago and it has taken off like crazy. That's on Friday night. It's a big draw for us. Everybody seems to love it. We've got different divisions of the prune spitting.
Another real fun event that we have is called the Bohemian tractor pull, and that's on Saturday. And that's where people actually pull a tractor instead of a tractor pulling something else. So we have all sorts of divisions, ladies divisions, and kids, and groups, and it really is fun. That's a fun one we have. Right.
[LAUGHTER]
We come up with all sorts of great things. We have music all weekend long. We've got some old time jamboree going on. We've got music for the younger crowd at night. We have a grand day parade on Sunday That it is huge and wonderful. We've added some fireworks to the event on Saturday night, and it's choreographed to polka music, which is super fun.
CATHY WURZER: Of course.
MAUREEN FRANEK: So there's just a little bit of something for everybody. We have a bike ride and a bun run, softball tournament, big-- we have a 25th annual car show. We've got a really great car show on Saturday on our Main Street.
CATHY WURZER: And you haven't mentioned yet--
MAUREEN FRANEK: A little bit of something for everybody.
CATHY WURZER: Oh, you do. You do. And I mentioned the kolaches, but you still have the eating contest, don't you?
MAUREEN FRANEK: We do. And that is one of the longest running events that we have. It's the kolache eating contest. And that is on Sunday. And we've got a youth division. And then one for everybody. And it's anybody is welcome to participate. And it's the person who can eat six prune kolaches the fastest, they get the title of being the Kolache King. So yeah, we really love our kolache eating contest.
CATHY WURZER: I have to say, I've gone to Kolacky Days in the past. It's a blast. It's really fun. So, Maureen, I hope you have a wonderful celebration this weekend. Thanks for joining us.
MAUREEN FRANEK: Well, thank you so much for having me.
CATHY WURZER: Maureen Franek has been with us. She's the organizer, one of the organizers of the Montgomery, Minnesota, Kolacky Days Festival.
Ya
Ya
Ya
Ya
Ya
Ya, you betcha
Them high life--
CATHY WURZER: [LAUGHS]
OK, going from Isaac to polka is pretty funny. And I love polka. We had to play some polka music ahead of our next segment. We are continuing our Summer Festival Spotlight Series by heading south of the Twin Cities. This week marks the 90th anniversary of Kolacky Days. It's a week-long festival in the Southern Minnesota town of Montgomery. That's in Le Sueur County.
Montgomery has a strong Czech background. I am a huge fan of kolaches. They are a Czech pastry that's served at the festival.
Looking at this list of events for this festival, it seems like they've combined, gosh, five festivals into one. To explain, Maureen Franke is-- Franek. Excuse me, Maureen Franek is here. She's an organizer of the festival. Maureen, did I get your name right? I hope I did.
MAUREEN FRANEK: You sure did. Yes. First when you said, Franke, I am not a Franke, but Franke's Bakery is the one that makes our delicious kolaches for the weekend.
CATHY WURZER: Exactly. And that's what I was-- I was going to ask you about that, because, I mean, Franke's been around for 1,000 years, right? I mean, that is the place I go to get my kolaches.
MAUREEN FRANEK: Yes. Yes, they have been around for a long time. Well over 100 years.
CATHY WURZER: Wow. So tell me about Kolacky Days. I mean, this is the 90th Kolacky Days Festival. How did this whole thing get started?
MAUREEN FRANEK: Well, it started back in 1929. And it was actually started as a harvest festival just to celebrate the end of the harvest and just a gathering. And they said if they made these kolaches, that they would get a lot of people that would come and attend. And they were certainly right about that.
The community club is the one that puts on the organization, or that puts on the festival. And our organization has been around for 101 years this year. So we're pretty proud of that, that an all volunteer group has been putting on this festival for 90 years.
CATHY WURZER: Gosh, so for folks not familiar with a kolache, there's been some debate about the pronunciation of the word, I know, depending on your cultural background. I am Polish with some Czech. So how do you pronounce them?
MAUREEN FRANEK: You are saying it right. It is kolache.
CATHY WURZER: Now, and how do you describe a kolache to someone who's never tasted them?
MAUREEN FRANEK: A kolache is made with kind of a sweet dough. So it's kind of like a dinner roll, but it has a filling in it. And the traditional fillings always were poppy seed, prune, apricot. And then apple came along quite a few years ago. And then just recently, it seems like it's just exploded into just about every flavor. There's a strawberry cream cheese, and blueberry, and even a jalapeño cream cheese one. And there's a lot of delicious flavors. So it's a little bit of a sweet roll with a filling in it.
CATHY WURZER: And do you have a favorite filling?
MAUREEN FRANEK: Well, personally, I love the poppy seed. I didn't try one until about 10 years ago, to be honest with you, but I love it. It's a real kind of a sweet filling in there. And that is actually my favorite. My second favorite is blueberry.
CATHY WURZER: Oh, for goodness sakes. Now, the poppy seed, I just can't go for it. I'm more of a apricot person, really.
MAUREEN FRANEK: OK.
CATHY WURZER: And then raspberries are not bad either, so good. I'm glad we
MAUREEN FRANEK: Raspberry has been-- raspberry has been the latest craze. We sell them all weekend long in the park, and last year we could not keep up with the raspberries. That's what everybody wanted.
CATHY WURZER: Yep. Yep. Pretty popular stuff. OK, so what are you doing for the 90th anniversary? You've got a ton of different events for Kolacky Days. So beyond eating kolaches, I see you've got the-- is this, what, the National Championship of Prune Spitting? What is that?
MAUREEN FRANEK: Yes.
[LAUGHS]
It is. And that just started a couple of years ago and it has taken off like crazy. That's on Friday night. It's a big draw for us. Everybody seems to love it. We've got different divisions of the prune spitting.
Another real fun event that we have is called the Bohemian tractor pull, and that's on Saturday. And that's where people actually pull a tractor instead of a tractor pulling something else. So we have all sorts of divisions, ladies divisions, and kids, and groups, and it really is fun. That's a fun one we have. Right.
[LAUGHTER]
We come up with all sorts of great things. We have music all weekend long. We've got some old time jamboree going on. We've got music for the younger crowd at night. We have a grand day parade on Sunday That it is huge and wonderful. We've added some fireworks to the event on Saturday night, and it's choreographed to polka music, which is super fun.
CATHY WURZER: Of course.
MAUREEN FRANEK: So there's just a little bit of something for everybody. We have a bike ride and a bun run, softball tournament, big-- we have a 25th annual car show. We've got a really great car show on Saturday on our Main Street.
CATHY WURZER: And you haven't mentioned yet--
MAUREEN FRANEK: A little bit of something for everybody.
CATHY WURZER: Oh, you do. You do. And I mentioned the kolaches, but you still have the eating contest, don't you?
MAUREEN FRANEK: We do. And that is one of the longest running events that we have. It's the kolache eating contest. And that is on Sunday. And we've got a youth division. And then one for everybody. And it's anybody is welcome to participate. And it's the person who can eat six prune kolaches the fastest, they get the title of being the Kolache King. So yeah, we really love our kolache eating contest.
CATHY WURZER: I have to say, I've gone to Kolacky Days in the past. It's a blast. It's really fun. So, Maureen, I hope you have a wonderful celebration this weekend. Thanks for joining us.
MAUREEN FRANEK: Well, thank you so much for having me.
CATHY WURZER: Maureen Franek has been with us. She's the organizer, one of the organizers of the Montgomery, Minnesota, Kolacky Days Festival.
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