I would be very interested to know where Brinna got her authentic recipe. All four of my grandparents were Polish immigrants, and my parents went to a Polish church and had many Polish friends. I am 71, and have eaten literally thousands of babkas in my life, made by various individuals from all parts of Poland. I have never tasted one even remotely like Brinna's recipe, nor one soaked in any kind of syrup, including rum! Babka is a very old Easter bread, and the Polish peasants who made it would not have even heard of rum, in all likelihood. Your recipe sounds much more to me like a huge baba au rhum, and given the similarities of the words "babka" and "baba," it occurs to me that Brinna may have confused the two. Babka is definitely a bread and the sweetness level does vary among Polish bakers. Sometimes the bread has a cinnamon swirl, a chocolate swirl, a "swirl" of sweetened farmer's cheese, or a layer of almond paste, but no rum! It is also possible that Brinna's recipe is a modern one, given many changes by a modern baker to accommodate modern American tastes. However, to me, "authentic" is synonymous with "old, original, traditional." I'm sure your recipe is delicious, but surely not traditional. It is also interesting to me that no one has commented on your website that your recipe is the same as their Babcia's, which they surely would if it were, in fact, authentic.

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