Why are Polish restaurants not successful in the USA?

OK, that's true, Polish food, however some of it doesn't taste bad, seems to be pretty heavy indeed.

Not really. The older Polish cuisine uses barley, buckwheat, millet, and all kinds of healthy grains. The problem with it is that the food is not so diverse. It's just poor peasants food. Then you have the noble people's food which includes a lot of game.

Listen, Polish cuisine is excellent, it just has to be promoted properly, meaning the restaurant owner must be committed to serving the public in a tasteful and courteous manner...Couple of the joints in Philadelphia don't even keep evening hours, so of course, how can you eat there?

The place in Chicago, what is it 'Smulasz', hell, the menu looks great: I would eat there once a week for sure...You can get a drink there,too...You want some kinda 'fusion cuisine' made by a hyper fag and a staff ready to have a nervous breakdown, don't go to a Polish joint.

Here's one place in Philly that is right downtown, keeps regular evening hours and has very good food:

warsawcafe.thekalon.com/menu.php

If you can't say anything good, don't say anything. This is only your thinking, if that is what you want to call it. Let all think for them selfs, you are no expert.

Mike

What's Italian water ice? I know I've never heard (or seen in Italy) of Italian sausage being grilled with onions.

Funnily enough, I actually quite like the Polish interpretation of Chinese food - yes, even including the obligatory surowki. It can be a bit strange sometimes, but on the whole, it's actually not bad.


But hardly any of it is actually Polish. I don't recall ever seeing "Russian Crepes" (!), "Austrian Lamb Stew" (Lamb? In Poland?), "Norwegian Strudel" (err) or "Borscht" (.....seriously, A 'Polish' place calling it that?) on a menu in a traditional Polish restaurant here.

PennBoy is right - the food has stayed as it is, and for that reason, it'll never do well in America.

I'm listening man and I don't blame you for feeling that way as you are a Pole but Polish cuisine is not everyone's choice, that's for sure. As I said earlier, some of it is really good but certain foods are terrible to even look at it, not to mention to taste it or smell it (flaki).

When you have italian,spanish,greek,french,lebanese and turkish restaurants the competition is so high that other cuisines are not in place to compete simply the bar is too high and can be only undercut by cheap food like chinese or mexcan.

Mostly what you see is Mexican/South American and Asian outside the larger cities. There's plenty of pizza places and a few Italian restaraunt chains. Hardly ever see any French, Turkish or Lebanese. There's room for Polish if a brave soul started a franchise.

Yesterday I made a bunch of gołąbki for my monthly party.
People were putting hot sauces on them.
I think Americans kill their taste buds.

In Japan I've seen people put wasabi on a steak, tried it myself but didn't like it.

PS. The term "monthly party" sounds very exclusive to us men. ;)

Hm.. I didn't think of it this way.
I have an open house on every third Friday of the month. It started with trying to limit my friends from popping in unexpectedly (and a motivation to get my house in shape once a month) to a houseband, vats of food and general liability concerns..

They love spicy stews; I did gumbo, curry, chillis, chowders, goulashes. All as long there is some heat to it.
But anything with minimal seasoning they find bland.

I like select Polish foods like Kielbasa with Koscziuszko mustard.

I like Pierogis too.

Here Brazil's Broadway Paulo Szot and Martha Stewart are making pierogies. They are both of Polish ancestry.

youtube.com/watch?v=PxVAaRqb59U

I like the way Martha makes them :)

All looks very yummy, especially that Paulo ;)

Oh man.

MediaWatch. Seriously.

The plural of pieróg is pierogi. We also don't call it Pierogi, as it's not a proper noun. Honestly - learn! Even Martha got it right! (edit : no she didn't, she lapsed into that age-old mistake)


Oh jeez. Kiełbasa isn't a 'food', it's simply the Polish name for sausage.

Embarrassing, especially for someone who claims to be Polish.


You actually want to claim a lying criminal as being Polish? We don't think so.

Cough; You call that a criminal act? Getting a stock tip from an insider friend happens all the time in the circles she moves in. Nothing unusual there, what's different is that she was proven guilty of telling few white lies once caught. LOL

Insider trading is pretty much the norm, unlike prosecution in those cases which are rare indeed.

Damn, it seems as some people just come here looking for a fight.

Ever watch Tool Time? There's an episode where Tim Allen gets a stomach ache, after eating Polish food. Perhaps the idea of staying away from Polish food hit some of the television audience?

Why go to a Polish restaurant when boiling cabbage and diced potato with sauted keilbasa is about as simple as home cooking gets. Not complicated and so not worth the markup. Hams are the only cross cultural offering.

Kielbasa is a Polish sausage. They are different from other sausage types at the grocery store. It's a shortening of Polska Kielbasa. Because the word is Polish, the implication is there.

Yea I remember that episode. The stuff you can buy here in Polish restaurants is not the same. Was in a Polish restaurant in Brooklyn last week tasted ok, I wasn't wowed by any of it. Remember when in the Polish countryside my grandmother cooked home made food from their own hormone free meats and fresh vegetables, it was like heaven in your mouth. Whatever she made rosół, kaczka pieczona, kapusta, ruskie pierogi, wonderful sauces made from wild mushrooms even the potatoes that she poured it over tasted so good.

Is it because the ingredients aren't as good, or is it just that the restaurants aren't up to much?

Nah it was a pretty good restaurant (maybe because i didn't bother adding salt lol) It was pretty neutral in taste because unlike fast-foods, Chinese take out in particular , they don't add flavour enhancing MSG. Polish food grow and raised in the countryside when natural doesn't feed that stuff to taste good.

Had my Cajun pierogi the other night down the shore. Yum. It's become somewhat of a routine every time I go there now.

The question is, which one of them (Poland, Russia, Germany, The Netherlands, England, Scotland or Belgium) sells better in the US (I know, most of you won't like the answer).

But is it a Polish word?

Wikipedia mentions the word has Turkish origin?

"...In the United States, the form kielbasa (usually /kiːlˈbɑːsə/ or /kɪlˈbɑːsə/) is more often used and comes from the Polish kiełbasa [kʲewˈbasa] "sausage", perhaps a derivation from the Turkic kül bastï "grilled cutlet"..."

en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Kielbasa

Here's the Urban Dictionary version. I must say I like the explanation #2. :-))

urbandictionary.com/define.php?term=kielbasa

Italian, then Chinese, Mexican and so on..

I meant, out of that bunch but if count those too, I'd have to say (in NC) Mexican, Chinese and then Italian.

You're probably gonna say German but i'd say English (British). Our American breakfast of bacon and eggs, potatoes, toast bread has it's origin in the UK. Hot roast beef, hash browns, baked beans, different kinds of soups and pastries.

OK but I'm talking about real restaurants PB.

Probably German but that


was a very limited list to choose from. There are far more Italian, Chinese, Greek, Japanese (hibachi & sushi) Mexican restaurants. Indian and Turkish are becoming very numerous especially here in the Northeast.