April 19, 2014

A lot of people don't realize this, but Polish food is a thing in Cleveland. I remember school lunches in elementary school where we'd get pierogies and kielbasa. So when I moved to New York and my sister took me to places like Odessa, and Veselka I was incredibly happy to be in a place where I could get a fix of the kind of stuff that's always been a comfort food for me. My favorite of these places was Krolewskie Jadlo in Greenpoint, translated as "King's Feast" apparently. You'll know it from the suit of armor out front.

When I decided to leave New York I made a list of places I'd miss that I wanted to hit again (I surprisingly didn't take a lot of pictures as I was checking places off), and this place was one of the first I thought about. On the menu I believe this is listed as "The Fuckton of Polish Food" but I could be mistaken. Blood sausage, stuffed cabbage, pierogies, roasted pork shoulder, grilled chicken, kielbasa, roasted potatoes, grilled pork, and (out of frame) three kinds of slaw. It's probably for the best they didn't bring out the customary bread and lard to start.

I knew I was going to be stepping into something like this when I decided to meet up with Josh and Christine so I made the choice to walk the two miles from my apartment. It was a nice day, the anticipatory calorie burn was nice, and it gave me a chance to take a long look at that stretch of Brooklyn. And what a weird look it was. Not the whole walk, of course. Just the stretch of Bedford Ave. running through North Williamsburg. I still remember my first trip down that stretch of street when I moved here. Ryan, Kenny, Kat and I had just finished unloading a moving truck into my apartment and were looking for some food. We stopped in to say hi to my sister at the Greenpoint Tavern and walked up to Muggs for some inattentive service and burgers. There were dive bars everywhere, and patrons of dive bars everywhere.

Not anymore.

I remember there used to be this bar called Cyn, which was a hole. It was dank, the bathroom didn't lock, and Ryan and I used to go there often-ish because they had $1 PBRs and a large patio for smoking in the back. There's a bakery there now, and as I walked past it on my way to the restaurant, dodging foot traffic like I was in SoHo, I saw a some European tourists shepherding their children up the block. And that's becoming Brooklyn now. Cheap, grimey, homey places ousted for million dollar condos and tourism dollars. At least the GPT was still there. That place will change over Rosemary's cold, dead body.