Off The Eaten Path: Pierogi Grill

Text by JEFF HOUCK Illustrations by DAVID WILLIAMS The Tampa Tribune

Published: Jun 13, 2007

CLEARWATER - Like a lot of tourists who come to the Tampa Bay area, Marek Pietryniak fell in love with the warm weather while visiting a friend in Clearwater a few years back. The reaction was understandable, considering he was visiting from Wroclaw, an ancient city on the Odra River in southwest Poland that averages a high of only 64 degrees in the summer.

Fascinated as a young man by stories of ancient Egypt, Pietryniak opened four successful Egyptian-themed restaurants in Wroclaw in 2000. The 38-year-old restaurateur decided to open a similar Middle Eastern eatery in Clearwater last June.

He bought a former diner on high-traffic Gulf-to-Bay Boulevard and painted the exterior to look like golden desert sand. Then he filled the interior with Egyptian decor and the menu with exotic dishes. His new restaurant's name: Piramida.

But Pietryniak didn't anticipate his American customers' diminished appetite for Middle Eastern cuisine, caused, in part, by their distaste over terrorism and war in that region.

The few customers who did come told him they loved the few Polish dishes he featured on the menu, including pierogies, the dumplings from his native country that are usually filled with mashed potatoes, meats or cheeses.

So on Valentine's Day, the name was switched to Pierogi Grill and the menu was transformed. Other than the one Chicken Shawarma dish, most of the offerings include such Eastern European dishes as schabovy (breaded pork cutlet with mushroom sauce), golabki (stuffed cabbage rolls), golonko (roasted pork shank) and kiszka (black barley Polish sausage with onion).

The response from locals with a Polish background and among the culinary curious has been strong.

"It was an accident with the pierogi thing on the menu," says Zofia Boron, a Polish-born restaurant manager who acts as an English interpreter for Pietryniak. "We thought we'd try it out, see how it goes. People started to ask, 'Oh, you have pierogies; why don't you have more Polish food?' A lot of people made us to change."

NEW IDENTITY

The "Piramida" (pyramid in Polish) name remains on the sign along Gulf-to-Bay Boulevard, despite the removal of the Middle Eastern food from the menu. Hieroglyphics are still painted on the exterior (including on the walls surrounding the garbage bins). But Polish flags fly outside adjacent to the Pierogi Grill sign, indicating to passing motorists what kind of food is served inside.

"It was easier to change the name and the menu than to change the decor," Pietryniak says.

DECONSTRUCTING THE PIEROGI

Just about every country in Eastern Europe has claimed to be the birthplace of the pierogi. The tender dumplings are served hot with cheese, meat, sauerkraut or mushrooms, but some variations include cottage cheese and fruit. The most popular is mashed potatoes. The name pierogi traces to the Slavic word "pir," which means "festivity."

NOT FANCY FOOD

The recipes Pietryniak uses are family ones he grew up eating. "Pieorgies are no big deal, just time-consuming," Boron says. "That's why we didn't make it Polish food in Poland. Everybody has that type of food there. Here, it's different. There is no Polish restaurant around in the neighborhood."

During lunch, the restaurant serves a "12 Mix," which includes two samples of potato and cheese, potato and cheddar, kraut and mushrooms, meat, spinach and a maltaschen (think German ravioli).

"Everything made from scratch, but it's not fancy food," Boron says. "Everything is handmade. Nothing is pre-made. Everything has to be authentic."

The best seller? "Pierogi, No. 1," Pietryniak says.

KING MAREK

Marek Pietryniak customized the restaurant almost single-handedly. He carved the hieroglyphics in the floor tile. He built a beautiful chestnut bar. He painted the interior walls to look like the inside of an Egyptian pyramid. And he commissioned a life-size statue of a pharaoh that is carved in his own likeness. It stands in a hallway between the men's and women's restrooms. A painting in the bar of a pharaoh's bust also features Pietryniak's face.

ALL IN THE DETAILS

Pietryniak waited 18 months for county and city permits to be approved. To fill his time, he shifted his attention to the small accents, from the pyramid-shaped salt and pepper shakers and napkin holders on each table to the custom-designed, obelisk-shaped lamps that hang over the restaurant's booths and tables. Much of it was imported from a supplier he used in Poland for his other restaurants. How did he accomplish it all?

"I had 18 months. I had to do something!" he says.

PIEROGI GRILL

ADDRESS: 1535 Gulf-to-Bay Blvd, Clearwater

PHONE: (727) 216-3055

HOURS: 11 a.m. to 10 p.m. every day

MENU: Pierogies, borsh (soup with meat dumplings), krokiety (crepes stuffed with meat and sauerkraut), Polish zurek (soup with potatoes sausage and eggs), Polish shish kebab, pyzy (nine round dumplings filled with meat or cheese), gulasz y kopytkami (beef stew with finger dumplings), bigos (beef and sausage stew mixed with sauerkraut and cabbage, served in a bread bowl) and American salads and appetizers