Menu, please
Last night, Krakovian and I went out to dinner by ourselves. (And I must note, in passing, that he violently objects to the fact that I have misspelled "Krakovian" on purpose, so that my little handful of readers will be able to pronounce it properly. In Polish, it would be Krakowian, but the "w" sounds like "v.")
By ourselves, as I was saying. We went to the center of the old city and ate at a restaurant right on the square, sitting at an outdoor table where we could watch people and enjoy the lovely summer evening. When we sat at our table, there was already a menu lying there--an English-only menu. (Restaurants in this area cater to tourists.) We looked at the menu for a few minutes, chatting quietly about what we might choose, but hadn't made any decisions when a waiter walked over and asked if we wanted to order.
Krakovian said quietly, "Nie jesteśmy gotowe," or "We're not ready," and the waiter left us alone for a moment, but immediately returned and dropped a Polish menu on the table. He thought we weren't ready to order because we couldn't understand the English menu on our table. We were highly amused by this presumption, and gratified that we did not stand out as obviously non-Polish tourists.
So we ordered from the Polish menu and left a nice tip afterward.
I also want to add that althought it is possible to eat at restaurants that charge $20 or more per person for dinner, it is also possible to eat for $4-6 per person, which is what we did.
posted by Karen G. @ 9:14 AM
2 Comments
2 Comments:
Ahh...good question! We had grilled pork chops (garnished with onions and mushrooms)--there were two on the plate. They were served with frytki (fries) and a "bukiet sałaty" or "bouquet of salad." That means a generous portion of the ever-present coleslaw, flanked by smaller servings of carrot salad and beet salad.
Being the dutiful low-carber that I am, I didn't touch the fries. I ate the pork chops and the coleslaw, and allowed myself only a taste of the carrot and beet salads. It was delicious, and with cokes and the tip, the whole thing came in under $15.
Polish coleslaw can be "white" or "red" (from red cabbage), but it can also have bits of grated carrot, parsnip, or celery root in it. It is sometimes seasoned with visible bits of herbs, and the dressing is always vinegrette-style, never mayo.
Carrot salad is usually just grated carrots, also with a vinegrette dressing, and beet salad is the same--just grated beets with some kind of dressing, and maybe some fresh dill. Polish people live on this kind of stuff. Coleslaw is a permanent addition to every meal at every restaurant, including Chinese or Mexican. That's how you know you are eating at a Polish restaurant. I've even seen places where they put in on hamburgers...
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