Although it was the Scots-Irish who put the yin in our yinz, and the Germans who gave us Iron City and whose descendants here claim ancestral ties more than any other European tribe, it’s hardly a reach to suggest that no ethnic groups are more closely associated with Pittsburgh than Eastern Europeans, specifically the Poles.
You’d hardly guess it by looking at the local culinary scene, which is dominated by Italian, Mediterranean and Asian fare (not that Munch is complaining).
Perhaps it’s because Polish food is simpler, a bit heavy and a tad inelegant — pierogis and haluski do not exactly scream “hot date” the way, say, tapas and sangria do — or perhaps because so much of this gastronomic tradition is still kept alive in Gram’s kitchen and church basements.
After all, why eat it out when you can get it better at home?
As a pure Heinz 57 Pittsburgher, Munch claims no favorites among ethnic dishes, except for one: more. And that’s exactly what this Baghead-American got at the S&D Polish Deli in the Strip District. More. More! Dalszy!
