Polish chef wants to keep food traditions alive
When she moved to Milwaukee in 1969, Ela Wasielewski was just 20. Cooking was the only job she knew, and the thing she loved.
When her children started school, she started working in restaurants and met another Polish immigrant, Andy Wasielewski, who had roots in Lodz. In 1983, the couple opened Crocus, a Polish restaurant on S. 13th St. While Ela was in the kitchen, Andy worked the bar and shared Polish history with customers.
In 2010, the couple retired (and the restaurant closed), but Ela’s passion for Polish food continues. Sharing her recipes, she returns to Polish Fest to teach the secrets behind her recipe for Polish potato pancakes, known as placki ziemniaczne.
While she acknowledges today’s changing tastes, she also knows there’s an audience for the traditional foods of Poland. That’s why the 68-year-old gets up on stage every year and teaches, gladly handing out her recipe.
“It is time for a new generation, the younger people, to learn,” said Wasielewski. “I don’t want these recipes to be lost.”
Ela lives in Milwaukee with Andy, 75. She will be demonstrating placki ziemniaczane (potato pancakes) at 1 p.m. Saturday. (For information on additional cooking demonstrations, visit polishfest.org.)
Question: How did you get started cooking?
Answer: My mom, she was always cooking. It was only me and my brother, and he didn’t eat meat. So she always cooked something for him and something else for us. That interested me, and I started working with her in the kitchen.
How did you end up cooking Polish food in Milwaukee?
I came to Milwaukee when I was 20 years old. I have kids, so after they started going to school I started looking for a job, around 1979. I went to culinary school in Poland, so I was looking for a job in restaurants. Because of my language I started as a cook. I met Andy, and we opened Crocus in 1983. I have more skill with the Polish food.
Q: What are some of your favorite memories of meals?
A: For Polish Fest and Summerfest, we’d make 35,000 pierogi. One year, somebody broke in to the garage. They stole the pierogi (from the freezer) in the middle of the night. They’re all made by hand. We had to make them all again.
We bought the place on 13th Street, and I came up with the idea of preparing a Christmas eve carryout. There’s no meat (for the Christmas eve meal), but lots of fish. It was always popular.
We had mushroom soup, red borscht with uszka (dumplings) that look like little ravioli, sauerkraut and mushroom pierogi, Russian pierogi, Polish potato salad and croquette — a crepe with sweet filling like cabbage and mushroom — plus two kinds of fish, fried and baked.
In Poland, it is tradition to have a compote from the dried fruits, and we made this. We made kluski. It was very successful. We tried to keep up Polish traditions.
Q: How has your cooking shifted from the restaurant to home?
A: We retired in 2010. It was hard for me to go from the big pots to little pots. I always peel too many potatoes.
Q: What can people expect at your Polish Fest cooking demonstration?
A: I’m making potato pancakes. I can’t fry enough for everyone, so we do these little little pancakes so many people can try. You want to give people the pancakes when they’re fresh. If you make them ahead, they get mushy. I give out the recipe.
This will be my third time doing the potato pancakes at Polish Fest. I use potato flour, because it gets more crispy. I use two kinds of potatoes. Those are my secrets.
I want young people to start doing traditional Polish food. I don’t have a restaurant anymore to share the food and pass on what I know.
Q: What do you miss about Poland?
A: After many years living here in Milwaukee, I don’t think I’m fit for living there. I grew up in Warsaw after World War II. Last time I was there was 17 years ago. I took my granddaughter to Poland and Italy. I met all my friends in Poland. We went back and saw the apartment where I’d lived. It all looked so different.
Q: Why is it important to teach your recipes?
A: I am proud to be Polish. I want another generation to know how to cook this food. Lots of young people just go for the easy stuff, not the tradition. You have to make everything from scratch.
Q: What Polish foods are most misunderstood?
A: Polish food is like all foods, just with different spices. For example, we do sauerkraut a different way
than German tradition. It is milder, German uses more sugar. We put in onions, salt and pepper and carrot and some bacon.
Q: How have tastes changed?
A: We used to sell czarnina (a soup), but now people don’t want that as much. One time, a customer bought our czarnina and sent it to Alaska.
Q: Can you share your secret for czarnina?
A: It has duck blood, and some people just are scared to eat it. Even the older people stopped eating that soup. It is sweet and sour.
I got my recipe from Andy’s mom, my mother-inlaw. In Poland, czarnina has regions. I’m from Warsaw, we did not eat czarnina there. So it was even new for me, but it was popular here. There are people from different regions living in Milwaukee.
Q: What’s one Polish recipe everyone can learn?
A: Stuffed cabbage. That’s one all my grandkids know.
Table Chat features interviews with Wisconsinites, or Wisconsin natives, who work in restaurants or support the restaurant industry. To suggest individuals to profile, email nstohs@journalsentinel.com.