The Something Russian Festival hasn’t happened as a fall event for a couple years due to the pandemic, but volunteers at St. Nicholas Orthodox Church in Mogadore continue to share their Slavic food specialties with the community through a monthly drive-thru.
The next one is Tuesday, and a kielbasa and sauerkraut dinner ($16), pierogi dinner ($14) and Natasha’s honey cake ($6) are on the menu. The smoked sausage is an old country recipe served with sauerkraut, or kapusta, that’s simmered in bacon and onions. Parsley potatoes, applesauce, a roll and butter also come on the side.
The pierogi dinner features six homemade dumplings filled with fresh mashed potatoes and cheese, topped with butter and onions. Sides include sour cream, green beans, applesauce, roll and butter.
National Pierogi Day is Oct. 8, so just in case you want more pierogis for later, the church sells a dozen frozen homemade pierogi for $14.
To top things off, the multi-layer honey cake is made with caramelized honey and a sour cream and whipped cream frosting.
It’s all lovingly homemade by volunteers sharing their ethnic fare. Also offered is homemade chicken noodle soup for $13 and frozen vegetable beef soup by the quart for $14.
The drive-thru, which takes the place of the food portion of the Something Russian Festival, happens the first Tuesday of each month, except during Lent, when the church offers Friday fish fries. Ordering is available now at marketplace.stnickoca.org/food/. New customers must create an account to order.
Online orders will be taken until 8 p.m. Monday for Tuesday’s drive-through pickup, which is from 4:30 to 6 p.m. under the banquet center portico at 755 S. Cleveland Ave., Mogadore.
The menu rotates each month, with a cabbage roll (halupki) dinner as well as a halushki dinner (cabbage, homemade noodles and onions) offered Nov. 1. Pierogi dinners and kolachi nut rolls will be offered Dec. 6.
Other ethnic specialties on the rotating monthly menu are chicken kiev, borscht soup, blini, poonchki, potato pancakes and cevapcici sausages.
As a bonus, parish volunteers will sell trays of an assortment of homemade Christmas cookies Dec. 20, which include lady locks, cream horns, Russian tea cookies, kifli cookies, decorated cutouts and more.
Longtime volunteer Mia Rohweder will be making halushki in November, which she says often sells out. Desserts also tend to sell out.
Rohweder’s mother, RoseMarie “Ruza” Vronick and Hope Zemlansky, were co-chairs of the church’s first Something Russian Festival in the early 1970s, when Rohweder was 4 years old. Rohweder reports that her mother’s dessert, Ruza’s rice pudding, is “absolutely to die for.”
Parishioners take turns making the desserts, which are often a tribute to favorite family recipes and those who’ve passed them down.
“Some of the (dessert) items that we’re offering are a nod to our own parishioners,” Rohweder said.
Twenty-five to 30 church volunteers make the Slavic food drive-thru happen each month.
The public hasn’t been able to see the ethnic wares, dance, balalaika playing or pysanky egg-making demos live at the festival for a couple years. But St. Nicholas also sells pysanky eggs, Russian teas, church choir CDs, cultural gifts, religious items and books on its online marketplace at marketplace.stnickoca.org/products.
“We’re trying to build more of an online presence and an online brand,” Rohweder said.
Source : Akron Beacon Journal