About this Event
Pittsburgh and Pierogies have a rich, delicious history! We are so thrilled to host Anna D. Jaroszyńska-Kirchmann at The Whale to celebrate her new book, Pierogi: An American Story of Polish Food! Interweaving academic research, cookbooks, interviews with culinary experts, ethnographic observations, and personal memories, Pierogi is perfect for foodies, historians, and proud Pittsburghers! Anna D. Jaroszyńska-Kirchmann will be joined in conversation by dear friend of White Whale, Andrew Moore.
Today, pierogi are the most recognizable Polish food in the United States and a symbol of Polish American identity. How did this humble dish attain such lofty status?
Anna D. Jaroszyńska-Kirchmann explores the surprising history of pierogi, tracing how Polish cuisine evolved in the multiethnic landscape of the United States. When Polish immigrants crossed the ocean, they brought with them their traditional cuisine, which came to signify enduring attachment to homeland, family, religion, and culture. In time, they as well as new generations and new immigrant waves gradually transformed Polish American culinary culture, reflecting food trends and changes in the United States, Poland, and the world.
Pierogi takes readers into the kitchens where Polish American families, friends, and community organizations carry on the custom of cooking and eating together. Jaroszyńska-Kirchmann highlights small- and large-scale pierogi producers who adapted traditional dishes for the US market and food celebrities who mainstreamed them, and she traces the symbolic representation of pierogi in popular culture. She also shares personal stories, from her family’s resourcefulness in communist-era Poland facing near-constant food shortages to her experiences as an immigrant to the United States in the 1980s. Drawing on sources from historical and recent cookbooks to interviews with Polish American entrepreneurs and community members, this book offers new insights for anyone interested in East Central European and American foodways.
Andrew Moore is an environmental journalist and author from Pittsburgh. His new book, The Beasts of the East: The Fall and Rise of America’s Eastern Wilderness, a history of rewilding elk, bison, and red wolves in the eastern United States, was published by Mariner Books this summer. He is also the author of Pawpaw: In Search of America’s Forgotten Fruit, a James Beard Foundation Award finalist in Writing & Literature. His work has appeared in the The Washington Post, The Allegheny Front, and The Daily Yonder; and he has written an introduction to the forthcoming The Pocket History of Pączki (by Natalia Mętrak-Ruda), a chronicle of the long and delicious journey of pączki from Warsaw to Polish-American bakeries.
Anna D. Jaroszyńska-Kirchmann is Distinguished Professor of History and CSU Professor Emerita at Eastern Connecticut State University. She is the author of The Exile Mission: The Polish Political Diaspora and Polish Americans, 1939–1956 (2004) and The Polish Hearst: Ameryka-Echo and the Public Role of the Immigrant Press (2015) and coeditor of Polish American Voices: A Documentary History, 1608–2020 (2024), among other books. Jaroszyńska-Kirchmann is editor in chief of the journal Polish American Studies and past president of the Polish American Historical Association
Event venue & nearby stays
White Whale Bookstore, 4754 Liberty Avenue, Pittsburgh, United States
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