The first Friday of the month from 5pm to 8pm is Perogy Night down at the Ukrainian Orthodox Cathedral, and it’s every bit as awesome as it sounds. First of all, PEROGIES. Second of all, it’s in a cathedral, which makes it feel somehow more purposeful than usual perogy eatin’.

I was excited. I had heard there would certainly be a line up, so I showed up as early as possible to get a leg up on the carby goodness. The line was already maybe 15 deep when I arrived at 6pm, and it managed to expand little by little as we continued to wait in line. I felt my stomach cannibalizing itself as I listened to a guy behind me explain the whole concept to his friend, emphasizing how delicious the perogies are. Okay guy, I know how great they are, quit making me hungrier than I already am.

We got up to the entrance, and were met by someone who took us to our table. We were instructed to write our name on our placemats, fill in the little order sheet, and wait in line to get the food. Guess what I ordered!

It sounded pretty organized at first, but as we waited in line for our food, it seemed somewhat inefficient as we were waiting a significant amount of time for our food while our dining spots were hogged by our placemats.

The venue gave off a dance hall vibe. There was a stage up front where, surprisingly, there were some additional tables set up also. I imagined eating up there on stage was probably a lot like being a bride/groom at a wedding reception: pretty awkward, and worrying about food all over your face.

The dinner assembly line was cute. Traversing from one end to the other, your plate would magically fill up depending on your order. Mine, of course, was the Super Dinner, so I had everything and some more. Wink. I also inadvertently stole a piece of bread at the end of the line without thinking about it. Dear Ukrainian Orthodox Cathedral, I have sinned and taken your bread. Sorry.

This is the borsch: fun to say, fun to look at, also probably fun to throw at people. I’m not a big fan of beets so I didn’t have any. I don’t have any particular opinion about borsch except hey, if the name has a sometimes t (borsch? borscht?) it just makes everyone’s life more difficult.

This is the money. Check it out: perogies piled perilously paving path to passion and.. peristalsis? Let’s see what we’ve got goin’ on. We got some sauerkraut action there, nice, nice, that generous, sexy dollop of sour cream, and of course! That illegitimate slice of bread that was never meant to be there. The blurry misshapen lumps in the background were the amazing cabbage rolls and the sausage (not actually blurry and misshapen). Nom. It was a massive plate and I took about half of it home, and had it the next day. So good.

There was also dessert. Carrot cake, to be exact. There was a bit of flip-flopping between our group on whether to get the carrot cake or not; but it was just all posturing. We knew we had to have a slice each. And my friends, it was good. I didn’t know what to expect beyond the tiny little frosting carrot on top, but oh, it was yummy.

Proof.

In the midst of my near-hallucinogenic food coma I couldn’t resist doodling on the placemat. It eventually got out of control.

Now I know how difficult it is to positively portray perogies on paper. Stimulating the tibbidy creativity, my friend began to fold up her placemat into a paper crane.

A… Ukrane/Ucrane/Ucraine if you will.

To make the joke more obvious I wrote it on the crane, but ended up making a damn fool of myself. I was in the middle of writing an E when it turned into a K. Oh, the disaster. Oh, the embarrassment. Hijinks and hilarity had by all.

All is good again. Except now, I’ve finished all my perogies and I’m pining for the next time this thing is happening again. They do takeouts and they do have limits – next time, I will, in a manner of speaking, take it (out) to the limit. Tibbidy OUT

» Friday Night Suppers at Ukrainian Orthodox Cathedral on 154 East 10th