{"id":390080,"date":"2025-11-19T14:30:14","date_gmt":"2025-11-19T14:30:14","guid":{"rendered":"https:\/\/www.europesays.com\/us\/390080\/"},"modified":"2025-11-19T14:30:14","modified_gmt":"2025-11-19T14:30:14","slug":"polished-up-chicago-magazine","status":"publish","type":"post","link":"https:\/\/www.europesays.com\/us\/390080\/","title":{"rendered":"Polished Up \u2013 Chicago Magazine"},"content":{"rendered":"<p>\n\t\t<strong>Maplewood Lounge<\/strong><br \/><strong>2717 N. Maplewood Ave.<\/strong><br \/><strong>Avondale<\/strong>\n\t<\/p>\n<p class=\"hours\"><strong>Hours<\/strong> <\/p>\n<p class=\"perfect-order\"><strong>Perfect order<\/strong> Pork butter, fall pub salad, lazy dumplings<\/p>\n<p>Maplewood, a brewery and distillery, has long been known for its canned beers like Son of Juice IPA. But since 2017 it has also run a semihidden taproom hard up against a weed-choked highway overpass in Avondale, and since earlier this year that taproom has spawned one of the city\u2019s more interesting venues for Polish food. When chef Joanna Janczurewicz (BiXi) was tapped to design a menu, she leaned into her heritage. \u201cI said, \u2018Guys, just trust me. Chicago has such a deep Polish history,\u2019\u2009\u201d she recalls. \u201cIt was a bit of a leap of faith.\u201d<\/p>\n<p>The food, which for now comes in cardboard, includes such fun bites as smalec, a spread of \u2018pork butter\u2019 (a.k.a. lard) flavored with cracklings, onions, and apples and served with sourdough, and leniwe kluski (lazy dumplings) made with farmer\u2019s cheese and topped with Parmesan-dill cream sauce. Char-grilled kielbasas and house pickles (sweet and gently tart) keep the tone Old World, but there\u2019s also a smashburger for folks who want traditional pub fare. Look for rotating seasonal vegetables, like a pub salad with roasted beets, butternut squash, and barley. While I\u2019ll miss the grilled corn and shishitos from summer, the Brussels bowl with bacon fat vinaigrette, shallots, and hazelnuts has my name on it.<\/p>\n","protected":false},"excerpt":{"rendered":"Maplewood Lounge2717 N. Maplewood Ave.Avondale Hours Perfect order Pork butter, fall pub salad, lazy dumplings Maplewood, a brewery&hellip;\n","protected":false},"author":3,"featured_media":390081,"comment_status":"","ping_status":"","sticky":false,"template":"","format":"standard","meta":{"footnotes":""},"categories":[5124],"tags":[52912,185740,960,5386,1818,185739,185737,185736,185741,123543,185738],"class_list":{"0":"post-390080","1":"post","2":"type-post","3":"status-publish","4":"format-standard","5":"has-post-thumbnail","7":"category-chicago","8":"tag-avondale","9":"tag-bixi","10":"tag-chicago","11":"tag-il","12":"tag-illinois","13":"tag-joanna-janczurewicz","14":"tag-maplewood-lounge","15":"tag-neighborhood-find","16":"tag-old-world","17":"tag-polish","18":"tag-son-of-juice-ipa"},"share_on_mastodon":{"url":"https:\/\/pubeurope.com\/@us\/115576847068169897","error":""},"_links":{"self":[{"href":"https:\/\/www.europesays.com\/us\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/posts\/390080","targetHints":{"allow":["GET"]}}],"collection":[{"href":"https:\/\/www.europesays.com\/us\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/posts"}],"about":[{"href":"https:\/\/www.europesays.com\/us\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/types\/post"}],"author":[{"embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/www.europesays.com\/us\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/users\/3"}],"replies":[{"embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/www.europesays.com\/us\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/comments?post=390080"}],"version-history":[{"count":0,"href":"https:\/\/www.europesays.com\/us\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/posts\/390080\/revisions"}],"wp:featuredmedia":[{"embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/www.europesays.com\/us\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/media\/390081"}],"wp:attachment":[{"href":"https:\/\/www.europesays.com\/us\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/media?parent=390080"}],"wp:term":[{"taxonomy":"category","embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/www.europesays.com\/us\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/categories?post=390080"},{"taxonomy":"post_tag","embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/www.europesays.com\/us\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/tags?post=390080"}],"curies":[{"name":"wp","href":"https:\/\/api.w.org\/{rel}","templated":true}]}}