Hope you enjoyed seeing all the amazing Ukrainian food we tried in our own neighborhood of the East Village. Hit the like button and SUBSCRIBE to see even more food & travel videos. We really appreciate the support!
Super!! I visit VESELKA too! but.. they have no real Borsch.. like in Ukraine.The correct way to say these words is: `kovbasA`, `derunY` (potatoes pancakes) I`m sorry..
I'm watching this video on Sunday evening, 6 march 2022... 2 weeks into the Russian invasion of Ukraine... I've been educating myself on the history & culture of Ukraine... (I'm a American of English/Scottish ancestry). It is very apparent that you have passion and exuberance in your heart and genuine caring... (I subbed!). Prayers of peace and love to the Ukrainian people all over the world.
I liked the video ... my family is Ukrainian. I grew up in NYC until I was 5 years old and then I returned for 1 year in my 18 years ... I liked seeing all those memories ... now, I live in The Netherlands and cook Ukrainian food for my children. Greetings and thanks !!!
Cintia Smalko it is so wonderful to hear that you liked our video and felt a connection as a Ukrainian remembering the neighborhood and the amazing food. We are glad you are cooking Ukranian food for your children so they too can enjoy a taste of home. 😋
Food and Footprints thank you so much for watching! It was so incredible to see the whole process and how fast these women make pierogies! We tried to make them 🥟and they all opened up in the boiling water.
@@JamesandKarla pierogi is already plural, it doesn't need an english plural 's' at the end. Generally, all their nouns ending with 'i' are plural nouns. I.e. pierog - singular, pierogi - plural.
As my father was born in the Ukraine, i'm all too familiar with these foods. Great video which makes me reach out for some borscht, as i write. Of course you know of Streecha Ukranian Restaurant at 33 East 7th St, affiliated with the church; homemade food. It's nice to go behind the scenes and see how foods are prepared..You always do a great job bringing out this facet whichever food establishment(s) you visit. Keep up your labor of love, JamesandKarla. Fan#1
Pizza Rules we are glad our video brought back a taste of home (your dad’s). We love the borscht that Veselka makes and of course Streecha is a hidden gem. We plan to highlight them in a future video once it is safe to do so. Thank you so much for watching and commenting as always!
FYI, the strip between 3nd St. and 13th St. along 2nd Avenue was known as the Jewish Rialto - there were several Yiddish theaters. When I was a kid, one of Sholem Aleichem's plays was playing at the Anderson theater. The theaters were the Anderson, the Leow's Commodore (later the Fillmore East), the Orpheum (in your shot - with "Stomp"), the St. Mark's, and one more between 12th and 13th whose name escapes me.
Yes @MichaelBobrick we highlighted about the Jewish Rialto in a previous East Village food tour video. The theater on 2nd Ave you are speaking about is the Louis Jaffe theater now known as the Village East Movie theater. We have posted gorgeous photos of its ornate main theater with its plaster ceiling in our @jamesandkarla Instagram feed and on our website in case you would like to see them. Thank you so much for watching and commenting!
Fantastic!! I'm starving now!! A little fact about St. George's Church. Back in the 1860s, the location was home to the are's main police station. when the draft riots broke out in 1863, most of the nearby buildings were set on fire, except for McSorley's, across the street, because the police would hang out there after work and so they protected it.
Brad Marcus we are so glad you enjoyed watching and now want some pierogies 🥟 and borscht! That is a really interesting fact about the church and so funny about McSorley’s!
I am so hungry and so homesick right now! Veselka and Kiev (RIP) were my go-to places throughout the 80s. Now living in a city where no one seems to know what a pierogi really is. 😩Thanks for taking me back to one of my faves. Stay safe! xo
tahloolahlee we are so glad our video brought back wonderful and tasty 😋 memories of your old neighborhood and having pierogi at Veselka and Kiev. Sadly, Veselka is now temporarily closed due to the pandemic ...at first they stayed open for takeaway and delivery but they made the decision to close last week. We hope you are also staying safe and hopefully can visit NYC and have some delicious 🥟 pierogi once things return to normal.
James and Karla I’m supposed to be in NYC right now, as a matter fact. (Eating my way through the city!) I hope we all weather this craziness; I especially worry about small businesses. Fingers crossed I get home soon… I am a one woman economic stimulus. Hold fast, Veselka et al! ♥️
Karla that Ukrainian Greek Catholic church was Andy Warhol's favourite his father was Ukrainian and his mother Slovakian . There's a historical photograph of Jim Morrison wearing a Ukrainian shirt given to him by Andy Warhol.
I have a mixed Slavic ancestry, which includes some Ukrainian (on my paternal side). That food looks really good. Borscht is my favourite soup. My maternal ancestors came through New York City, in the early 1900s, from Czechoslovakia and Poland. Cheers!
Thank you so much for watching and commenting. We love hearing from people who have a personal connection to our videos. The food from Veselka is both amazing and authentic. We highly recommend both their cold borscht served in the summer and their hot borscht which they always have year-round. Much love from NYC!
@@JamesandKarla My late, paternal grandmother was half Polish and half Ukrainian. Her and my late grandfather were from Galicia. She taught me how to make pierogies, when I was a child. I wish she would have taught me how to make borscht. My maternal ancestors ended up in Canada, after coming through New York City. Cheers!
Dwayne Wladyka you definitely would love Veselka’s pierogis and they also have excellent blintzes. Did your grandmother also teach you how to make blintzes and stuffed cabbage? Really everything Veselka makes is excellent as they are made with love. We hope you are staying safe and healthy! 😊
Dwayne Wladyka we just went to Veselka today and got their summer borscht which is served cold with a sliced hard boiled egg in it. It is also really delicious and perfect for a hot day like today (93 degrees F).
Thank you so much Apnan Gaming! We will definitely highlight this and other different Ukrainian neighborhoods in NYC in future videos! Sending our love from NYC to you in Germany!
For some reason I never got to the Ukrainian Museum, I should go sometime. Also the Tenement Museum although I almost went about six years ago, but I had other fish to fry and was down there for a concert later that evening. I used to hang out out at Veselka a lot years ago, mainly in the 1990s after clubbing on St. Marks Place or whatever, Coney Island HIgh, etc. The routine would often be to stop by Veselka for breakfast to go, at 3 or 4 a.m. Or a few delis on Delancey St. before hitting the bridge to get home. The last time I went to Veselka was already seven years ago, took a morning ride into the city to hit up Kim's Music and Video and other things, and went there right off for breakfast, it was still just as great as ever. The coffee there is amazingly good, too. It kind of saddens me that you can't do that anymore, with Kim's gone and all of that stuff now gone on St. Marks. Oy vey. I also spent a lot of time at B&H Dairy down from Gem Spa, the little diner place, which I think is still going. I also spent an inordinate amount of time in that other kind of Ukrainian diner that used to be on 2nd Ave. at around 5th St. or so, cannot recall the name but I think it shut down later on. This was the place we would often repair to after nights in the clubs downtown in the mid to later 90s in my case, The Bank, places like that. Also, there was a good diner or two further down from there on 2nd Ave. that may or may not still be extant that also were hangouts. Also, Odessa on Avenue A (just west of Tompkins Sq. Park) used to be quite good and we'd go there pretty often, also at 3 a.m.! Back when I lived the vampire lifestyle. Apparently Veselka is currently temporarily closed, they are not even open for takeout. B&H the same, they claim to be reopening by the end of April, we'll see.
Scott Briggs we are glad our video brought back good memories. We love Veselka too and yes they are closed for now and even taped up the windows with brown paper so it looks extra forlorn. B&H couldn’t make it with just takeaway so they too are closed for now. We think the diner on 2nd Ave that you are thinking of may be Ratner’s. They also had a Kosher bakery too before it became Moishe’s. So much has changed in the immediate area that it is heartbreaking 💔
LoL, I can't believe I'm saying this for a yootoob video, but your volume is a bit too high. I really miss the neighborhood. My grandparents were from Ukraine and Lithuania. I know I never went to the museum, I may have not known it was there. I couldn't afford to eat out much beyond a couple of slices, but I always went to the Odessa (couldn't beat the roast chicken dinner for $7) and occasionally to whazziz name on Houston, with the good knishes... Yonah Schimmel's! (in the summer for their jars of cold borscht, with sour cream of course) It's a shame that the greed of landlords and corporations have screwed the whole city up so much, and those chains just leave whenever their accountants say it's time to go, and then there's nothing.
Hi Spaneen, thank you so much for watching and commenting. We are glad our video brought back good memories of spending time in the neighborhood. We have also highlighted Yonah Schimmel in a previous video along with other great places nearby but will definitely visit again. By the way, we have adjusted our volume as we realize that I (Karla) can be extra loud at times. We hope you also enjoy watching some of our other videos too!
john smith this amazing Ukrainian soul food diner is certainly missed by many. We hope that they can reopen again quickly as soon as it is safe to do so!
@@JamesandKarla Ukrainian east village restuarant and Streecha are also 2 hidden gems. Also Sly Fox is a Ukrainian bar! My father used to bounce there in the 80s
john smith oh yes we have visited both of those hidden gems and plan to highlight them in the future once things reopen. That is too funny that your father worked at Sly Fox. It is still very low key from the outside with just a small neon sign for it near the door to go inside and there is never a crowd outside like most bars. Hope you are staying safe and healthy.
john smith forgot to mention that we too miss Stage. Did you remember the Polish waitress Ola who worked at Stage. She now co-owns B&H Dairy Restaurant that is directly across the street from where Stage was.
Rent increase from 24,000 a month to 33,000 a month..?????? Omigod....so New York rents are thru the roof for the small businesses.....no wonder they are all disappearing.....geez....
Blue Bird huge rent increases are definitely the number 1 reason why NYC has lost so many of its unique small businesses. And that huge rent increase was back in 2006...we can’t even imagine what the rent at that storefront is now in (almost) 2020!
@@JamesandKarla It's a total scam. The rents go sky high so that figure is in the tax records. Then the owners can go get bigger mortgages to buy other buildings. It doesn't matter whether or not the property is occupied.
You did it wrong when tried borsch. You should have added sour cream to the borsch, this is the only way it is supposed to be eaten. Without sour cream it is not tasty.
fridge666 our friend is Russian and always adds sour cream and would laugh when we don’t add it but we actually love the taste of their borscht even without sour cream. 😋
Let's get real - it's not open 24 hrs - they close for cleaning after 3am.....the Borscht is nowhere as good as B+H Dairy - the only thing that's v. good at Vaselka - is the chicken noodle soup. The service is not very good in normal times.,,,,when cameras aren't there.Most the people that go there now are young and new to the 'hood....they'll realize soon that most of the dishes are 'hollow' , starchy and unhealthy.
We are sorry that you do not care for Veselka and certainly plan on highlighting B & H Dairy in a future video as we love the old-school vibe and both of the owners Ola & Fawzy are so sweet and you also get homemade challah bread there with your order which is always a bonus. Thank you so much for watching and commenting as we really appreciate the support.
Hope you enjoyed seeing all the amazing Ukrainian food we tried in our own neighborhood of the East Village. Hit the like button and SUBSCRIBE to see even more food & travel videos. We really appreciate the support!
Super!! I visit VESELKA too! but..
they have no real Borsch.. like in Ukraine.The correct way to say these words is: `kovbasA`, `derunY` (potatoes pancakes)
I`m sorry..
I'm watching this video on Sunday evening, 6 march 2022... 2 weeks into the Russian invasion of Ukraine... I've been educating myself on the history & culture of Ukraine... (I'm a American of English/Scottish ancestry). It is very apparent that you have passion and exuberance in your heart and genuine caring... (I subbed!). Prayers of peace and love to the Ukrainian people all over the world.
I liked the video ... my family is Ukrainian. I grew up in NYC until I was 5 years old and then I returned for 1 year in my 18 years ... I liked seeing all those memories ... now, I live in The Netherlands and cook Ukrainian food for my children. Greetings and thanks !!!
Cintia Smalko it is so wonderful to hear that you liked our video and felt a connection as a Ukrainian remembering the neighborhood and the amazing food. We are glad you are cooking Ukranian food for your children so they too can enjoy a taste of home. 😋
So awesome you got to see how they make the pierogies
Food and Footprints thank you so much for watching! It was so incredible to see the whole process and how fast these women make pierogies! We tried to make them 🥟and they all opened up in the boiling water.
I Love Hudson 💘
Oooh make more of these! Loved it.!! 💕
Ohh short rib pierogies sound really good!
Food and Footprints we highly recommend those short rib pierogies 🥟as they were soooo delicious 😋
@@JamesandKarla pierogi is already plural, it doesn't need an english plural 's' at the end. Generally, all their nouns ending with 'i' are plural nouns. I.e. pierog - singular, pierogi - plural.
fridge666 thank you so much. We love their pierogi 🥟🥟🥟🥟🥟❤️❤️❤️❤️❤️
Those are very good!
A-Train Travels the short rib pierogi were delicious and the classic potato 🥔 and farmers cheese filled ones were also amazing!
As my father was born in the Ukraine, i'm all too familiar with these foods. Great video which makes me reach out for some borscht, as i write. Of course you know of Streecha Ukranian Restaurant at 33 East 7th St, affiliated with the church; homemade food. It's nice to go behind the scenes and see how foods are prepared..You always do a great job bringing out this facet whichever food establishment(s) you visit. Keep up your labor of love, JamesandKarla. Fan#1
Pizza Rules we are glad our video brought back a taste of home (your dad’s). We love the borscht that Veselka makes and of course Streecha is a hidden gem. We plan to highlight them in a future video once it is safe to do so. Thank you so much for watching and commenting as always!
Awesome 🇺🇦👍
A-Train Travels thank you so much for watching and so glad you enjoyed our East Village Ukrainian 🇺🇦 Food Tour!
FYI, the strip between 3nd St. and 13th St. along 2nd Avenue was known as the Jewish Rialto - there were several Yiddish theaters. When I was a kid, one of Sholem Aleichem's plays was playing at the Anderson theater. The theaters were the Anderson, the Leow's Commodore (later the Fillmore East), the Orpheum (in your shot - with "Stomp"), the St. Mark's, and one more between 12th and 13th whose name escapes me.
Yes @MichaelBobrick we highlighted about the Jewish Rialto in a previous East Village food tour video. The theater on 2nd Ave you are speaking about is the Louis Jaffe theater now known as the Village East Movie theater. We have posted gorgeous photos of its ornate main theater with its plaster ceiling in our @jamesandkarla Instagram feed and on our website in case you would like to see them. Thank you so much for watching and commenting!
2nd Ave Deli, I miss it. Not overly touristed or commercialized as deli’s on the West Side. More intimate and cozy, and a great pastrami
Fantastic!! I'm starving now!! A little fact about St. George's Church. Back in the 1860s, the location was home to the are's main police station. when the draft riots broke out in 1863, most of the nearby buildings were set on fire, except for McSorley's, across the street, because the police would hang out there after work and so they protected it.
Brad Marcus we are so glad you enjoyed watching and now want some pierogies 🥟 and borscht! That is a really interesting fact about the church and so funny about McSorley’s!
I am so hungry and so homesick right now! Veselka and Kiev (RIP) were my go-to places throughout the 80s. Now living in a city where no one seems to know what a pierogi really is. 😩Thanks for taking me back to one of my faves. Stay safe! xo
tahloolahlee we are so glad our video brought back wonderful and tasty 😋 memories of your old neighborhood and having pierogi at Veselka and Kiev. Sadly, Veselka is now temporarily closed due to the pandemic ...at first they stayed open for takeaway and delivery but they made the decision to close last week. We hope you are also staying safe and hopefully can visit NYC and have some delicious 🥟 pierogi once things return to normal.
James and Karla I’m supposed to be in NYC right now, as a matter fact. (Eating my way through the city!) I hope we all weather this craziness; I especially worry about small businesses. Fingers crossed I get home soon… I am a one woman economic stimulus. Hold fast, Veselka et al! ♥️
Karla that Ukrainian Greek Catholic church was Andy Warhol's favourite his father was Ukrainian and his mother Slovakian . There's a historical photograph of Jim Morrison wearing a Ukrainian shirt given to him by Andy Warhol.
I have a mixed Slavic ancestry, which includes some Ukrainian (on my paternal side). That food looks really good. Borscht is my favourite soup. My maternal ancestors came through New York City, in the early 1900s, from Czechoslovakia and Poland. Cheers!
Thank you so much for watching and commenting. We love hearing from people who have a personal connection to our videos. The food from Veselka is both amazing and authentic. We highly recommend both their cold borscht served in the summer and their hot borscht which they always have year-round. Much love from NYC!
@@JamesandKarla My late, paternal grandmother was half Polish and half Ukrainian. Her and my late grandfather were from Galicia. She taught me how to make pierogies, when I was a child. I wish she would have taught me how to make borscht. My maternal ancestors ended up in Canada, after coming through New York City. Cheers!
Dwayne Wladyka you definitely would love Veselka’s pierogis and they also have excellent blintzes. Did your grandmother also teach you how to make blintzes and stuffed cabbage? Really everything Veselka makes is excellent as they are made with love. We hope you are staying safe and healthy! 😊
@@JamesandKarla I know how to make potato pancakes and cabbage rolls. The only thing I can't make is borscht. Cheers!
Dwayne Wladyka we just went to Veselka today and got their summer borscht which is served cold with a sliced hard boiled egg in it. It is also really delicious and perfect for a hot day like today (93 degrees F).
Pls make more videos of Ukraine neighborhood in New York City.I am a German New Yorker.
Thank you so much Apnan Gaming! We will definitely highlight this and other different Ukrainian neighborhoods in NYC in future videos! Sending our love from NYC to you in Germany!
Hey Karla ! You have a Very Caring husband !
Thank you! ("Dyakuyu" in Ukrainian)
Olena Semenova you are most welcome 🙏! We are so glad you enjoyed our Ukrainian food tour!
For some reason I never got to the Ukrainian Museum, I should go sometime. Also the Tenement Museum although I almost went about six years ago, but I had other fish to fry
and was down there for a concert later that evening. I used to hang out out at Veselka a lot years ago, mainly in the 1990s after clubbing on St. Marks Place or whatever, Coney Island
HIgh, etc. The routine would often be to stop by Veselka for breakfast to go, at 3 or 4 a.m. Or a few delis on Delancey St. before hitting the bridge to get home. The last time I went
to Veselka was already seven years ago, took a morning ride into the city to hit up Kim's Music and Video and other things, and went there right off for breakfast, it was still just
as great as ever. The coffee there is amazingly good, too. It kind of saddens me that you can't do that anymore, with Kim's gone and all of that stuff now gone on St. Marks. Oy vey.
I also spent a lot of time at B&H Dairy down from Gem Spa, the little diner place, which I think is still going. I also spent an inordinate amount of time in that other kind of Ukrainian
diner that used to be on 2nd Ave. at around 5th St. or so, cannot recall the name but I think it shut down later on. This was the place we would often repair to after nights in the
clubs downtown in the mid to later 90s in my case, The Bank, places like that. Also, there was a good diner or two further down from there on 2nd Ave. that may or may not
still be extant that also were hangouts. Also, Odessa on Avenue A (just west of Tompkins Sq. Park) used to be quite good and we'd go there pretty often, also at 3 a.m.! Back
when I lived the vampire lifestyle. Apparently Veselka is currently temporarily closed, they are not even open for takeout. B&H the same, they claim to be reopening by the end
of April, we'll see.
Scott Briggs we are glad our video brought back good memories. We love Veselka too and yes they are closed for now and even taped up the windows with brown paper so it looks extra forlorn. B&H couldn’t make it with just takeaway so they too are closed for now. We think the diner on 2nd Ave that you are thinking of may be Ratner’s. They also had a Kosher bakery too before it became Moishe’s. So much has changed in the immediate area that it is heartbreaking 💔
Love from kiev
Thank you so much for the love Stellar Green. We send our love from NYC to you in Kiev
@@JamesandKarla thank you James and Karla
LoL, I can't believe I'm saying this for a yootoob video, but your volume is a bit too high.
I really miss the neighborhood. My grandparents were from Ukraine and Lithuania. I know I never went to the museum, I may have not known it was there. I couldn't afford to eat out much beyond a couple of slices, but I always went to the Odessa (couldn't beat the roast chicken dinner for $7) and occasionally to whazziz name on Houston, with the good knishes... Yonah Schimmel's! (in the summer for their jars of cold borscht, with sour cream of course) It's a shame that the greed of landlords and corporations have screwed the whole city up so much, and those chains just leave whenever their accountants say it's time to go, and then there's nothing.
Hi Spaneen, thank you so much for watching and commenting. We are glad our video brought back good memories of spending time in the neighborhood. We have also highlighted Yonah Schimmel in a previous video along with other great places nearby but will definitely visit again. By the way, we have adjusted our volume as we realize that I (Karla) can be extra loud at times. We hope you also enjoy watching some of our other videos too!
I miss Stage!
john smith this amazing Ukrainian soul food diner is certainly missed by many. We hope that they can reopen again quickly as soon as it is safe to do so!
@@JamesandKarla Ukrainian east village restuarant and Streecha are also 2 hidden gems. Also Sly Fox is a Ukrainian bar! My father used to bounce there in the 80s
john smith oh yes we have visited both of those hidden gems and plan to highlight them in the future once things reopen. That is too funny that your father worked at Sly Fox. It is still very low key from the outside with just a small neon sign for it near the door to go inside and there is never a crowd outside like most bars. Hope you are staying safe and healthy.
john smith forgot to mention that we too miss Stage. Did you remember the Polish waitress Ola who worked at Stage. She now co-owns B&H Dairy Restaurant that is directly across the street from where Stage was.
They had Cherry Lime Rickeys?!? (I'm from the neighborhood)
Yes Veselka most certainly makes Cherry Lime Rickeys! Please let us know what you think of them once you try it.
Rent increase from 24,000 a month to 33,000 a month..?????? Omigod....so New York rents are thru the roof for the small businesses.....no wonder they are all disappearing.....geez....
Blue Bird huge rent increases are definitely the number 1 reason why NYC has lost so many of its unique small businesses. And that huge rent increase was back in 2006...we can’t even imagine what the rent at that storefront is now in (almost) 2020!
@@JamesandKarla It's a total scam. The rents go sky high so that figure is in the tax records. Then the owners can go get bigger mortgages to buy other buildings. It doesn't matter whether or not the property is occupied.
🇺🇦🙏❤️💪🥟
You did it wrong when tried borsch. You should have added sour cream to the borsch, this is the only way it is supposed to be eaten. Without sour cream it is not tasty.
fridge666 our friend is Russian and always adds sour cream and would laugh when we don’t add it but we actually love the taste of their borscht even without sour cream. 😋
Sour cream and a raw garlic clove!
Olena Semenova oh yes that would be extra good! 😋Thank you so much for watching!
@@JamesandKarla although your breath may stink a little, at least you won't have a cold!
Olena Semenova most definitely 😆
Let's get real - it's not open 24 hrs - they close for cleaning after 3am.....the Borscht is nowhere as good as B+H Dairy - the only thing that's v. good at Vaselka - is the chicken noodle soup. The service is not very good in normal times.,,,,when cameras aren't there.Most the people that go there now are young and new to the 'hood....they'll realize soon that most of the dishes are 'hollow' , starchy and unhealthy.
We are sorry that you do not care for Veselka and certainly plan on highlighting B & H Dairy in a future video as we love the old-school vibe and both of the owners Ola & Fawzy are so sweet and you also get homemade challah bread there with your order which is always a bonus. Thank you so much for watching and commenting as we really appreciate the support.