Maplewood, the brewery and distillery founded in Chicago, now has a chef who’s making nostalgic American comfort food with unexpected Eastern European whimsy, from lazy dumplings and pork butter to pizza with ketchup.
Maplewood Lounge opened in Logan Square in 2017, and executive chef Joanna Janczurewicz launched the expanded kitchen in 2025.
“We do a lot of Polish food,” said Janczurewicz. “And Hungarian and Czech.”
She also oversees the food at the new Maplewood Public House in Glen Ellyn, which just opened this May.
The lazy dumplings, literally translated from kluski leniwe in Polish, have become her best-known signature, eliciting emotional responses from regulars.
They’re supposed to be a lazier way to make pierogi, using the same ingredients, without having to fill all those dumplings. Superbly soft and saucy clouds, they’re enlightened with lovely lemony breadcrumbs.
“Traditionally they’re served sweet,” said the chef. “We serve them in almost an Alfredo-ish sauce.”
Janczurewicz and her team make the dumpling dough in small batches, mostly with tangy farmer cheese, and just enough egg, flour and butter to hold it all together.
“We chill that,” said the chef. “And then roll each one.”
They cook the dough fingerlings gently, before tossing in the velvety yet loaded sauce.
“We start with bacon fat and bacon, throw in peas, dill, cream and parmesan and just let that all thicken,” she added. “Then toasted lemon breadcrumbs on top.”
There’s nothing lazy about her dumplings, except for how they might make you feel.
The pork butter, or smalec in Polish, is in fact lard. Silky yet studded with exquisite bits, the pork fat comes with crisp pickle spears and slices of terrific toasted sourdough bread.
“When my mother used to make it, it was very plain,” said Janczurewicz about her mother’s smalec, which was just lard and pork cracklings, but delicious.
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Their version adds aromatic spices, including black peppercorns and bay leaves, plus garlic, onion and apple and the coveted cracklings.
“Once you taste it, it’s actually full of flavor,” she added. “And it’s not so scary.”
Chicago is still home to more Polish immigrants than nearly any other city in the world, and Janczurewicz’s roots are from Eastern Europe, by way of the East Coast.
“I’m from Dorchester, inner-city Boston,” said Janczurewicz, who’s Polish American. “I always cooked and baked with my mother and my aunts and my cousins, and I learned a lot from them.”
After her parents moved back to their hometown of Drezdenko in Poland, she and her husband moved to Chicago.
“I worked for Northwestern University as a program director for 10 years,” said Janczurewicz. “Then I was like, I don’t want to do this anymore.”
She started working at Perkolator, the coffee shop in her neighborhood of Portage Park, around 2015 as a dishwasher, cashier and eventually sandwich maker.
“I’m a self-taught chef,” said Janczurewicz. “I watched a lot of YouTube and Food Network.”
She became the opening chef at Twisted Hippo in 2018, then worked at Owen & Engine and BiXi for chef and owner Bo Fowler, then Publican Quality Meats under chef Rob Levitt.
“I learned so much,” said Janczurewicz. “Especially from chef Bo about refinement and nostalgia and whimsy, and how to get the deepest flavors.”
Burnt out by 2023, she went to Poland to care for her mother, then returned to work front of the house at Migos Fine Foods for chefs Brian Jupiter and Azazi Morsi.
“And then the guys at Maplewood approached me,” said Janczurewicz.
Her husband, Adam Smith, is the head distiller and creative director, so she’s known the co-founders for 15 years. But everything changed when founding brewer and CEO Adam Cieslak attended her Polish pop-up dinner at PQM and left impressed.
The mushroom baguette pizza, however, was not on that pivotal menu. Deeply roasted mushrooms smother an open-face, toasted, crunchy yet chewy, cheesy baguette that’s finished with drizzles of lemon garlic aioli and, curiously, ketchup.
“It’s Polish street food,” said the chef about her variation on zapiekanka. “And it always has ketchup on it.”
You can order it without.
“I have gone out to tables and been like, ‘OK, listen, I know you asked for no ketchup, but I need you to trust me, because the ketchup makes it,’” said Janczurewicz. “And then they’ll try it and be like, ‘Oh, my God, the ketchup makes it!’”
I don’t know if the condiment really makes it, unless you’re nostalgic for the flavors, but it’s applied so sparingly that it just adds a familiar aroma and subtle sweetness.
“That’s actually been more difficult to get people to order than the pork butter,” said the chef. “The pork butter, the mushroom pizza and the lazy dumplings, those are my cultural pride.”
Her chicken Kiev has become another must-order dish, with a shockingly tender breaded bird, around a melting heart of garlic herb butter, on chunky mashed potatoes and dark chicken gravy.
I’ve had so many dry versions in my life, since chicken Kiev is traditionally made with chicken breast. But her cousin Magda shared a life-changing chicken tip on a visit to Poland, where the dish is called devolaj.
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“We use Slagel ground chicken,” said Janczurewicz. “Light and dark meat together for flavor.”
The potato babka, or babka ziemniaczana, offers three glorious golden bars of deep-fried potato cakes, layered with bacon and onion, alongside a refreshing little tomato and cucumber salad.
Polish meatballs, or klopsiki, transform nuggets of pork and beef, with plain boiled buttered potatoes and a monochromatic dill cream gravy into salvation for the darkest days of seasons to come.
A kielbasa plate holds a snappy grilled sausage and an amazing, aggressively charred cabbage that steals the spotlight.
Do note that some dishes are currently only in the suburbs or city; the plate with cabbage is only available at the Public House in Glen Ellyn, but you’ll find a kielbasa sandwich at the Lounge in Logan Square.
A farmer’s cheese dip, or gzik, can be found at both locations, and it’s fine, served with more of that great grilled sourdough bread, plus cucumber, radish and other somewhat seasonal crudités. The spiritfree Pink Is Punk mixes strawberry, rhubarb, lemon and soda for a nonalcoholic drink that’s undeniably delightful, but rhubarb feels like spring or early summer, even though I know there can be a second harvest sometimes right now. A strawberry-rhubarb parfait dessert with layers of fruit compote, whipped cheesecake filling, graham cracker crumbs and whipped cream was also perfectly pleasant, but again seemed out of season. A seasonal Apple Express THC drink releases the fragrance of fall with dreams of juicy fruit, and is a fan favorite seltzer, but I found the flavor too bitter even for my taste, which can happen with cannabis infusions.
The Fat Pug brownie sundae, though, is timeless and flawless. Made with Maplewood Fat Pug Oatmeal Milk Stout, the warm and fudgy and cakey dessert bar gets topped with vanilla ice cream and house-made salted caramel sauce. The beer was named for Otto, founding brewer Cieslak’s beloved dog.
My dog Kōl and I loved that we could make a reservation for outdoor seating at the Public House in Glen Ellyn for the fully covered expansive patio. It’s first-come, first-served at the Lounge in Logan Square. Both locations lean into the industrial loft vernacular architecture of working breweries and distilleries with bars and airy dining spaces.
In the burbs for dinner, our server was so kind and conversational, as was all the staff who came out to say hi to my big dog. In the city for a solo lunch, it was a hybrid service, which I like, where I ordered off a QR code at my table, with physical menus available, and a server brought out orders.
All went well until I realized after I left that the lazy dumplings I’d ordered were never served. I wouldn’t even mention an isolated dumpling incident, but there were some systemic service issues that were giving a vintage gruff Eastern European vibe..
And I really appreciate that real, live people answered the phones at both locations — sometimes. When I attempted to confirm details before visiting, including conflicting opening hours online, no one answered multiple calls or ever replied to voicemails, emails or a message sent via the contact form on their website.
I was only able to reach the chef after visiting by going directly to her personal social media.
“There’s a lot of really talented people behind the scenes,” said Janczurewicz. “It’s not just me.”
And I believe her, because their work clearly shows in the food and drink. But no matter how wonderful the menu, the service staff needs some more support, because they can make or break our first and last impressions.
Maplewood Lounge and Maplewood Public House
Maplewood Lounge, 2717 N. Maplewood Ave., 773-270-1061
Maplewood Public House, 486 Pennsylvania Ave., Glen Ellyn; 630-547-2171
Open: Chicago: Monday to Wednesday, 3 p.m. until 10 p.m.; Thursday and Friday, 11 a.m. until midnight; Saturday, 10 a.m. until midnight; Sunday, 10 a.m. until 10 p.m. Glen Ellyn: Wednesday to Friday, 4 p.m. until 10 p.m.; Saturday and Sunday, 11 a.m. until 10 p.m.
Prices: $20 (lazy dumplings), $10 (pork butter), $15 (mushroom pizza), $22 (chicken Kiev), $22 (potato babka), $9 (strawberry rhubarb parfait), $10 (Pink is Punk nonalcoholic cocktail), $14 Apple Express THC drink four-pack
Accessibility: Wheelchair accessible with restrooms on the same level
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Tribune rating: Very good to excellent, two and a half stars
Ratings key: Four stars, outstanding; three stars, excellent; two stars, very good; one star, good; zero stars, unsatisfactory.
Meals are paid for by the Tribune.
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