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Largo restaurant serving up European soul food
For soul food that reflects Eastern Europe, Monika's European Kitchen in Largo promises slow-cooked dishes that feature favorites from Hungary, Germany and Poland.
LARGO, Fla. - For soul food that reflects Eastern Europe, Monika's European Kitchen in Largo promises slow-cooked dishes that feature favorites from Hungary, Germany and Poland.
Customers can find staples such as handmade dumplings, goulash and schnitzels.
What they're saying:
"Monika’s is a European cuisine-based sit-down restaurant. It’s what somebody coined as 'European Soul Food'," owner Chad Belson said. "We make authentic, slow and low-cooked comfort food. And people absolutely love it."
Belson and his wife, Monika, the restaurant's namesake, prepare fresh baked goods, slow-cooked meats and other fresh foods made in the time-honored ways of the old country.
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"From the Hungarian dishes, chicken paprikash and Hungarian beef stew, to traditional goulash soup. So we have sausages, we have rouladen, we have schweinebraten, we have schnitzels," Belson said. "We have schnitzels all over the place. One of our most popular dishes are the chicken and the pork schnitzels."
They offer a pork cutlet schnitzel breaded and fried golden brown. They offer it with a chicken cutlet too. There is a Hunter schnitzel that smothers the meal with mushroom gravy.
Their "Tour of Germany" offers the customer one of each: Bratwurst, white bratwurst and knackwurst to go with some traditional sides like sourkraut and potatoes.
The backstory:
"We actually got our business started in New Jersey as a food business. We were doing pop-up markets, and we had kiosks in several malls, and we had an opportunity to relocate to Florida and open up our first sit-down restaurant," Belson said. "We jumped at the chance. Within six weeks we were here."
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Monika's past was as a home-taught baker making homemade baked goods and meals in Budepest, Hungary. She came to America to work as the head baker and chef at Café M in New York City.
Monika met Chad and the two shared a European heritage and a love for food. They married and settled in New Jersey, where the original Monika's European Kitchen was born.
Local perspective:
Their relocation to the Tampa area came with the opportunity to take over the former Jagerstuble restaurant in Largo.
"We wanted a chill, slightly upscale, but still very casual. But we wanted a very chill vibe," Belson said. "And their reaction to the food is what we were looking for."
So their journey to the Bay Area is just a step in the journey as their goal is to help their customers connect to their past.
"When people take that first bite, sometimes the reaction is, you know, 'Oh my God, this is just love in a bowl,' or they get teary-eyed, and they say, 'This is Grandma.' So we want to take them back to a time when they were younger, where they were eating this authentic food cooked by a loving family member," Belson said. "And that... that comes from her grandmother, that comes from my grandmother, it comes from my mother, MiMa, and we just brought those European recipes here to Largo."
What's next:
To visit Monika's European Kitchen for yourself, they are located at 1995 East Bay Dr, Largo, FL 33771. They are open from Wednesday through Sunday. Their hours and menu options are on their website here.
The Source: This story was written based on in-person interviews at Monika's European Kitchen in Largo.