Kinga's Lounge: Drink Up!

Dear Readers, 

I had to skip a few blocks for this week's eatery, for reasons that may or may not be obvious yet, depending on where you're reading this. I'll be back on geographical track next week with Cheeky Monk. Without further ado, I give you. . .Kinga's Lounge.  

At 1509 Marion, Kinga's is another place whose mail doesn't go to Colfax Avenue. But hey, it's on the corner, one of their patios is on Colfax, and we've all seen those semi-drunk 20-somethings jay-walking late at night across Colfax to get there. Yes they have booze, a smattering of Polish beers and infused vodkas to be sure, but Kinga's happy hours are more of the Jägerbomb/Long Island Iced Tea variety, a more efficient and enticing bait for the not-too-discerning customer. Hoping to avoid the obnoxious loudness that is Kinga's at night, I figured a nice, respectable weekend brunch would give us a chance to focus on the food without distraction. 

I arrive at 11am on the dot. The door is unlocked and the open sign is on, but the hostess/server/bartender looks at me with an unmistakable glare of unwelcome surprise when I open the door. Someone is vacuuming and disinfectant lingers in the air. She gives me two options: wait on the patio or wait outside, it'll be a few minutes. I know when I'm not wanted and god forbid I be a nuisance to this woman before I even sit down. I mean really, how dare I. So back outside I go, into the hot summer sun, which affords me a chance to check out the building. I hope Kinga knows how good he has it. The building is an old house, pleasantly upkept through the years. The back patio is raised above the sidewalk and surrounded by a fence covered in thick leafy ivy, I can see white Chinese lanterns hanging above the tables, it's private and quiet and shady. I suppose it lends an air of respectability to the late night riffraff. 

My companion Lori arrives, I tell her about my banishment. It's 11:08 at this point, and there's power in numbers, surely we can overtake this young guardian of the door, so we barge in and take a seat. The server asks us if we want menus. Oh gosh. Yes sweetie, we're actually here to eat your food. I had perused the online menu, but what she handed us varied slightly. Where was the breakfast salad (really?) or the garlic-infused bloody mary or the homemade spiced hot wine? Only in the ether apparently, as these items were not on the menu and I could tell the girl was not about to tell us anything more than she absolutely had to. I settle on "Polish style breakfast", coffee, and a regular old bloody mary, and Lori goes for pierogies and iced tea. The only pierogies I've ever had came from a box out of the freezer, so it'll be nice to taste something authentic.

What seems like 20 minutes later our beverages come out. My coffee cup is precariously narrow at the bottom, like the opposite of a Weeble. The bloody mary is peppery and tomato-y but that's about it, no horseradish or Worcestershire or garnish to speak of, but I later discover a tiny olive and lime slice sunken beneath the ice. When she delivers the plates, I stifle a horrified laugh. Mine looks like a kindergarten à la carte plate. A Polish style breakfast at Kinga's is 2 veal frankfurters, an over easy egg, 4 slices of swiss cheese, 3 slices of tomato, and Polish bread. If you took me here blind-folded and plopped this plate down in front of me I would never guess it was supposed to be Polish. Really, it's like an adult-sized Lunchable. But okay, presentation isn't everything. Maybe this really is what the Polish masses eat for their first meal of the day. The meat is undistinguishable from a hot dog, which really bums me out because I know there will be no dearth of hot dogs for me on this 4th of July weekend, and all I can think about is how these wieners are longing for sauerkraut. The cheese is, well, Swiss, the tomatoes once again anemic, and the bread is dry as a bone. Expecting something light and potato-y, the bread is more like something that came out of a plastic bag from King Soopers, but not recently, more like last night. I make a little sandwich out of the cheese, tomato, egg and bread, hoping that acting like I'm sitting in a grade school cafeteria will somehow make the dish more appealing, or at least more fun. Nope. Lori's pierogies are downright repulsive. Slickly lying in a boat of liquid butter, the texture of the meat resembles what I gave my cat for breakfast, and if I knew what kitty's food tasted like I probably wouldn't hesitate to make that comparison as well. The dough is severely overcooked, it's just a mushy hot mess. Damn! I wanted this to be a good one. 

We have been the only diners for about an hour, and I half-jokingly wonder if it's a bad sign when you're the first person to order food in a restaurant. It's like the kitchen isn't warmed up yet, they won't be hitting their stride until at least 3, which is also the hour when brunch officially ends at Kinga's. Eventually an older couple comes in to eat. They stare indifferently at one of the three tvs, all of which are playing the same baseball game. What, no soccer miss server? Argentina is currently getting crushed right now and I'd like to think that if Kinga himself were in-house, he would at least have the World Cup on. 

After making a couple wrong turns I find the women's room. Not much to report except for a strange 80's era poster advertising a decidedly non-Polish hair product. I wander around the rest of Kinga's for a minute. Upstairs, next to the aforementioned verdant patio, is a seductively charming old bar and lounge. So this is the lounge, draped with dark red walls and smooth wooden paneling and floors, comfy black leather chairs and fancy crystal ashtrays. There's a tile-top table and heavy-looking brass candle holders on the mantle, a row of white orchids in the window. Even in the daylight, perhaps especially in the daylight, it makes me want to break out my bejeweled cigarette holder and invite some dapper chap for a game of Parcheesi or Pchelki (Polish Jumping Flees), after checking my pocket watch to make sure there's enough time before high tea, or happy hour. It's inviting enough to make me want to come back and have a dram or three or four. Now I see why it's known as a place to get drunk. The food at Kinga's seems like an afterthought, something to offer the masses merely because there's no other Polish restaurant in Denver proper, and it just happens to be the food Kinga's cooks know (ostensibly) how to make.