From the archive
The Bohemian and American dinner menu
A historical document. Its dishes, prices and sections preserve a record of the kitchen.
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- Printed
- 2003
- Archived
- 19 April 2009
- Pages
- 5
- Prices
- Historical, as printed
Klas
Bohemian and American Restaurant · Opened 1922
Dinner Bohemian style
The Czech kitchen the house was known for, and the part of the menu that kept its shape across every edition we have.
- Roast Loin of Pork 10.95
Slices of tender and juicy roast loin of pork.
- Roast Long Island Duckling 12.95
Golden succulent roast duckling. Half or quarter.
- Svíčková “pickled beef” 11.95
Beef and vegetables marinated then simmered until tender, served with a rich sour cream gravy.
- Koprová “boiled beef” 10.95
Beef boiled until tender, served in a rich creamy dill gravy.
- Pilsner Beef Goulash 10.95
Beef simmered with Pilsner beer until tender, served in a dark rich paprika gravy.
- Breaded Pork Tenderloin 10.95
Loin of pork tenderised, breaded and fried to a golden brown.
- Chicken Paprika 9.95
Chicken off the bone simmered with onions, served in a rich creamy paprika gravy.
- Roast “Free Range” Chicken 10.95
Half a chicken stuffed with homemade celery, onion and garlic dressing.
- Tenderloin Budweis 10.95
Loin of pork tenderised, coated in a potato batter, pan fried golden brown.
- Smoked Sausage 9.95
Grilled Maxwell Street style sausage.
- Boiled Smoked Butt 9.95
Tender sliced smoked butt.
- Homemade Meatloaf 8.95
Ground meat combined with spices, formed and roasted.
- Fruit Dumplings 8.95
Fruit filled dumplings topped with cinnamon, sugar, butter and cottage cheese.
Why not begin with an appetizer
Any of these could be ordered as a dinner entrée for three dollars more.
- Potato Pancakes 6.95
Three freshly prepared pancakes with sour cream or apple sauce.
- Smažený sýr “fried cheese” 7.75
Muenster cheese, breaded then fried, served with tartar sauce.
- Duck Liver and Onion 6.95
With topinka.
- Smoked Sausage Plate 7.75
Sliced and served with fresh onions, mustard and freshly baked rye bread.
Continental favorites
The Austrian and Central European half of the list, which a Cicero dining room was expected to carry.
- Wiener Schnitzel 12.95
Tenderised veal cutlet breaded and fried golden, with potato salad and vegetable du jour.
- Wiener Schnitzel à la Holstein 13.95
Topped with fried egg, anchovies and capers.
- Wiener Schnitzel à la Emmenthal 13.95
Topped with Emmenthal Swiss cheese.
- Klas Pork Medallions 12.95
Three tenderloin medallions wrapped in bacon, broiled, finished with a creamy mushroom sauce.
- Chicken à la Kiev 10.50
Boneless breast hand rolled around herbed butter, breaded and baked.
- Chicken à la Klas 10.50
Boneless breast hand rolled around mushrooms and spinach, baked.
- Chicken Cordon Bleu 10.50
Boneless breast stuffed with ham and Swiss cheese, breaded and baked.
- Roast Beef 9.25
Thin slices with brown mushroom gravy, mashed potato and vegetable du jour.
From our broiler
The American side of the same kitchen.
- Cicero Cut Sirloin Steak 14.95
Ten ounces broiled to your liking, topped with sautéed mushrooms.
- T-Bone Steak 16.95
Twelve ounces cut from the short loin, topped with herbed butter.
- Center Cut Pork Chops 10.95
Two chops broiled, topped with herbed butter, apple sauce alongside.
- Baked or BBQ Ribs 12.95
Slow cooked until tender, finished in the broiler. Full or half slab.
- BBQ Chicken 9.95
Half a chicken in a rich tangy sauce, finished in the broiler.
Take something special home
The counter trade — the part of the menu that says most about who was eating here.
- Loaf of Homemade Rye Bread 5.00
- Foot and a half dumpling loaf 5.00
- Baker’s Dozen Kolacky 12.00
- Quart of Czech Gravy 8.00
Pint 5.00.
- Quart of Sauerkraut 4.00
Pint 2.50.
- Quart of Soup 4.00
Pint 2.50.
Pivo
The draught and bottle list, Czech first.
- Pilsner Urquell
- Staropramen
- Radegast
- Czechvar
- Spaten
- Franziskaner
- Guinness
- Heineken
- Beck’s
- Amstel Light
- Corona
Every entrée came with soup or salad and two Bohemian sides — bread or potato dumplings, boiled or mashed potatoes, sauerkraut, sweet-sour cabbage, or the vegetable of the day — then dessert: kolacky, rice pudding, chocolate pudding or fruit jello, and coffee or tea.
About this document
Five pages, carrying a 2003 copyright line, recorded on 19 April 2009. Prices are reproduced exactly as printed and are historical. The transcription is ours; the original file is not republished here.
This is the menu that did most of the work: it is the document Google indexed for years, and the reason people looking for a dumpling recipe kept arriving at a restaurant's website.
How five pages divide a kitchen
The document is organised by cooking method as much as by course, and the divisions are the argument the menu is making. Dinner Bohemian style comes first and is the longest section: thirteen entrées, every one of them a roast, a braise or a fry that a Czech household would recognise without explanation. Then a lighter Czech list, then the continental section with its three Wiener schnitzels and its chicken rolls, then the broiler with a T-bone, a New York strip, pork chops and ribs, then the counter trade at the end.
Read top to bottom it is a journey west. The first page is Bohemia, the middle is Vienna and Central Europe generally, and the last of the hot sections is an American steakhouse. A kitchen that can do all three is not confused about what it is; it is a kitchen that has been feeding the same families for three generations while what those families order slowly changed, and has kept every stage of that on the card rather than replacing one with the next.
What the prices say about 2003
The Bohemian entrées run from 8.95 for fruit dumplings to 12.95 for the duckling, with most of the list sitting at 10.95. That is a range of four dollars across thirteen dishes, which is remarkably flat. Nothing in the Czech section was positioned as an occasion. The broiler is where the prices step up, and the gap between a 10.95 roast pork and a 16.95 T-bone is the clearest statement on the menu about which half of the list the house considered everyday.
Every one of those numbers included a cup of soup or a salad, two Bohemian sides and dessert, which changes what the figures mean. An 8.95 plate of fruit dumplings arriving after soup and followed by kolacky is not a cheap dish; it is a complete meal priced below nine dollars in a restaurant with a chandelier in the dining room.
The counter at the end of the menu
The last section is not a course. It prices things to carry out: rye bread by the loaf, dumpling loaf sold by the length, gravy by the quart, kolacky by the baker's dozen. A restaurant only prints that when enough people are buying it to make listing it worthwhile, and its position at the end of a five-page dinner menu says the two trades shared one document and one kitchen.
It also explains something about how the food travelled. A dumpling loaf bought on a Saturday and sliced at home on a Sunday puts the restaurant's cooking on tables it never served, and that is the likeliest route by which a Cicero dining room ended up in the household memory of families who had long since moved further west.