True tastes of home Displaced by the Russian invasion, newcomers are upping the local Ukrainian food game By: David Sanderson Posted: 5:30 PM CST Friday, Nov. 17, 2023

Hey there, time traveller!
This article was published 17/11/2023 (1072 days ago), so information in it may no longer be current.

One of the first things Olha Mashyna did after moving to Winnipeg from Ukraine in March, to escape the Russian invasion, was pick up some foodstuffs that would remind her, her husband Oleksandr Mashyn and their teenage children Alieksa and Anton of home.

It wasn’t overly difficult to source items such as perogies and cabbage rolls, what with the city and province’s deep Ukrainian roots. When she got around to sampling what she’d tossed in her shopping basket, however… let’s just say she was less than impressed.

“They called it borscht, but let me tell you, that wasn’t borscht,” she says, pursing her lips. “Trying more things, it made me sad to think Canadians are eating this, thinking that’s what varenyky is supposed to taste like, when it isn’t.”

Well, how’s this for putting one’s money where their mouth is?

Since mid-September, Olha and Oleksandr have operated the Centre Ice Café, tucked inside the Dakota Community Centre at 1188 Dakota St. There, the couple turns out a wealth of Ukrainian favourites seven days a week, most of which are based on her late mother’s tried-and-true recipes.

“It’s been interesting, because it seems like a lot of the people who come for food are making a special trip… they aren’t here to watch their kids play hockey or whatever,” Olha says, seated next to Oleksandr at a raised table opposite their setup.

“So far, everybody has welcomed us with open arms, and it makes us so happy to be able to share our food with Winnipeggers.”

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Olha and Oleksandr were both born and raised in the village of Komyshyvakha, located 20 kilometres from Zaporizhzhia, a city in eastern Ukraine that, prior to the war, had roughly the same population as Winnipeg.

Zaporizhzhia is the site of a nuclear power plant, and was one of the Russian army’s early targets. That forced the couple to begin making preparations to leave their village in the spring of 2022.

Despite the impending danger, it wasn’t an easy decision. They ran two businesses, a liquor store and a grocery store, in Komyshyvakha. They also owned the apartment where they lived, along with a second unit that housed Oleksandr’s mother, Tamara Makarenko.

“There, we had all we needed; we had a wonderful life,” Olha says, reaching for her husband’s hand.

“But because of the war, it was worthless. We couldn’t sell a thing to raise money for our move. We even had to leave our dog behind… it was too expensive to bring with us.”

After going through the proper channels, the family — Oleksandr’s mother included — arrived in Winnipeg on March 21. Although they didn’t know a whit about the city aside from what Olha had researched online, it didn’t take long for them to feel comfortable in their new surroundings.

(Sure, it gets cold in their former part of the world, they say, just never as frosty as what they’ve been told to expect, during their first full winter here. “Minus-40? Sorry, but that sounds crazy,” she says.)

Their grocery store in Ukraine included an annex that served a variety of home-style meals.

Olha wanted to do something similar here, and learned she would require a food-handler certificate in order to make that a reality. While she was completing the provincially-run course, which she passed with flying colours, she was introduced to Lise Bourassa, owner of Le Goûter, a seasonal restaurant situated in Albert Beach.

The two became fast friends and, beginning in July, Bourassa invited Olha and Oleksandr to use her premises free of charge every Monday and Tuesday, when her establishment was normally closed.

Faster than you can say holopchi, cottagers from Albert Beach, as well as from neighbouring communities such as Grand Beach and Victoria Beach, were beating a path to their door, for what was being billed as Ukrainian Night.

Among the people who sampled their fare was Jody Wreggit, Dakota Community Centre’s director of finance and administration.

Wreggit was at work one morning when a local television station aired a report about what Olha and Oleksandr were up to at the lake.

Wreggit leaned over to Michele Augert, Dakota’s chief executive officer, who was in the same room, and said, hey, that’s the couple she’d been telling her about.

That exchange took place in early August, Augert recalls, and because the report mentioned the couple only had access to Le Goûter until the end of that month, when it was scheduled to shut down until next summer, a light bulb went on in her head.

One of Augert’s duties at Dakota Community Centre is staffing a canteen that offers small meals and snacks. That’s never been a simple task, she says, as the hours, primarily evenings and weekends, don’t appeal to most.

Plus, it can be hit-and-miss in terms of sales: steady during the winter hockey season, but far less so from May to September.

“To me, I always thought it would be suited to a family, that could come in and do their own thing,” Augert says. “So when I saw that story on the news, my first thought was, omigod, wouldn’t they be a perfect fit?”

The next time Wreggit was at the lake, she visited Le Goûter to chat with the Mashynas, who were commuting back and forth from their Transcona apartment.

She explained the setup at Dakota, and invited them to come and take a look, if they were interested. They did just that and on Sept. 16, they officially took over the Centre Ice Café, signing a one-year lease.

Augert, whose maternal grandmother was Ukrainian, describes the relationship as a win-win.

“The timing couldn’t have been better. We needed somebody to run the canteen, and they needed a place to cook,” she says, adding it took some coaxing to convince Olha that besides perogies, cabbage rolls and pelmeni, the latter a meat-filled dumpling, they would be wise to include more pedestrian selections such as french fries and chicken fingers, as well as that Winnipeg rink staple, taco-in-a-bag.

“Word of mouth has been incredible, and like they probably told you, lots of people drive here specifically for their food, to enjoy at home,” she goes on.

“Not long after they started, there was a fellow who came all the way from St. James, to buy something like $200 worth. We couldn’t be happier with how it’s been working out.”

Olha, who is definitely a member of Team Boiled versus Team Fried when it comes to perogies, allows that the hours can be long.

There have been occasions when she and her husband, who arrive first thing in the morning, haven’t returned home until close to midnight, especially if there is a hockey tournament scheduled at the community centre the following day, and they need to prep more than usual.

Neither of them is afraid of hard work, mind you.

Also, since Oleksandr’s mother lives with them, and is able to care for their son and daughter in their absence, they’re willing to do whatever it takes to make their new enterprise a success.

“Winnipeg is going to be our home now. We want to get a house, a mortgage… to make it like it was for our kids in Ukraine,” she says, mentioning they have hired three people who, like them, fled Ukraine, and are hoping to add a few more, to prepare for what they are hoping will be a large number of holiday catering orders.

“We’re also helping new (Ukrainian) refugees get what they need. When we moved here, our Canadian friends gave us so much — tables, chairs, beds — and we feel it’s time to return the favour.”

As for future plans, Olha smiles, remarking she and Oleksandr are content to take things one step at a time.

That said, customers are forever commenting how they wish they had a “real” restaurant of their own, somewhere they could reserve a table for friends and family.

Perhaps one day, she replies, telling them in addition to peace, that would be their dream scenario, too.

david.sanderson@freepress.mb.ca