Drive-thru dumplings: Baba's Homestyle Perogies pinches 12,000 daily to prepare for holiday rush
Owner Rob Engel his Saskatoon business has the only perogie drive-thru in the country
When the holiday season comes calling, one particular potato dumpling becomes an important fixture on many dinner tables: perogies.
That's certainly the case at Baba's Homestyle Perogies, where they are hand-pinched at a rate of 12,000 per day during the holiday season — up from the usual 5,000 to 8,000.
"We never stop making perogies. We're making them every day," said Baba's owner Rob Engel. "Cabbage rolls pick up as well. We do maybe 3,000 a day normally, and at this time of year, we do closer to 5,000 a day. So it's really busy, and we can't let up. The demand gets high at Christmas time."
Located at 720B 51st St., Baba's opened in 1984. Rob, his wife Chelsea and their family have owned it since 2006, and carry on the hand-pinched perogie tradition.
"It's grown over the years from what started in a Baba's kitchen, to 20 people working full time, pinching perogies all day, every day, Engel said."
Pinching perogies isn't the only all-day, every-day job at Baba's. There's also the perogie drive-thru. The window has become an iconic piece of the restaurant's identity. It's especially popular with lunchtime customers looking to enjoy a filling, homemade meal in the comfort of their car.
Engel says Baba's is currently the only perogie drive-thru he knows of in Canada.
"It's such a great concept," he said. "I can't say there's a slow time for the drive-thru — it's always busy."
The making of a stand-out perogie
The perogie recipe at Baba's hasn't changed. The dough consists of flour, water, oil and salt — staples that Engel says lay the foundation for a stand-out perogie.
"There's been some tweaking, but you don't need to mess with a perogie recipe. The ingredients are basic, and that's part of what makes us special," he said. "You can put whatever you want in a perogie, but the filling of the perogie, it's almost like a base."
Baba's offers seven regular perogie flavours including potato and onion, cottage cheese, Saskatoon berry, and potato and cheddar cheese, the most popular. They've also experimented with other flavours, like apple cinnamon or pulled pork. Engel says there's an eggs benedict perogie in the works.
The most important element, however, is every potato dumpling being made by hand.
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"Everything we do here is by hand. We peel the potatoes. We stretch out the dough. We cut the dough. Pinching the perogies, cutting up the cabbage, rolling the cabbage rolls — it's a lot of hand work," Engel said. "I think that's what makes it a special food. When you're making perogies by hand, there's just a tenderness and a touch to them that you don't get with a machine-made perogie."
Tradition at the heart of the business
Saskatoon has a history of hand-pinched perogies. Prior to Baba's, a business called the O&O Drive-in sold handmade Ukrainian food and had a perogie drive-thru.
"The O&O has been closed for over 30 years now, but people still come in here and ask us, 'Hey, do you have anything to do with the old O&O drive-thru and their perogies?'" Engel said.
"We don't — we're kind of our own thing. But it's neat to be compared to an iconic thing from Saskatoon's history that people still think of."
That history is a testament to Prairie folks' commitment to this humble but mighty potato dumpling. It brings people to Baba's year-round, but Engel says there's an especially strong connection during the holiday season.
"At Christmas time I think we really focus on families and traditions, and something that we all connect with is being around the table with family, maybe pinching perogies, maybe doing Christmas cookies, maybe making sausage. It's as much about the family and the tradition as it is about the food and being able to connect with others over a shared meal," he said.
From cabbage rolls to the signature mushroom dill sauce, Baba's has all of the homemade fixings to complement perogies perfectly. The take-home freezer is always well-stocked in the lead-up to Christmas, as customers look to bring a bit of that handmade tradition home.
"[Perogies] taste like home. They taste like love. I find that people have an emotional connection to perogies when they're handmade because it tastes like growing up. It tastes like Baba's house or Grandma's house. There's a tradition in it that people connect to, and that's really special about what we do."
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