LIBERTY — A Polish tradition overtook an Irish one Tuesday as Kravitz Delicatessen and Polish Youngstown collaborated for the 15th annual Paczki Day.

Kravitz owner Matt Rydarowicz said sales volume for the annual Mardi Gras celebration was higher than its sales on St. Patrick’s Day, which is traditionally its highest grossing day of the year.

Rydarowicz took over ownership of the Belmont Avenue eatery in April 2002.

Aundrea Cika Heschmeyer of Polish Youngstown said 243 dozen of the paczki, a Polish donut, were sold. That is 2,916 of the sweet treats.

She said the initial 186 dozen ordered from a bakery in Cleveland were close to sold out by 4 p.m., and the bakery brought an additional batch to get through the deli’s closing at 6:30 p.m.

“This was the first huge bounce back since COVID,” Heschmeyer said.

However, she and Rydarowicz both said weather played a part in the huge turnout. Temperatures were in the mid-50s most of the day and it was sunny.

“One year when we had an ice storm, we had to give away our last few batches,” Heschmeyer said.

“People don’t mind standing in line outside when the weather is nice,” Rydarowicz added.

Heschmeyer said a percentage of the paczki sales, and a smaller percentage of the eatery’s regular sales, go to Polish Youngstown to support scholarships for students and other events.

“We brought this tradition to (former owner) Jack Kravitz, so it’s nice to see people still coming out and supporting it,” Heschmeyer said.

She said the deli cannot keep up with the volume of donuts sold and that is why Polish Youngstown contracts with the Cleveland bakery. Some of the pastries are made at Kravitz, however.

“The chef here uses my mom’s recipe and we coached the Cleveland bakery on how to make them, also using her recipe,” Heschmeyer said about her mother, Dolores Cika, who died in 2009. “Me and Marta (from Krakus Deli in Boardman) were in the back overseeing them while wearing our babushkas.”

Rydarowicz said the chef at Kravitz and he are usually “pretty good with numbers,” but he never expected Tuesday’s sales to overtake the Irish holiday fare of corned beef and cabbage.

“Today was our best sales day since I took over,” he said. “We sold our last six paczki five minutes after closing.”

He said in addition to the weather, he thinks opening at 8 a.m. also helped sales because people stopped on their way to work.

“We were slammed all day,” Rydarowicz said.

The newspaper’s photographer said the line outside was 15 deep when he arrived a little after 10 a.m. and was 30 deep when he left an hour later.

“We appreciate all the customers and their support. Hopefully they will come back St. Patrick’s Day weekend,” Rydarowicz said.

In addition to paczki, Kravitz also offered other Polish fare, including kielbasa, stuffed cabbage and Polish beer, as well as their own menu offerings.

Eating paczki is the traditional Polish way to indulge before fasting in observance of Lent, which begins today. Although they look like jelly doughnuts, paczki are made from especially rich dough containing eggs, fats, sugar and sometimes milk. Traditionally, a small amount of Spiritus grain alcohol is added to the dough before cooking; as it evaporates, it prevents oil absorption deep into the dough.

In Poland, paczki sales are the highest on “Fat Thursday,” marking the start of the final week of the pre-Lenten celebrations. In the United States, it is observed the day before Ash Wednesday. It became popular in the Polish communities at the beginning of the 20th century, Heschmeyer said.