Kenny and Zuke’s is Open!
Tuesday, October 23rd, 2007
Pacific deli fans can finally rejoice, because the Oregon air is now filled with the scents of curing and smoking meats wafting out of Kenny and Zuke’s Delicatessen, which opens in Portland today. After living in a temporary home as a Sunday affair in a diner (dubbed Ken’s Place), the new deli is now housed in a permanent location at 1038 SW Stark Street, in the hipster heaven ACE Hotel.
Kenny and Zuke’s shows tremendous promise. They are a new school deli that adheres to old school traditions of quality and cuisine, making as much as possible on the premesis. Just check out their menu. Their pastrami is cured and smoked in house. Their bagels and breads are baked in the basement. Eggs are free range and natural. It is as deli was meant to be…natural…pure…traditional…all with the freshest ingredients and minimal processing. They even ask patrons to turn off their cell phones at dinner! What heaven.
The menu looks trim and classic, with few dishes that veer too far from the canon of Ashkenazi cooking.
As I’m thousands of miles away, it’ll be some time before I can head over to Portland and check out the goods at Kenny and Zuke’s, so for now, you and I will have to discern what we can via secondhand sources.
A Flickr photoblogger, vj_pdx, took these great shots:
Latkes
The Joint
Pastrami n’ Eggs
House cured, hand cut pastrami. photo courtesy of katez0r
There’s also a few early reviews, though they’ll trickle in shortly.
Willamette Week “Sweet Jesus guys. You’re killin’ me here.”
Neighborhood Notes “it is sooooooo worth it!”
Metro Blogging “…thick cut pastrami that tasted like it came from God’s kitchen.”
I’m sure we’ll hear more great reviews real soon. Good luck and mazel tov to Ken Gordon and Nick Zukin. What began as a hobby of making pastrami at a farmer’s market has blossomed into something great. Save the Deli wishes them many generations of success.
Ess Gezunt!
“Nosh in My Backyard!” from the New York Observer
Monday, October 22nd, 2007
VS
With the reopening of the 2nd Ave Deli on everyone’s tongues, the articles are starting to appear fairly regularly. I missed this one from last week, which doesn’t make any sense, as I was actually quoted in it. The piece, called “Nosh in my Backyard!Veteran Deli Eyes Newcomer” was written by Chris Shott, and concerns the effect the new 2nd Ave Deli will have on longtime Murray Hill staple Sarge’s New York Delicatessen. Sarge’s is a beloved institution in its own right. They pickle and smoke their meats in store (something rarely found in New York these days), and have a strong local following.
Sarge’s was founded by another Abe…Sgt Abe Katz of the NYPD. It’s a family owned and operated place open all night, and its devotees swear by it. What effect the 2nd Ave Deli will have on its business remains unseen, but I personally think it could be positive for both of them (see my comments in the article).
Heirs of the hallowed Second Avenue Deli, which shuttered its original East Village location during a 2006 rent-hike dispute, are now encroaching upon Sarge’s turf, with construction well under way to reincarnate the fabled eatery in the space of a former tapas joint on 33rd Street, nearest the corner of Third Avenue. Once it opens, the new location threatens to set up a head-to-head scrum for bragging rights as the area’s knish capital, pitting against one another two of the city’s enduring delicatessen clans, both of whose founding patriarchs, it turns out, happened to be named Abe.
CLICK HERE TO READ THE REST OF THE ARTICLE
Sarge’s New York Delicatessen
www.sargesdeli.com
548 3rd Avenue
New York, N. Y. 10016
(212) 679-0442
(877) SARGES1
“A Counter History” The New York Times Magazine on the new 2nd Ave Deli
Saturday, October 20th, 2007
Can you feel the excitement start to build? It began as rumors, was confirmed briefly, descended into silence, and now prepares to rise anew. Yes, the Second Avenue Deli is ready for the most stupendous comeback in New York’s Jewish deli history, and the time is almost upon us.
I have been speaking with Jeremy Lebewohl for the past few weeks, who is ready to open, save a few regulatory roadblocks that we should all pray get settled real soon. The staff is in place, the meat is about to pickle, and the Berkel slicer is sharp as a sushi knife. Deli fans wait with bated breath.
So today, in the always on top of shit New York Times, there is a small preview in the Magazine by way of a wonderful article called “A Counter History“, written by staff writer Alex Witchel. The piece briefly profiles the Lebewohl family, with a focus on Jack, Jeremy, and the departed and beloved Abe, founder of the 2nd Ave Deli a half century ago. It’s a wonderful ode to a New York family dynasty, and a tempting forshpeis to what we all hope will be another legendary kosher delicatessen in a city that has lost so many.
From the article:
The Jews who immigrated here during the first half of the last century ate at delis — most of them kosher — regularly. Eventually they moved to the suburbs and traded salami for salad. In the 1960s there were 300 kosher delis in the city and suburbs and a Greater New York Delicatessen Dealers’ Association. That group is long defunct, and you can count the number of marquee delis left in Manhattan on one hand: Carnegie, Katz’s and Stage, none of them kosher. Assimilation is one reason; also, the need to separate dairy from meat limits menu choices (kosher meat is more expensive besides), and New Yorkers do not like limits. The staples of deli food, like matzoh-ball soup and corned beef, migrated in nonkosher form to diners and coffee shops decades ago; you need to be Jewish to eat deli the same way you need to be Italian to eat pizza. But for aficionados of the real thing, the high-quality, old-school kosher renditions of brisket or flanken or center-cut tongue like silk, the Second Avenue Deli was it.
CLICK HERE TO LINK TO THE NEW YORK TIMES STORY “A COUNTER HISTORY”
Dinner at Manny’s anyone?
Tuesday, October 16th, 2007
Saving the nation and the deli. Way to go Obama.
Well, it’s official. After months of rumors and me trying to keep it hush hush, Manny’s Cafeteria and Delicatessen is finally open for dinner. Chicago’s hungry masses can finally rejoice in the knowledge that a hard day at the office or the meat processing plant holds the reward of a hot bowl of Manny’s mish mosh, their fantastic kishke, and a hot, pink tower of steaming corned beef with a scraggly, crisp latke on the side.
The deli celebrated with an opening dinner party the other night. Check out the photos here. Note the picture of Obama above. How can you not support him now? Congratulations to the Raskin family. One small step for Manny’s is one giant leap for Chicago.
For those of you not familiar with Manny’s, here’s a brief tour.
Manny’s is open now from 5 am to 8 pm 6 days a week.
It’s still closed on Sundays.
1141 S. Jefferson
Chicago, IL 60607
www.mannysdeli.com
Harcourt is on board to Save the Deli
Friday, October 5th, 2007Wonderful news out of New York yesterday. The US rights to my upcoming book “The Death of Deli”, which launched this very blog, have been picked up by.Harcourt Trade Publishers. The deal was skillfully executed by my Canadian publisher, McClelland and Stewart, with rights maven Marilyn Biderman running the play and my editor Doug Pepper helping to bring it home. Needless to say that I am extremely excited. Harcourt is an excellent publishing house, and I’m very much looking forward to working with them, and my new editor Jenna Johnson, to bring the cause of deli devotion to American readers in the near future.
A Little Slice of Hell: Subway rolls out the Montreal Smoked Meat
Thursday, September 27th, 2007
Warning!
If you’re a true deli fan, know that the following post may cause you to cringe, gag, and possibly retch in disgust and shame. For this news is worse than a glass of milk with a corned beef sandwich, and yet contains just as much evil. It hit me unexpected the other day, as I was walking down the street in Toronto with a friend. I saw it gleaming at me, backlit by neon, from behind a plate glass window. My heart sank. I wanted to smash the glass and burn the goddamn place down. The devil had arrived, and he was pining for deli’s soul.
Yes friends, the dark day has arrived…. Subway is now offering a Montreal Smoked Meat sub.
Ugh. Feh. Yech.
That’s right, Subway. One of the companies that has done more to drive the Jewish deli out of business than most others is now trying to steal the deli’s thunder. The reprehensible corporate douchebags in the marketing department have decided to appropriate our finest sandwich, crappify it for the sake of productivity, and sell it with chips or a greasy cookie to those who know no better. Bravo Subway, first you took pastrami to new lows in the United States, and now you are attacking the legacy of Schwartz’s, Lester’s, and the like. I didn’t think I could hate you any more after I ate that wretched frozen tuna sub in Israel five years ago, but once again you’ve proven me wrong. There is no low to which you won’t stoop. Next thing we know, that skinny putz Jared will be hawking chopped liver sandwiches on your tasteless multigrain loaves. Bravo. You’ve earned a special place in my hell.
Ok, you can all see I’m blinded by rage, so let me refer you to cooler heads at The Hour, an alternative Montreal weekly:
It’s not because the meat was so substandard (it was, falling somewhere between poorly corned beef and an insole), nor that the rest of the sub’s components bore scant resemblance to the traditional substructure of a true smoked meat sandwich (what cruel subterfuge to pass that off as bread!). What irks me is the continual subplot of countless chain restaurants to subvert cultural culinary icons through the substitution of bland, unrepresentative ingredients, often resulting in the subjugation of the gastronomic subculture.
Believe me folks, this isn’t just a rant against Subway. It’s a fight for the preservation of our traditional foods. One day, you want your children and grandchildren to know that Smoked Meat comes from the trained hands of a counterman in a Montreal deli. But if this keeps up, all he’ll know is that it’s one more fast food that has been distilled and simplified down to its shittiest essence. I’m not the only one piping up about this. Check out the Chowhound debate that’s raging against such an abhorrent violation of the laws of taste.
Rue this day.
* To those of you who don’t know, this is what a Montreal Smoked Meat sandwich should always look like
Pastrami King opens in Barrie, ON Today!
Monday, September 24th, 2007Great news to report today. The Pastrami King deli will open in Barrie, Ontario today at 11 AM.
Headed up by Marty Marks, a caterer in the far north and BBQ master with a history in the deli business, it is the first new delicatessen in Ontario since 2000. It is also one of the first delis in the province to be situated out of Toronto, as more and more city dwellers retire north and want their pastrami.
Marks is promising big things up at his location, conveniently placed just off exit 90 A, right by Dunlop St. W, which is conveniently directly en route to my own cottage. Aside from house smoked pastrami, homemade cabbage rolls, and rice puddings (among other treats), The Pastrami King will offer cottage dwellers the chance to purchase a specially designed cooler bag, and make their deli orders ahead of time for the weekend. That way, you can head up north, swing by the King, pick up your deli, and be ready to sit on the dock, or by the ski hill, and nosh. Sounds like a winner to me.
Here’s a tidbit from their soon to be built website:
We’ll be specializing in Hot Smoked Pastrami Sandwiches on Rye. ( We make our own pastrami daily with a generous crusting of spices and peppercorns ). We’ll also be serving up traditional Corned Beef, Roast Brisket of Beef & Authentic Montreal Smoked Meat sandwiches along with sliced meats by the pound for take out, traditional appetizers, side dishes, homemade salads and comfort food desserts.
I plan to visit this very weekend, as I head up to my cottage, and I suggest those of you who are around Toronto do so as well. As old delis fade, new delis become that much more important. Also, note that Pastrami King will not be kosher by any means. In fact, Marks runs a hog roasting school nearby…so if you love your treyf, this is the place.
Check out the Pastrami King and send Marty your heartfelt congratulations.
The Pastrami King
# 4 Cedar Pointe Drive in Barrie, Ontario
877-724-4488
Is BBQ the New Deli?
Thursday, September 20th, 2007
Just after I posted yesterday about new incarnations of deli in New York, my good friend and trusty photographer Christopher Farber sent me the link to this story from New York Magazine.
Barbecue, the New Deli? Who Knew?
In it, the authors argue that the void created by departing New York delicatessens is going to be filled with BBQ places, swapping cured and brined briskets for ones that are hickory smoked and slathered in sweet sauce.
“The shuttering of 2nd Avenue Deli’s landmark location and the unstaunched rumors about Katz’s impending demise have given the corned-beef crowd some major heartburn, or at least a twinge of dyspepsia. If it’s true, as the deli doomsayers insist, that New York’s archetypical cuisine is on the wane, what will fill the high-fat, high-cholesterol void?
If you’ve been out to eat lately, the answer is obvious. New York is in the midst of an unprecedented and seemingly unstoppable barbecue boom, with three terrific new joints opening over the past year alone. And there are enough striking similarities between the two foodways for us to christen Barbecue the New Deli.”
Whoa! Whoa! Whoa!
Back up the truck a bit Bessie, because I’d like to jump off. I’m all for BBQ. In my brief 28 years on this earth I’ve consumed far more meat from the fire than that from the deli slicer. After deli, there’s no more satisfying taste than that of wood grilled Argentinean mollejas, Turkish kebabs, KC ribs, or good old fashioned burgers.
But declaring BBQ the New Deli smacks of catchphrase journalism. I know that New York Magazine is the trendsetting voice of the Big Apple, trying to stay ahead of the curve by espousing provocative ideas, but I find this a bit of a stretch. Yes, there are paralells between deli and BBQ (brisket, brining, pickled veg), but why declare it the New anything? It sounds like some Williamsburg hipster bullshit to me. “Mondays are the new Saturdays” or “Red is the new Black”. Deli’s not the new anything. It’s old, which is why we love it. We cherish the fact that Jewish delicatessen food remains unchanged while others are chasing fleeting foodie fads and taste profiles. BBQ is the same, and I have no problem with the two existing happily side by side. BBQ, like deli, is a traditional slow food that draws devotees of a similar characteristic. They don’t replace one another…they compliment.
So please, spare me the Anna Wintour/ E! Entertainment titles of who is hot, what is new, who is in, and when they’re out. As long as delis in New York are serving up pastrami, knishes, kasha, and tongue, ain’t nothing going to stand in its place.
New Deli: Spinning the Classics
Wednesday, September 19th, 2007A great article appeared today in the New York Post about restaurants spinning classic deli fare in delicious new ways. It’s written by a friend named Kiri Tannenbaum, who is a food writer and scholar, and also a serious deli researcher who is working on a project similar to mine.
WELCOME TO…NEW DELI
NEW JEWISH CUISINE IS NOT YOUR MOMMY’S PASTRAMI
Skip ahead a century, add sophisticated palates, a taste for nostalgia and superstar chefs, and you’ll discover modern appropriations in the most unlikely of places.
WD-50 chef Wylie Dufrense, known for his progressive cuisine, reinvents beef tongue and applies traditional brining methods to his corned duck breast cooked sous-vide, served with a side of crispy thin rye, purple mustard and horseradish cream.
Executive chef Patricia Yeo cures a hankering for Yonah Shimmel’s knishes with her dressed-up variation of mashed Yukon golds and crème fraiche, fried in a spring-roll wrapper, finished with a dollop of American paddlefish caviar which landed on Sapa’s menu when Yeo headed the kitchen. As the chef diaspora continues, Yeo’s mini knishes followed her to the Monkey Bar.
Helen Ng of Amazing 66 and Pastrami Fried Rice
In the article, Tannenbaum mentions, among other places, Amazing 66, a new Chinese restaurant I discovered last November, shortly after they opened on Mott (#66), just south of Canal St. It’s owner, a delightfully vibrant and hillarious woman named Helen Ng is a bold risk taker. The result: the ultimate Jewish dream. Amazing 66 features dishes like corned beef and Chinese greens and pastrami fried rice (made with pastrami created by the Chinese chef). Finally, Jews have somewhere to go where all their culinary cravings can be fulfilled.
Corned Beef braised with Chinese greens
Another deli fusion I encountered in New York takes a prominent place on the menu at the swank L’Atelier de Joel Robuchon, the sleek entry into the Big Apple by the famous French chef. On his menu, at the Four Seasons Hotel, Robuchon featured a dish called “New York Pastrami” (no longer available), which was in fact cold, lean corned beef, mixed along with Alsacian potato salad and shaved curls of foie gras. It was delicate, sensual, and stupendous, and undoubtedly the finest interpretation of deli I’d ever seen. Supposedly Robuchon got the idea from a Jewish friend of his in Paris, and incorporated foods found traditionally in Alsacian-Jewish cooking.
L’Atelier de Joel Robuchon chef Yosuke Suga with the New York Pastrami dish (foie gras and Alsacian potato salad and cold corned beef)
For deli fans this doesn’t change too much. It’s unlikely Ben’s or The Bagel will be adding foie gras or Chinese broccoli to their menus anytime soon. But it shows that deli foods, long dismissed as a basic and crude slice of culinary life, are garnering serious respect in some of the finest kitchens of the land. If Joel Robuchon is a deli fan, perhaps there’s something in the mustard that makes for great cooks.
*also, it was noted to me by Kiri that the editors f**ked up some facts. It is Barney Greengrass who is celebrating 100 years and Katz’s with 120
Ben’s Best and the case of the hanging Wurst
Wednesday, September 5th, 2007
News out of New York last week. Ben’s Best, the popular Queens kosher delicatessen, which has been a local hotspot for political power brokers over the years, has been temporarily shut down due to a health code violation. Though I have never had the chance to visit, Ben’s Best is reputed to be one of the finest kosher delis in the New York area, with a reputation as having some of the best kosher pastrami in the country. This is the place where then Texas Gov. Bush won a bet against then NY Gov. Pataki (over the NBA finals), winning a feast of matzo balls, deli sandwiches, and cel-ray soda. For deli lovers, this is sad news.
At this point, most Jewish deli fans would take the news, and never visit Ben’s Best again. They might be wrong. The New York City health department is notoriously zealous when it comes to enforcing bylaws, often pinning violations on restaurants as though they were scarlet letters. This story in the New York Daily News shows that perhaps Ben’s Best was a victim of New York’s food Gestapo:
Popular Ben’s Best forced to close for 3 days
BY DONALD BERTRAND
Tuesday, September 4th 2007, 4:00 AM
Blame it on the salami - 11 hanging in the window, to be exact.
That was the major culprit that prompted the Health Department to shut down the popular Ben’s Best delicatessen on Queens Blvd. in Rego Park for three days recently.
Ben’s Best failed inspection on Aug. 23 with 44 points of violations. Twenty-eight points is a failed inspection.
“Our biggest problem was the hanging salami in the window, which we had hanging there for 60 years,” said deli owner Jay Parker. “Now the Board of Health says that it has to be confined to the temperatures of other meat products even though it is salted and smoked.”
Inspectors have been extra vigilant since the KFC/Taco Bell incident in Greenwich Village in February, when cameras captured images of rats brazenly romping through the store after-hours.
The salami in the window was 14 points on the inspection, he said. The deli was slapped with an additional seven because of the failure to clean a slicing machine after each use.
“We had sliced some pastrami, after which we were supposed to clean the machine before slicing some corned beef,” Parker said. “We were making a pastrami-and-corned beef sandwich, so I did not understand what cross-contamination [there] was.
So let me get this straight… the large fast food conglomerate of KFC (AKA the Dirty Bird) and Taco Bell (AKA the Dirty) have rats running around in their stores so the health department closes down a kosher deli because they have salamis hanging. Italian delis have salamis hanging on Arthur Ave. Chinese restaurants on Mott have ducks and stingrays hanging. Preserved meats can hang because they are PRESERVED! All the salt which makes kosher salami so delicious is what keeps it from spoiling. Pickled foods were specifically designed to endure the stress and strain of hanging in a window.
As for slicing meat on a machine, were delis to clean the blade after each use, we’d never get served. They clean it regularly, but if you want a combination sandwich, what is the problem? Cross contamination is an issue if raw chicken is used on a cutting board, but one type of pickled beef and another type of pickled beef mixing is like the porterhouse cooking on the same grill as the ribeye at Peter Luger’s. What ever happened to buyer beware? The worst part about this is that Ben’s Best will suffer greatly from reputation, while KFC/Taco Bell will just open up shop elsewhere, continuing to serve filth day in and day out, regardless of how clean the location is. It is time health department authorities wisened up and respected the traditions of food preparation. I don’t know anyone who has gotten sick from a salami before. The sterilized, chemical laden food at the fast food joints is so much worse for you than anything that can be found at a delicatssen. It’s time we stood up for our food heritage. Before long they’ll be forcing us to microwave tongues and boil pickles…in the name of public safety.
Ben’s Best is indeed open. Please show them your support by heading in.
Ben’s Best Kosher Deli
9640 Queens Blvd, Flushing, NY
(718) 897-170
www.bensbest.com
