"I grew up on chicken necks, kishke, all the stuff that clogs your arteries," he reminisced, pushing his cap back on his head and smiling at the memory. "And I was a victim of it - I'm a cardiac patient. Now I eat lunch at the salad bar at Whole Foods."
Friday, February 26, 2010
'AUTHENTIC' IS A MOVING TARGET: Ha'aretz explores the question of what constitutes a "real" Jewish deli in the sustainable food era, recapping a debate which occurred recently in, shockers, Berkeley, CA. (Yes, Michael Pollan was in attendance.) While it certainly seems plausible that "what American Jews think of as the authentic Jewish deli is an ossified construct based on post-World War II ideals of abundance that had little to do with how Jews ate in early 20th-century New York, let alone in the Old World," it required 80-year-old Philadelphia native Max Cooperstein to bring it all home:
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The article notes that Jewish delis are going out of business all over NYC -- and I'm going to suggest this is less a function of sustainable eating than competition from mass-processed foods and pre-made sandwiches.
ReplyDeleteAs far as the post-war abundance thing goes, I'd eat at these delis more often if they made sandwiches that were physically possible to eat in one sitting. I recommend the corned beef in Montreal for this purpose, but I'm definitely going to check out Mile End (speaking of La Ville aux Cent Cloches) in Brooklyn as soon as I get dug out of this snow.
The psychology of portion size is a strange one: I have an In-N-Out dangerously close to my office but after just three times in avoiding the temptation for the double-double in favor of a single, the idea of the larger burger is no longer appealing. Yet, if presented, I'd eat it. I'd be great to find a small, good pastrami sandwich like that. I'd even pay the same amount for a larger one, knowing I wouldn't then be compelled to eat the larger one.
ReplyDeletePossibly the best (also possibly the only) Jewish deli I've eaten in is Rein's Deli in Vernon, CT, right off 84. We always go on our way home from NYC, and it's fantastic. Definitely recommend it.
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