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Saturday, December 10 Lower East Side
Hey Kids The Lower East Growing up on the Jersey Shore in the 1970’s a trip to New York City only meant one thing; the Lower-East-Side. We would take the hour and fifteen minute ride that felt like a decade through the Holland tunnel and emerge in the rough and tumble world of Manhattan’s Jewish bargain district. There I would delight as my mother would drag us to stall after stall along Orchard Street haggling with the Chasidics who sold socks, shoes, leather jackets and braziers. After a hard days haggling and a visit to Cohen’s Opticals for discount glasses the family would be treated to the reward we’d been salivating about all day; David’s Kosher delicatessen. I don’t know if it’s that I was so much shorter then, but David’s felt like it was 20 feet high and a city block wide and was filled with hanging salamis, smoldering brisket, kuggel, potato pancakes all the delights of Ashkenazi childhood. We would sit at about 3:00 and eat till 4:30, then crawl out of the den of derma reeking of pastrami for the long ride home. I knew the day they turned David’s into a Blimpies sub shop the Lower-East-Side of my ancestors was gone. The brassiere shop is now a hip-hop clothing store. The Chasidic vendors have been replaced with Hispanic vendors. Where we used to see carts rolling by filled with Turkish apricots and halvah, now you see Korean street vendors selling fake designers watches. Then the café’s came. The Lowest-East-Side once the immigrant center for post Ellis Island European Jews and more then a few Irish has become something no one could have predicted. It has become hip. There are French café’s, art galleries, tattoo parlors and trendy independent designer clothes stores. The realtors in a rush to capitalize on the growing fashion of the neighborhood have dubbed it “Loho” (lower-Houston) much like the tags for other Manhattan hoods that have been un-affordable to anyone but the rich; Soho, Noho. But there are still signs of the old Lower-East-side and perhaps the most brilliant amongst them is the Essex Street Market. The Essex Market is a large indoor market which opened its doors in 1939. Ironically the market was created by NYC mayor Fiorello La Guardia in an effort to rid the streets of pushcarts. The pushcarts stayed well into the 70’s so his plan did not work but one of the great and lasting Manhattan institutions was born. One will no longer find a kosher butcher or a Chasidic dairyman in the market but there is Norman Schapiro, the grandson of Sam who founded the kosher winery Schapiro’s which distributes worldwide. Norman sold the much beloved and famous Schapiro winery building which welcomed tourists to Rivington Street for over 100 years. When asked why he sold, Norman answered simply, “For five million dollars…that’s a good reason!” Money aside Norman who grew up talking to tourists about his family’s legacy prefers to sit in his tiny stall at the market posing for photographs and offering tastings to playing golf. Dont' bother looking for tongue or kishka at the butchers in Essex market they have been replaced with “Chuletas” and “Tripe.” But at the adorable Jeffrey’s market, the grandson of the original owner who has had the meat market right where it stands since 1939 now plays homage to the rising tide or artists in the hood. Jeffrey’s meat market is now an art gallery. Behind the glass case of pork chops hang watercolors by local school kids and paintings by whatever local artists Jeffrey deemed worthy for the month. There are fruit vendors, fish stalls laced with bin after bin of fresh fish on ice, dry goods vendors, a dumpling man, a tailor, a barber and the newly hip “Rainbo’s” which makes specialty cake toppers including an S&M scene and a severed head. One can walk into the Essex Street market and emerge with dinner, wine, a haircut, your trousers cuffed and more then a few stories to tell. The market is perhaps the perfect icon for today’s Loho; Yiddish to Puerto Rican to young hip and often Japanese. We emerged from the Essex Market with our teeth stained purple from freshly made blueberry juice, an armload of cod, shrimp and filet mignon and the feeling that we’d stepped back in time. What more can you ask for in the busiest city in the world?
** Recipes are done in collaboration with Miha Juric Corn Crusted Cod Rub the top side of cod ( or any white fish) filet in rough ground yellow corn meal and season with salt and pepper. Sear on the corn side in hot oil. Then lay on a greased baking pan and bake at 350 degrees for 10 to 15 minutes depending on the desired done-ness of the fish. Red Miso sauce
Cut filets into 1-inch thick medallions, dredge in olive oil and salt and fresh ground pepper. Chutney
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