UNCLE JIMMY wrote:[Never knew what a bagel was growing up in Pennsylvania. Nor English muffins, Pastrami, Corned beef, or New England clam chowder.
After the service and the move to this darn state just to get a job that paid halfway decent, and only after that......we were introduced to that foods.
The fresh bagel has to be crisp outside, and soft and warm inside.
Lox chopped in with the creamcheese is my favorite.
I'll never forget, my brother lived in MD, and we took a trip to visit.
It was 97ºF that day. He served breakfast outside on the picnic table, and had all these fresh baked bagels from the Baltimore City.
A lazy susan was all divided with.... diced fresh mushrooms / chopped tomatoes / chopped broccoli / chopped cauliflower / chopped onions.... fresh raisins, / chopped lox / and cream cheese spread.
OMG..... it was the best fix it yourself bagel brunch ever. I couldn't stop eating them.... Tina went with just butter and jelly or jam.
She is NOT a veggie eater, and won't eat raw onions....or Seafood.
Fun reading about your first exposure to bagels, Jimmy! That spread sounds delicious though I've never had nor even seen lox chopped up and mixed with cream cheese. I'm sure I would love it, too.
My father grew up in New York and Chicago, cities with a much larger Jewish population than New Orleans. He was a big fan of and frequented a great deli that was in N.O. until 1987 called Bill Long's Bakery and Delicatessen. He'd bring home delicious pastrami, corned beef, and peppered beef along with fantastic pumpernickel and rye bread with caraway seeds. He'd also regularly bought some stuff that only he liked that he knew would last in the fridge, like tongue, liver cheese (I ate it when I was a young kid but don't care for it anymore) and really stinky cheeses like Limburger (I just read Limburger, the most popular of the stinky cheeses, "is fermented using Brevibacterium linens, a bacterium partly responsible for the smell of the human body. As a result, when people say Limburger smells like human feet they are scientifically correct." Gag! My mom used to fuss at him if he didn't keep it wrapped up in the deli paper it came in and then insisted that he enclose the wrapped package in a sealed container in the fridge. I remember him laughing like a little kid when she'd fuss about the smell and I also remember him winking at us while she complained about it! Sort of reminds me of you, Jimmy, now that I think about him doing that.
I didn't have a bagel until I was out of high school, as you just didn't see them often though I know Bill Long's sold them. If I remember correctly, I don't think my mom liked them which is probably why my dad never brought any home. I didn't have my first really good bagel until I went to NYC in my early 30s. I love 'em today. We buy Thomas's everything bagels but I sure wish someone sold good ol' onion bagels! Bill Long, the owner of the deli, was shot and killed in a robbery attempt in front of the deli in 1985 while his wife watched out the window. The deli closed about two years later. People here still lament its absence. I just looked up some articles to make sure I had the years right and remembered when I read it that people "came from all over the city to buy Bill Long's potato salad." It was a mayonnaise based type whereas my family preferred mustard in ours but I remember my father loved it, again probably because he could enjoy the container at leisure and not worry one of us kids eating all of it before he had a chance to finish it!
It's funny, as lots of the places that have closed over the years that people in N.O. still talk about are often joked about, as people always say about those places that they "ain't dere no more!" (with "dere" being pronounced as "dare"). Sometimes you will see a list of places, be it restaurants, groceries, holes in the wall, barrooms, that "ain't dere no more" -- always makes me laugh. Some of the places were indeed true New Orleans icons and others didn't seem to be really very highly thought of UNTIL they weren't "dere no more!" But I guess that's true all over...
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