Recipes

Gourmet Foods and Drinks of Forty-Seventh Street 1947-1953

Half-sour pickles must be straight out of a wooden barrel and wrapped in brown paper. East as you walk down the street with a parent or a friend.

Charlotte-Rousse: in a small cardboard container, with bottom that can be pushed up, made with sponge-cake, whipped cream and a bright red cherry.  Don’t eat too quickly.

Good Humour Popsicle on a stick, vended by a man riding in a white truck playing recorded music, and a bell.  Comes in all flavours, but only available in chocolate and vanilla.

Eskimo Pie ice cream block, no stick, chocolate sandwich-cookie, only sold by a man on a  bicycle with small chest strapped to it. No songs.

Knish, either potato or kasha, brought to you by an old man pushing a little trolley with heating unit. If you want, add some salt and pepper, a little shmear of mustard, or by itself it’s so delicious.

New York pretzel, big and chewy with large lumps of salt outside, to be scraped off as you walk, in the style of Hansel and Gretel leaving a trail behind them.

Real Italian pizza made in a bakery out of left over dough, very thick and crusty, with tomato sauce and mozzarella cheese: five cents a slice.

Bagels right out of the oven, shmeared with fresh cream cheese and a thick slice of lox. Also drink a tall glass of milk.

Bocksa, or Saint-Johns Bread, sold in long black strips, from some mysterious source. Chew until all the juice comes out, and then throw what remains at other kids on the street.

Sticks of sugar cane, to be chewed, sucked dry, and the fibre spit out; see recipe for  bocksa for method.

Chicken from the market, still alive when you point it out, then its neck twirled and killed, and a specialist flicks its feathers, but always in need of extra preparation at home.

Egg Cream made with fresh whole milk, Fox’s U-Bet chocolate syrup, and Goodhealth seltzer spritzed directly into the glass or jelly jar.  Give a little stir with a spoon and sip.

Fish taken out especially from a large stone tank where it swims with its fellows, then walloped until dead, split, gutted and scraped clean of scales.  Take home and cook however you like.

Italian ices.  Available from a man with a cold-box held by straps around his neck.  You want, he opens, there is a block of ice, he chips away a few minutes into a Dixie Cup and, if you have an extra penny, then you can ask for cherry or strawberry syrup on top.  Excellent for very hot days.

Chopped liver made from calves or chicken livers, one or two hard-boiled eggs, a bit of schmaltz, a finely chopped onion and maybe some garlic, served on saltine crackers.  On special festive occasions add some parsley leaves and shape into statues.

Grape soda made from grape jelly in a jar with a spritz of seltzer.  Put in two or three spoons of jelly, fill the jar almost to the top, and stir vigorously: the more you stir the sweeter it gets.

Lox and onion and eggs (scrambled).  Eat maybe with a warmed (never toasted) bagel. Goes well with chocolate milk made with Fox’s U-Bet syrup.

Fried salami and eggs (substitute for bacon & eggs).  Slice the salami as thin as possible until you can almost see through it.  Add eggs, as many as you want and stir for a while.  Cook slowly in a big pan after melting in some chicken fat or (if you can afford) schmaltz (goose fat).  Serve with salt and pepper and as much bread as you want.

French toast.  Take left-over Shabbos challah, slice into nice thick chunks, and soak in a bowl of eggs and milk whisked delicately, fry until crispy, sprinkle on cinnamon, drip over with some real Canadian maple syrup.  You will kvell. 

Doctor Brown’s Cel-Ray Tonic. Excellent with pastrami, corned beef and other delicatessen.  Try to get in a bottle not in a can, as it tastes better.

Frosted: fill up a metal malted milk container about two thirds with ice-cream, then whizz on the machine until the contents becomes almost liquid, serve in a tall glass.

Cherry lime ricky: fill a tall glass three quarters full of Pepsi Cola, add lime and cherry juice, spin for a few moments, and enjoy.

Bialy sandwich.  Carefully slice a bialystock roll down the centre, separate the two parts, add a sliver of pickled herring, ads as many onions as you like, and stick together again with cream cheese.

Onion roll open sandwich.  Heat the bread for a few moments in the oven until warm.  Put on a big blob of butter, watch it melt over the top.  Add if you want some diced scallions and/or radishes.  Bite carefully.

Chicken soup.  Pour water into a big pot.  Add a chopped onion or two, a sliced carrot, a handful of rice or noodles.  Bring to the boil.  Throw in two or more chicken or duck feet, the yellower the better.  Let simmer for six to eight hours.  Alternative suggested by one of my grandmas, if made in a bad week when no fowl feet are available: cause a borrowed still living chicken to fly two or three times over the water. Remove any feathers that happen to fall in.

How to make a sour pickle, according to Grandpa Dave.  Go the pickle factory on 39^th Street and watch the cucumbers move down the conveyor belt and then make faces at them when they pass. For half-sour pickles only grimace a little, like this.

If you have other suggestions or corrections let me know.  It doesn’t even have to be about Boro Park or Thirteenth Avenue.