When I saw Sid Cooper last night he mentioned that my Aunt Lynn Goodman hasn’t been well lately. I’ve never been very close to her and my Uncle Ernie but since its (almost) never too late I decided to go visit. Ernie is my Nana’s kid brother and I always thought he liked my brother better. Anyway, I bought some flowers and put together a Caplansky’s Emergency Pack (smoked meat, liver, tongue, turkey, slaw, etc…) and called on them this evening. They both looked great and I enjoyed every moment of our time together.
We got into a deep discussion about what I do for a living as more than just a restaurant. Deli’s are cultural institutions and I take that very seriously particularly having read David Sax’s wonderful book on the subject (signed copes available for sale at Caplansky’s). I loved telling Ernie and Lynn the story of Sandy Litman’s father Ben’s 90th Birthday a few weeks ago. Sandy called us to cater her dad’s bithday party up at the family cottage on Lake Simcoe. She said Ben wanted to eat all the things he hasn’t been allowed to have for the last 20 years: kishke, knish, chopped liver, smoked meat, lemon meringue pie and a boston cream pie too. The full schmear (spread). And we schmeared it up pretty good.
You see, Ben didn’t want just the food. He wanted a slice of his past. A shtickle of childhood. A forschpeis of memories. Its hard for me to describe the joy I felt watching them devour my food but let me try: it was fucking awesome. Yeah, that about covers it.
