It’s time to put your money where your mouth is folks, and start pre-ordering copies of Save the Deli, which you can do via this site now.
The publisher has set up a sales page, for both the Canadian and US editions (same book, different cover), which will soon be improved with better graphics and ads on the redesigned homepage here. Read the rest of this entry »
As the biggest, oldest, and best known deli in New York, America, and the world, Katz’s deli is more than simply a restaurant. It is a status symbol, a legend, an enigma.
It is the deli by which many others judge themselves. I can’t tell you the number of times deli owners says “we’re just as good as Katz’s” or “we’re trying to capture the spirit of Katz’s”. It’s so big, so bright, and so overwhelming to all five senses, that it’s impossible to match.
But does it hold up? Yes, the pastrami is universally acknowledged as excellent, as are the hot dogs, but what about the other stuff on the menu.
GQ food writer, and deli aficionado Alan Richman set out to test this, initially as a tribute to the great deli. The result: To say Richman was less than impressed is an understatement. He was positively outraged. Here’s a look at Richman’s takedown.
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Just got a link sent my way for a great mention by Bob Minzesheimer in USA Today’s Book Buzz about the upcoming book.
Noshing on knishes: Weighing in at 160 pounds, 5-foot-9 author David Sax looks too lean to have spent two years eating pastrami, brisket, knishes, blintzes and chopped liver — all in the interest of research. Sax’s Save the Deli: In Search of Perfect Pastrami, Crusty Rye and the Heart of Jewish Delicatessen, will be published Oct. 19 by Houghton Mifflin. At lunch last week — at New York’s 2nd Avenue Deli — Sax said he tried to limit himself to small portions, “more of a grazing nosh than a gargantuan fress.” Sax, 29, a Toronto native who lives in Brooklyn, calls traditional Jewish delis “an endangered species” because of diet, assimilation and economics. But on a cross-country search, he found good eats not only in New York, Miami and Skokie, Ill., but in Salt Lake City as well.
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Many of you think that I’m a one man deli machine, chronicling delis, eating myself obese, writing, publishing, and promoting my upcoming book.
I’m flattered, but the truth is that everything I do is done in concert with Team Save the Deli.
Who is team Save the Deli? Well, it’s mostly female, half based in New York, and half in Toronto, with one in Boston, half Jewish, half Gentile, and all talent.
Let’s meet them.
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My good buddy Mark Lamster sent me this cool pic today.
I think it’s done on that iPhone app, where you can finger paint. And I think it’s done by artist Jorge Colombo, who did the recent New Yorker cover. It’s available for purchase as a print on 20×200.com, a super cool website where you can get great original art for $20.
Also, another little tidbit. I got more great hyped press that came out of BEA. Vick Mickunas of the Dayton Daily News wrote about the Book Expo of America convention this past friday: Read the rest of this entry »
A year ago tomorrow, June 10th, Zane Caplansky opened the doors of his kitchen at the Monarch Tavern in Toronto, and started slicing his dry aged, hand cut smoked meat. There was a good crowd that day. So good, in fact, that he sold out of meat and had to close for two weeks.
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When I often write about saving delis, it usually occurs after a deli has closed down. Those are sad occasions, which ultimately serve to remind us all as to why we have to fight for delis to survive, to fight, and ultimately to prevail. But for the deli that’s just passed, there’s precious little we can do my friends. It is history.
Not this time.
This time we fight. Read the rest of this entry »
Great article today from the Buffalo News, and not just because it mentions me and my upcoming book (though, note to Mr. Simon, I’m from Toronto, not Montreal). Simon’s a lover of deli and he’s been lamenting its demise. What’s surprised him is that he’s not alone. Read on:
Deli dearth strikes a hungry chord
And I thought I was a rarity a couple of weeks ago lamenting the disappearance of my favorite deli —Risa’s—and her delicious matzo ball soup from Hertel Avenue. Was I wrong.
“My phone started ringing at 7 p. m.,” wrote Risa Paonessa about my column on my unfulfilled yearning for her glorious matzo ball soup, sandwiches and the current general lack of a good Jewish deli inside the city limits.
Well, my e-mail box filled up too. And so did my telephone receiver. Read the rest of this entry »
So things are moving along as the buzz for Save the Deli builds.
First, this weekend was the Book Expo America, the industry’s giant sales tradeshow, where book buyers meet publishers, and place their orders. My US publisher, Houghton Mifflin Harcourt, had their lunches during the conference catered by the 2nd Ave Deli. They did so well, they needed to restock their table, because editors, writers, and sellers were going crazy over the pastrami.
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Tomorrow night is going to be a big one. That’s when I, and several hundred other Jewish authors (or authors with Jewish books), audition for the Jewish Book Network. The JBN, which is part of the Jewish Book Council, is like the American Idol for Jewish literature in America. It helps organize and facilitate book tours to Jewish communities around the country, bringing authors who normally wouldn’t stop in those places, to the likes of Cleveland, Portland, and Tampa.
Cool, right?
But the JBN isn’t just a normal process. No no. It’s an audition. Read the rest of this entry »
Save the Deli is a space dedicated to the preservation of the Jewish delicatessen, a hallowed temple of salted and cured meats. [read more]
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