HUNGRY GERALD

These days HG rarely eats red meat except for a once-a-month rack of lamb or rib steak. But, in yesteryear New York HG was a passionate carnivore. And, the Big Apple was world capital of perfectly cooked red meat. Center of steak worship was the east 40’s (Christ Cella, Palm. Danny’s Hideaway, McCarthy’s, Pen and Pencil, etc.). Christ Cella was HG’s favorite. In the west side theater district there was Gallagher’s; Frankie and Johnnie’s; Dinty Moore’s; Jack Dempsey’s. Cavanagh’s on 23rd Street had splendid steaks in a pleasant atmosphere. Roast beef was great at the Oak Room of the Algonquin Hotel and at Keen’s Chop House. Keen’s also had a giant mutton chop which is still on the menu today. HG preferred the mutton chop with corn fritters at the long closed, alas, Gage & Tollner’s in Brooklyn. The best roast beef sandwich was the French Dip at the Brass Rail on midtown Seventh Avenue. HG had many inexpensive roast beef sandwiches at McGiness on Broadway. Smoked meat–corned beef, pastrami plus lushly fatty brisket–ruled at Jewish delicatessens throughout the five boroughs. HG’s favorite: Gitlitz on 79th and Broadway. Jewish-Romanian steaks were washed down with frozen vodka in the madhouse schmaltz fueled Sammy’s Romanian on the lower east side. Also in the LES, Moscowitz & Lupowitz served a strangely named but tasty “mushk steak.” Scores of Irish taverns served corned beef and cabbage. Favorite of cops and firemen was Conolly’s on 23rd Street that had sublime open faced sandwiches of pot roast doused in an exceptional dark gravy. Yes HG managed to ingest much cholesterol but at 88 HG is still standing (slightly stooped), walking (slowly) and swimming (gracefully).

Pete Wells, The New York Times restaurant critic, did a delightful, witty review of Sammy’s Romanian Steakhouse, The Cardiolgist’s Nightmare on New York’s Lower East Side. Sammy’s serves a nostalgia drenched, schmaltz (chicken fat) drenched, heavy on garlic cuisine. The place evokes the yesteryear Jewish New York of The Bronx, Brooklyn and the Lower East Side. It is loud and clamorous with music from a non-politically correct pianist. Customers, fueled by vodka from ice enclosed bottles, join in the songs and dance between the tables. There are no strangers, just one big family. Wells got it right when he called it a “permanent underground bar mitzvah where Gentiles can act like Jews and Jews can act like themselves.” The restaurant provokes strong emotions. Love it or hate it. Wells wrote: “Sammy’s is the most wonderful terrible restaurant in New York.” BSK is firmly anti-Sammy’s. HG and SJ love it. Sammy’s is a once (maybe twice) a year place. More than that is suicidial. HG once left Sammy’s full of vodka, chopped liver and silver dollar potatoes. Driving uptown on the East Side drive, HG’s equally sozzled companion pointed out he was driving in the downtown lane. Both survived. Barely. Some sensitive Jewish readers have complained about the Wells review. HG’s advice to them: “Lighten up. Sammy’s is just a Jewish joke. Have a shot of icy vodka. L’Chaim.”

HG AND BSK are planning a trip to Montreal this winter (Francophone and a lot cheaper to get to than Paris). As is HG’s custom, HG has been doing some thorough research on Montreal restaurants. Lots of good eating. The question is: Can greedy HG survive the onslaught of all the hearty, unhealthy foods that are Montreal specialties and HG’s heart’s (and mouth’s) desire? For example: A local favorite restaurant, Au Pied de Cochon, lists about 25 foie gras dishes on its menu. Foie gras my be outlawed in California but it thrives in Montreal. Examining Montreal bistro menus, HG has spotted lots of wonderful offal — calf’s liver, kidneys in mustard sauce. sweetbreads. And, an HG favorite, os l’moelle — roasted marrow bones served with a thin spoon for excavating, country bread and coarse salt. Steak frites, steak tartare and racks of lamb on every menu. Sammy’s Steak House on Manhattan’s Lower East Side has a challenger in Montreal’s Moishe’s Steak House. Moishe serves enormous steaks accompanied by potato latkes or varenekes (a type of pierogi). And, Schwartz’s challenges New York’s Carnegie Deli with its huge smoked meat sandwiches. It seems that Montreal’s Jewish community (which produced Saul Bellow, Mordecai Richler and Leonard Cohen) keeps the old, unhealthy traditions of overeating alive and unwell. HG intends to precede his Montreal visit with a few weeks of tofu and sprouts. After that, lead HG to the good, bad stuff.

They are not good for you since they are virtual cholesterol bombs. However, HG, like virtually the rest of the world excluding the U.S.A., loves innards. Kidneys. Splendid in a steak and kidney pie. Lush in a creamy mustard sauce. HG liked them at Sardi’s, the New York theatrical hangout, where they were grilled and served with lamb chops. Of course, rognons (kidneys) rule in France where they are often cooked blood rare.

Don’t see tongue on menus very often (Except when eating Korean food!). Al Cooper’s, a steak house in the New York garment district, served a thick cut of tongue with creamed spinach and super hot mustard and horse radish. Sweetbreads are a treat. Hotel Algonquin on W. 44th used to serve grilled sweetbreads on a slice of Virginia ham accompanied by thin cut French fries and Sauce Bearnaise. Yum.

Calf’s liver. Should be served pink. The accompaniment of fried onions and crisp bacon is obligatory. The dish reached Olympian heights at Dinty Moore’s (not to be confused with the dreadful line of canned beef stews) a long shuttered restaurant in the theater district (Dinty also did the classic corned beef and cabbage). HG likes chicken livers sauteed crisp and pink. Good with scrambled eggs or in a frisee salad or served over pasta (with plenty of olive oil, garlic and parsley). The chicken fat, fried onion and black radish drenched chopped chicken livers at Sammy’s Romanian are a naughty treat.

HG likes head cheese, tete de veau and all the other elaborate things done with the interior of a cow’s head. One of the best edibles in the world is a cow’s (or lamb’s) brains. The French do brains best, sauteed gently in butter, topped with warm capers and accompanied by a potato puree.

HG has dined on lungs and heart. Got them down, but not a treat. HG does not know if bull’s testicles should be classified as an innard. In any case, prairie oysters are un-yummy.

HG’s favorite innard is tripe. In the form of green chili menudo, HG enjoys it every ten days at the delightful El Parasol restaurant in HG’s New Mexico neighborhood. The ten day limit is self imposed, HG’s response to BSK’s gentle health warnings.

'Offal Taste' Photo Series by Stephanie Diani

HG has often devoted some lyrical prose to the triumphs of Jewish/ Eastern European/ Ashkenazi cuisine. Smoked fish; bialys and bagels. Savory brisket with lots of gravy. Real pastrami. Matzo ball soup. Chopped liver (don’t spare the chicken fat and top it with grieben–bits of rendered fat chicken skin); tzimmes (a pungent, caramelized carrot stew); karnatzlack (cigar shaped broiled hamburgers studded with onion and garlic). Many other meaty, fragrant, hearty dishes. And, of course, all the “Dairy” delicacies HG posted about earlier.

However, objectivity forces HG to mention some culinary travesties of the Chosen Few: Lungen stew. Essentially, this was cow’s lung stewed with garlic and onions. Tasted like thick rubber bands. Another was (HG spells phonetically from Yiddish): P’tcha. This was a kosher version of the French tete de veau. Nu. Nu. Don’t ask. Don’t even look.

Then there were the vegetables served in Jewish restaurants (kosher and non-kosher). Canned carrotsandpeas. Pronounced as one word. Nasty stuff. Limp string beans. Equally terrible. HG believes this was a bow to American ideas of healthy eating. Sammy’s, the chicken fat-drenched eatery on the Lower East Side, deals in nostalgia and garlic. Outside of fried potatoes and chopped eggplant, there isn’t a vegetable on the menu. Nary a lettuce leaf. Brave Sammy’s refuses to participate in the American version of healthy eating. HG fears Bloomberg may ban it.