Comfort food travels: Jewish deli food and Recipe
Posted in Food, Southwest, Travel | By Shelley Gillespie | Tags: Food, Recipe, Restaurants, Southwest, US Domestic Travel
While growing up, I had my share of deli food. I love it! Once in a while, I need my fix of the savory, scrumptious tastes, usually served in copious quantities.
I’m a good cook, but I really love to try the deli food of other great cooks. Plus, some deli food takes a really long time to make well.
I’ve eaten at Carnegie Deli in New York City. I’ve eaten deli food in many cities. Some is better than others: some is so-so; some is incredible; some is so bad you don’t want to take the leftovers home.
What makes good Jewish deli food?
That’s really what I’m talking about – pastrami sandwiches piled high and lean, chicken matzo ball soup, knishes – potato and kasha, kosher dill pickles. They are a special, acquired taste, but once you’re initiated, you won’t settle for less.
Now that I live in the Phoenix area, I was in despair of finding any good deli food. A little asking around, though, and I found two restaurants. One is very good and the other is terrific.
Very good Phoenix area deli: Chompies
The quantities are there, the incredible list of menu choices is there, but they’ve caved to popular tastes. Brisket tacos? C’mon!
But, I tried the matzo ball soup and it was good. My potato knish was good, but the crust just didn’t excite me and the filling was a little dry. I’d eat there again and try more of the old stand-bys to compare. They do have an extensive bakery. www.chompies.com
Terrific deli food: Goldman’s Deli
I don’t hold it against Goldman’s that they are in Scottsdale, the mecca in Arizona for kitschy restaurants. Goldman’s is totally unpretentious and totally fabulous. The atmosphere is not the reason you go there; the food is!
My family makes a passed-down-through-the-generations Sweet and Sour Stuffed Cabbage. Goldman’s makes the closest thing to the old family recipe I’ve ever had. The recipe is so addictive that my friend Phyllis, who was moving away after many years, requested it as her last home-cooked dinner I would cook for her.
Since they don’t make the stuffed cabbage some days, if they have the cabbage soup that can be a passable substitute. Not stuffed, but a very close, very tasty alternative while you load up on pastrami and other goodies.
Goldman’s also has fantastic knishes, pastrami and matzo ball soup. The matzo balls are just right. The chicken soup is good, but I add my secret ingredient to it, dill weed.
I give them an A+.
Now, I contacted Goldman’s and asked if I could have a recipe to post on this blog. The gentleman I spoke with said he didn’t think his mother would want to share. So, I’ll share my own family recipe for Sweet and Sour Stuffed Cabbage.
(I was not able to find a Web site for Goldman’s Deli in Scottsdale, AZ, but if you use your favorite browser, you’ll find the deli mentioned on other sites.)
RECIPE
Sweet and Sour Stuffed Cabbage
(Courtesy of Grandmas Greenwald and Gale)
Ingredients
1 large can of whole tomatoes – peeled – 28 ounce
1 large can of tomato sauce – 16-plus ounces
3 TBS honey
¼ cup raisins
2 TBS lemon juice
1 pound of lean ground beef
3 TBS white rice – uncooked
1 egg
1 small onion (minced) and a scallion or two (chopped fine)
1 large head of cabbage – be sure leaves are not torn up
Salt and pepper to taste
Toothpicks to fasten the cabbage rolls
(Potatoes for making mashed potatoes – follow your favorite recipe)
Directions:
Several hours before, place the cabbage in the freezer. This is my trick and it works well to get leaves off of the cabbage for stuffing, while keeping them intact.
In a very large pot or dutch oven, add the whole tomatoes, tomato sauce and chopped onion. Start heating on a low flame or low setting on the stove while you break up the whole tomatoes with the edge of a spoon into small chunks.
Boil water in a kettle so you have boiling water ready for when you take the cabbage out of the freezer.
When the cabbage has been in the freezer for an hour or two at least, remove it and place it in a large, heat-proof bowl, cabbage with the cut edge down. Pour boiling water over the cabbage until the bowl is full or most of the cabbage is covered by the water.
Remove the cabbage and make small slits at the bottom to remove leaves one by one, trying not to tear or crack the leaves. If you can only get a few leaves off before they are not soft, add more boiling water and repeat until you have 12-15 cabbage leaves. Cut the heavy cabbage rib so it is almost flat, then let the leaves soften in the boiling water.
In another bowl, combine the ground beef, the rice, the egg, and the scallions. Add salt and pepper as you prefer.
Form the meat mixture into small oblong meatballs. Pile up the cabbage leaves and, one by one, take a meatball, place it in the bottom middle of the cabbage leaf.
Fold up the bottom of the leaf slightly, then both sides into the middle so they overlap. Start rolling the leaf up from the bottom and then tuck the top flap into the little pocket formed at the bottom. Fasten the flap with a toothpick.
Lower the cabbage rolls into the tomato sauce mixture and let cook for at least an hour on a medium flame. (If you have any extra cabbage after removing the leaves you stuffed, you can chop it up and place it into the sauce, too.)
After the rolls have cooked for a little while, add the raisins to the sauce and gently stir the cabbage rolls, being careful not to unfold them. A wooden spoon is good for this purpose.
When the cooking has been in progress a little while longer, add some of the honey, then a little lemon juice. Do not add all of the honey and lemon juice at once. Taste the sauce and add the honey and lemon a bit at a time until you have a sweet and sour mixture that you find pleasing.
Let the mixture cook until all of the cabbage is tender.
You can serve the cabbage rolls 2-3 per person for main course or one roll as an appetizer. These are even better the next day.
Serve with mashed potatoes. I like to put some of the tomato sauce over the mashed potatoes.
Enjoy!
(By the way, cold water helps get out tomato stains – the sooner after you get splashed on clothes, the better.)
Tags: Food, Recipe, Restaurants, Southwest, US Domestic Travel