I miss those words coming from a high volume mouth of a deli owner in Lower Manhattan.
In my younger days working as an apprentice ironworker on 7 World Trade Center, I use to get the guys’ order for coffee and spend an hour in the local coffee shop directly across the street from where the Twin Towers once proudly stood. (I still can’t believe those buildings are no longer there)
Each morning, Monday through Friday at around 8:15 I would place my order (amounting close to $100) and the owner would comp my breakfast. (One hand washes the other, right?)
Deli Owner: “Steve, what are you havin’?” he’d ask with a smile on his face, in an Eastern Europe accent.
Me: Toasted bagel with cream cheese and a juice.”
Deli Owner: “TOASTED BAGEL WITH A SMEAR!” He would scream out without batting an eye.
This morning while munching on a plain toasted bagel with cream cheese and sipping some O.J., I thought back to the days of ordering a buttered roll and a light & sweet coffee at Pynn’s deli.
That was the norm for most.
I don’t recall ever getting a bagel though.
Even when you had to hop on the ‘F’ Train into Manhattan you always carried that small brown paper bag, newspaper tucked under your arm as you made your way underground. Once seated, you pulled out the items one at a time while you sat back on the lovely IND.
The fellow commuters who skipped breakfast that morning, already seated across from you, had a tendency to stare.
One day in the early 80’s a bagel shop opened up where L&J Bakery use to be and the avenue finally had bagels.
I don’t recall the guy’s name who opened it up but a few years later it was ‘under new ownership’
Louie (from St. Rose of Lima) to this day is the proud owner of a very successful bagel shop, Terrace Bagels. Whenever I am in town I always make it a priority to have a seat in the cafe portion of the bagel shop and enjoy my bagel and newspaper. (Does Rocco still work the counter?)
Salted bagel, Cinnamon Raisin, Poppy and Sesame all have been my favorite at one time or another. I still can’t get the courage to ask for an ‘everything’ bagel.
What I notice lately in a lot of places is that they don’t put the cream cheese on the bagel for you. No, they ask you if you would like it and if you happen to say yes, (they go ahead and charge you an extra .45) they reach into a fridge and pull out a small cup of cold cream cheese.
Oh, by the way, the knives are over there – the Barista boldly points out as they direct you half-way across the cafe.
Back in the day before bagels, we would get a buttered roll and pint of O.J.
Where did we consume this nutritious breakfast? On the park bench, boys or girls schoolyard or we sat on the front hood of a car parked on the avenue.
Other times we’d squat on Jimmy Cullen’s stoop at 175 Windsor discussing the Knicks, Mets or even Yankees.
The newspaper, bagel/roll and coffee or juice – I miss those days…
-SF
Hoops135@hotmail.com
My father was the king of buttered rolls for breakfast. Bless the man’s crazy heart, he started eating Wonder Wheat bread like two months before he died, to get healthy! LOL Thanks for the memory of my dad sitting on the sofa in his underwear, with a buttered hard roll in one hand and a cup of coffee, both from the Seeley Deli in the other….
Hey, so we have this wonderful bagel place here where I live now and the bagels rock. However…I teach swim lessons all day long. I spend four to eight to nine hours in a pool each day…..and between pools I rush over to the bagel place to grab lunch….every day I get the same thing. An everything bagel with low fat plain cream cheese. Every day for two years….and every day I stand on line. I stand on one line to order and obtain the bagel and I stand on line, again, behind the very people I just finished standing on line behind, to wait for the cashier to ring us up.
At least three or four times per month, I make it clear to the owners/managers/workers that this is nuts…to stand on line TWICE for the same item…..and they just look at me! So, yesterday I went in and asked for the most superior person in there. I went into great animated detail about the system at Terrace Bagels because they have a PERFECT system…and I think it may have worked. I’ll let you know if someone finally stands at the register, takes the order and the money at once and you just stand back and wait. I’ll be thrilled if it works.
EVERTHING BAGELS ROCK!! LOTTA FLAVOR IN EACH BITE.. WHEN THEY ARE MADE RIGHT, THEY’RE NICE AND CRISPY ON THE OUTSIDE AND SOFT INSIDE SO YOUR EGGS, BACON AND CHEEZE OR CREAM CHEEZE ARE NICE NAD SNUG IN THERE…
… MAKES ME WANNA GO GET ONE !!
Henry’s Ham,Egg,and cheese should go down as the best thing GOD ever created.Except for the GRAND CANYON of course.lol
We live in Marine Park, but my husband and son still go up 9th
for hair cuts at Lorenzo’s, and my son always stops at Terrace for a bagel.
i remember when lorenzos 1st opened , is lorenzo still cutting hair ?
Terrace Bagels used to be called “Bagelicious”. How about Red’s shoe store for back to school navy blue oxfords?
hmmmmmmmmmmm iron workers costello’s mullets maloney;s hartson donovan’s newfie’s ruled the steel mostly fromn conceprion bay and bay bulls my brother jim was forced to leave college at the u of wyoming in 66 or go to vietnam he worked the wtc job we joked it was work or get drafted not by the nba so jim left wyoming and came back to brooklyn and later was jioon by his soon to be wife janet so ironwork and the wtc will always be in my heart
his son jimmy worked on the metro tech job on a summer in college was good to have a hook and can you think ironwork and not think or eddie cush who helped so manty get started on the steel