First Look: Mile End

GutterGourmet — February 01, 2010

Top: Mile End’s Smoked Meat Sandwich Bottom left, Exterior. Right, Jars of pickled cabbage.

Like the Rolling Stones and Eric Clapton introducing traditional American blues to a new generation in the 60’s, sometimes it takes a foreigner to make you appreciate your own culture. So, maybe it’s not crazy that a French Canadian can make New Yorkers remember what the soul of a great Jewish deli is all about. Mile End (named after a neighborhood in Montreal) in Brooklyn’s Boerum Hill is faithfully recreating Schwartz’s Montreal Hebrew Delicatessen much the same way that Hill Country recreated Lockhart’s Kreuz Market barbecue.

 

Poutine with Smoked Meat ($11).

Mile End imports bagels from St-Viateur’s, one of the two great bagel makers in Montreal (the other being Fairmount Bagel). The bagels are sweet and covered with sesame seeds. While interesting and authentic, H&H and Ess-a-Bagel have nothing to fear. Mile End also serves poutine, the staple dish of Quebec, which is becoming increasingly prevalent south of the Canadian border. Here, the French fries are smothered with hot brown gravy and cheese curds, as well as an optional topping of smoked meat (more on that later).

 

The Ruth Wilensky ($6), salami sandwich pressed on an onion roll.

Mile End also features a sandwich named after Ruth Wilensky, the owner of Wilensky’s little soda fountain shop in Montreal dating from 1932. I’ve had the pleasure of being served a Wilensky Special (grilled salami and bologna on a mustard-slathered, toasted and pressed roll) by the 88-year old Ruth Wilensky. So I can tell you that Mile End’s (even sans the bologna) on a warm, pressed onion roll is pretty damn authentic. And thankfully, like at Wilensky’s, there’s a 10¢ charge if you want it WITHOUT mustard.

 

Cutting smoked meat on the line.

Then the pièce de résistance, Smoked Meat, or, as the French language police insist on calling it in Montreal, viande fumée. Invented at the now defunct Ben’s Delicatessen in Montreal and still lovingly preserved at Schwartz’s Charcuterie Hebraïque, smoked meat is the bastard love child of what New Yorker’s know as pastrami and corned beef. It is a blackened, dry-cured, peppery, intensely-smoked brisket that is not as spicy as pastrami and more complex than corned beef. So complex, that Jeff, was convinced that there were hints of truffle alongside the smoky, peppery notes.

Will Mile End supplant Katz’s and Second Avenue Deli? No more than Mick Jagger replaced Muddy Waters. But maybe, just maybe, New Yorkers will feel renewed pride in New York’s Jewish delis, forestalling their disappearance while gaining a new appreciation for our Jewish relatives to the North.