I’m not sure why the intersection under my window (West Broadway and Chambers) is so much noisier than other places I’ve stayed here; all night long it’s full of trucks and squeaky bus hydraulics and some really remarkably audible individuals, God bless them. But otherwise it’s not bad at all. We have had a very nice time getting our pictures in Galleycat, which makes it almost seem like we were truly taking Manhattan and not just stumbling around it and emerging from the subway on the wrong side of the street every single time.
I also did an interview about cupcakes, which technically had nothing to do with my being in New York, except that I got to meet Rachel in person (Do I call her the Cupcake Lady or the Lusty Lady? At least I know she’s not the Muffin Lady). She gave me a few suggestions for the cupcake pilgrimage that Chris and I might attempt tomorrow while we continue to comparison shop for slices. We’re hoping this will be more fun than our deli pilgrimage to Katz’s today, where I did not have a When Harry Met Sally orgasm at all, though I did feel kind of screwed. It was a very good corned beef sandwich but I wasn’t in the mood for the clusterfuck with the tickets and the random service and the busboys on break who you had to step over to get to the ladies room. Whatever, Thug Deli! Meg Ryan faked it, you know. And now I wish I’d gone to 2nd Avenue Deli before it closed.
I had a better time Friday night with a whole crowd of ladies including Jami and Hana and E. Flake and Maura (and those are just the ones with urls), where we had pretty drinks and fancy dinner and then wound up someplace in Brooklyn where people bring their own beer cozies. (Or at least this one guy did.) The fact that everyone was celebrating St. Patrick’s Day that night was hilarious and terrifying to me: the Chicago parades took place last weekend, the New York parade was on Friday, and it all feels like a big green cloud that I can’t outrun. Though maybe I have escaped it at last.
One more day here. More soon. See pictures.
Sorry to hear your experience at Katz’s wasn’t orgasmic. But… and oh my there is a large but coming here… you blew it. Corned beef? At Katz’s? Bad decision. Katz’s is and always will be about pastrami. Not thin-sliced, cold, peppery pastrami like you’d get at your local deli, but big, fat slices of still-steaming brisket that is so tender, so juicy, and so delicious that you will wonder where it’s been all your life. I have never had pastrami before or since that even compared. Their corned beef? meh!
See, I don’t like pastrami that much, and I’d heard/read equally good things about the corned beef. Of course NOW this just makes me wonder, what’s the point of this place if a lot of their standard stuff is just so-so?
I really wanted to like Katz’s, but it gave off the same kind of “overrated” whiff that some of the famous deep-dish pizza places have here. I get the distinct feeling that everything about Katz’s was supposed to be an “authentic experience” and blah blah blah, and when we went to DiFara’s Pizza the next day and stood around with everyone and watched this old guy make one pizza at a time and serve everyone haphazardly, I think I got a sense of what that experience was supposed to be like. And I totally enjoyed it at Di Fara’s. Which, in retrospect, makes Katz’s seem even more half-assed.
Also? To hell with any place where it’s all “oh, but you didn’t order the right thing.” I don’t think they could have served me anything that would have lived up to the hype or been good enough to be worth the pain in the ass that place was.
I completely understand. I had never enjoyed a pastrami sandwich before I had one at Katz’s. I didn’t go there for that. I went because of When Harry Met Sally. The food was an afterthought.
My previous/current idea of a sandwich involves either peanut butter or American cheese slices or copius amounts of mayonnaise. Rye bread? Mustard? Corned beef? Pastrami? No, thanks. But… Katz’s pastrami is just fabulous. And unlike anything I’d ever seen before that was calling itself pastrami.
I agree with your comments about the location (I remember with fondness the number of times I told a cab driver, “Houston and Avenue A”) and the atmosphere and the tickets and the grumpy and the lack of service except at those few tables along the wall.
Katz’s is an authentic experience. Authentically NY and authentically grumpy and authentically delicious pastrami.
But for me the pastrami is worth all of the drawbacks.
I lived in Manhattan for about 4.5 years. And when I moved away? I ordered Katz’s pastrami and a loaf of bread and ate that gourmet meal my first Christmas away from NYC.
Please tell me you went to Veniero’s (a mere two blocks away) for cannoli or cheesecake afterward?
!
I hear that 2nd Avenue Deli folks will be re-opening at some point in the future, of course at a different locale.
I guess I have a silly question. The Happy Food Spot, does it have a song and dance like the Chicken Hut? Like I said silly question, but can’t get it out of my head.