Mile End Delicatessen: Munchies

[MUSIC PLAYING]
DANI LUV: My name is Dani Luv.
Pick up your hands and sing with me.
[SINGING]
Da-ee da-ee indo.
Da-ee da-ee indo.
Da-ee da-ee indo.
[INAUDIBLE]
Oh, my god.
Let me tell you, she's got a great tuckus.
I love this shit.
Oh, look at the two guys with the camera.
What a bunch of shmucks.
[SINGING]
Hava unda nav a dah.

Mm.

NOAH BERNAMOFF: My name is Noah Bernamoff, and the
restaurant's name is Mile End Delicatessen.
Mile End is called Mile End because of my love for that
neighborhood of Montreal, and the very, very personal
history of my family in that neighborhood.
I was a second year law student.
I just really hated my life.
I started making smoked meat at home, as a hobby.
That led to me actually thinking through the idea of a
Jewish deli in any serious way.
New York's like the most Jewish place in the world.
Even more Jewish, in many ways, than even Israel.
And it always struck me that all these well represented
cultures in this city have more restaurants
than you can count.
Except Jews.
We just have like three, or something, like, stupid.
And I just thought to myself, we should have our own
restaurants.
We should have our own cuisine.
And the cuisine that everyone knows is sort of like this
deli thing.
But then we do more than that at night.
They're not dishes that you would find in old time
cookbooks from Europe, or Yiddish cookbooks from the
early period of Jews in America.
The cooking actually is innovative.
I mean, it's not really something that
Jews do, you know?
Jews own businesses, we're professionals.
We don't actually cook in this sort of context.
The kasha dinner is really, really popular, because it's
kind of it's like this healthiness of the grain, has
the noodles, has some meat in it.
It's kind of rich, but it's kind of light at the same time
and somewhat healthful.
Kasha is generally a pretty gross thing.
Like--
SAM FILLORAMO: That's what everyone says.
NOAH BERNAMOFF: Most people make it and it sucks.
Like my mom's.
No offense to my mom.

My wife, Rae, she handles a lot of our customer service
side of the business.
She does all the catering, off-site events.
We've been very picky with who we've hired as our staff.
And partly because we care so much about
the camaraderie aspect.
All right.
Very classic.
SAM FILLORAMO: Cheers.
RAE COHEN: L'chaim.
NOAH BERNAMOFF: Cheers.
A lot of gravy [INAUDIBLE] in this.

We all headed to Russ & Daughters, a appetizing shop
in lower East Side.
SAM FILLORAMO: I bought a Russ & Daughters t-shirt couple
months ago from them.
And she was like, now you pay me to advertise the store.
All right, I will.
That's fine.
NOAH BERNAMOFF: Love that.
Such a Jewish thing to say.

Russ & Daughters, it's an amazing place.
I mean, you walk in there and it's just like, whoa, this
place has not changed in as many years as it's been open.
I think it's been open 85 years now.
And what's so cool is when you look up and you see the photos
of the original owners, or like, even the second or third
generation owners.
And you look at where they're standing in the store, and
then you look at that spot in the store, they're actually--
you know, it's the same products sitting in the same
case, in front of them.
When I see that, it's just unbelievable.
The history in there is profound, that's for sure.
Our friend, Josh Tupper, who is a fourth generation owner
of Russ & Daughters.
JOSH TUPPER: Let's go make eggs.
So this is one of my favorite little treats, caviar in a
soft scramble.
NOAH BERNAMOFF: We soft scrambled some eggs, and threw
some caviar into it.
And ate that on a sliced challah rolls.

JOSH TUPPER: Mm.
NOAH BERNAMOFF: That's it?
That's where it's at?
JOSH TUPPER: Uh, huh.
I'd make you guys one but I'm too busy eating.

NOAH BERNAMOFF: Seriously, you should sell this.
JOSH TUPPER: This is an expensive--
RAE COHEN: How much would it cost.
JOSH TUPPER: $50.
SAM FILLORAMO: And you have to cook it yourself.
NOAH BERNAMOFF: Seriously, Josh, this is heaven.
SAM FILLORAMO: All right, we should have some shots.
NOAH BERNAMOFF: Yeah.
You're going to need to do a shot.
Cheers.
SAM FILLORAMO: Thanks again for having us.
NOAH BERNAMOFF: To our gracious hosts.
JOSH TUPPER: Wonderful.
Beautiful.
NOAH BERNAMOFF: You already drank it?
Fuck.
JOSH TUPPER: We might have an issue.
This is cold.
It's called Devil's Springs, but it's 160 proof.
NOAH BERNAMOFF: Dude.
SAM FILLORAMO: 160 proof bottle from New Jersey.
JOSH TUPPER: It's Brucha.
NOAH BERNAMOFF: Hold on, Devil Springs is in New Jersey?
Where else?
Vodka is the typical pairing for a lot of the
foods that they have.
They have the smoked fish.
In fact, a lot of fish is cured in a vodka solution.
We did a little taste test of herrings.
We did a shmaltz herring, pickled herring,
and a Holland herring.
Life is very good, right now.
We're in the middle of Russ & Daughters, the greatest Jewish
institution.
All right.
Cheers.
Thank you.

So after Russ & Daughters we headed over to Sammy's
Roumanian Steakhouse.

It's a really wacky place.
The keyboard player, the whole shtick there.
The dancing, the block of vodka on the table.
It's just by pure Jewish kitch.
Russ & Daughters remain in the family.
And it's gone, over the years, it's
become fancier and fancier.
Where at Sammy's it seems like it's just sort of devolved
over the years into being kitchier, kitchier.
And like, just kind of held up with its kitch.
We ate chopped liver, which was mixed at the table, which
was excellent.
We had the karnatzlack, which is like a rolled sausagey sort
of thing with a ton of garlic.
Look at this sandwich.
A chopped liver karnatzlack pickled green tomato sandwich.
SAM FILLORAMO: Mom would be proud.
NOAH BERNAMOFF: This is phenomenal.

There was a lot of vodka shots there.
We consumed another whole bottle of vodka.
We had what Sammy's calls their tenderloin steak.
And we really loved it.
There's only one Jewish variation on the steakhouse in
New York City, and that's Sammy's.
DAVID ZIMMERMAN: How's it going?
NOAH BERNAMOFF: Awesome.
DAVID ZIMMERMAN: Realy.
I'm David.
NOAH BERNAMOFF: Noah.
DAVID ZIMMERMAN: I'm the son of Sammy.
NOAH BERNAMOFF: Son of Sam--
Thanks for having us.
DAVID ZIMMERMAN: Ah, you're welcome.
The restaurants been here for about 80 years.
My father won the restaurant in a poker game in 1975,
against Sammy.
So there is no Sammy here.
SAM FILLORAMO: It's the Jewish--
NOAH BERNAMOFF: Is it always a Bar Mitzvah every night?
SAM FILLORAMO: We try.

DANI LUV: I want to see the boys just come alive.
Hey boys, you came late, you have to do it.
Leave your--
leave your vodka, that's right, that's a Jew.
That's a Jew-bird, come on.
He's walking towards the circle, he's still eating--

I want to see at least 20, 30 people.
My name is Dani Luv, you're beautiful.
Come on.
Everybody in the shitzas too, come on.
[ROUMANIAN SINGING]
NOAH BERNAMOFF: Well there is definitely
some dancing involved.
[ROUMANIAN SINGING]
DANI LUV: Come on, girls, come on.
[ROUMANIAN SINGING]
DANI LUV: Yeah.
This is Jewish rock and roll.

NOAH BERNAMOFF: Woo, to Dani Luv.
Woo.

Shalom.
TAXI DRIVER: Where you going?
NOAH BERNAMOFF: We're going to Brooklyn.
TAXI DRIVER: OK.
NOAH BERNAMOFF: OK?
No, you're supposed to say, ah, you fucking assholes.

Gracias.

Sammy's is so insane.
Woo.
Dani Luv for life.
We started doing the hora.
JOHN: He really was like, singing there, huh?
NOAH BERNAMOFF: Yeah.
Playing the piano and singing.
And he was chirping us.
He was like, look at you fucking Jews dancing around in
the middle of the room.
It was awesome.

We're going to make poutine.
And then we're going to throw the steak from
Sammy's on top it.
Poutine actually literally translates as hot mess.
But what it actually is is French fries,
cheddar curd, and gravy.
It always surprises me when people come in and they want
poutine for a brunch or something.
I'm like, this is not when you're
supposed to eat this thing.
This is total drunk person food.

All right, now we're going to sauce this bitch up.

It's like the most gut busting dish.
And just for the hell of it, I'm kind of thinking we should
pour more gravy over it.
This is as gross as it gets.
And this is like a Guinness World Record's poutine.
This is Sammy's Roumanian Mile End poutine.

Why the fuck not?
John, your poutine.
JOHN: Thank you, so much, Noah.

NOAH BERNAMOFF: So poutine is the go-to
drunk food of Montreal.
It's also like truck driver food, but, because it's such a
unique thing that you can't really get anywhere in New
York-- or very few places in New York--
people tend to consume it at all times of the day.
So it's interesting for me to watch.

Shall we say l'chaim to Russ &
Daughters and Sammy's Roumanian?
SAM FILLORAMO: Yes.
NOAH BERNAMOFF: And uh, and to Dani Luv.
Dani fucking Luv.
Check that punim out.
Look at that punim.
Oh.
too much wadkie.

Back to the water.
Back to water.
[MUSIC PLAYING]