Why can't Kansas City have a delicatessen like Shapiro's Delicatessen in my hometown of Indianapolis? When it comes to barbecue, Kansas City has it all over Indianapolis, which never really embraced smoked meats the way this river city has over the decades. And Kansas City has better steakhouses, too.
But as far as delicatessens go, Kansas City comes up short-handed.
I like the last great Kansas City deli -- the New York Bakery and Delicatessen -- for a lot of things (particularly their pastries, which are delicious). But even though it opened the same year as
the original Shapiro's in Indianapolis, the New York Bakery moved two
times over its 103-year history, and maybe something was lost on the
journey to 70th Street and Troost.
Back in the Pendergast era, Kansas City was more of a deli town;
the Kansas City directories in the 1940s listed 67 delicatessens
(including the Milwaukee Deli, the Chicago Deli and the Cincinnati
Deli). Unless you count corporate chain delicatessens like Jason's
Deli or supermarket deli counters (I don't), there's not much in
the way of a classic delicatessen, like the ones you might find in New
York City, Chicago or Miami -- or Indianapolis, who knew?
Shapiro's has hardly changed over the last century. In fact, it
looks amazingly like it did when I was a kid in the 1960s, when sliding
my tray down the restaurant's cafeteria line was a really big thing.
Desserts were up at the front (dangerous for me because I wanted all
of them) and then the hot foods in the middle. If you wanted a
sandwich, you called it out. You still do.
On my annual pilgrimage to Shapiro's last week, I ordered the Swiss
steak dinner, because I had never tasted it before. I loved it.
I had to have a potato pancake, too, a fluffy disc of mashed spuds
as big as a 1960s ashtray, fried crispy and golden brown. All the
dinners come with thick slices of rye bread and butter and a dill
pickle. I ate all of that, too, and a side of baked macaroni and cheese and a thick slab of devil's food with a layer of cheesecake in the middle and generously iced with fudgy frosting.
On second thought, maybe it's a good thing that there isn't a place
like Shapiro's Delicatessen in Kansas City -- I'd weigh 300 pounds! -- By Charles Ferruzza
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I was very disgusted today when I took my grandchildren to the New York Deli on 70th & Troost and found the place out of business. My children, who are now grown, frequently bought our delicious food there, bagged it up and went to the park. And, today was no different except there was no New York Deli. My family will sorely miss this tradition.
New York Deli has rotten pastries! I got 2 cream puffs a few weeks ago and one was full of green mold while the other was full of black mold. I got some cookies but they were just stale and not moldy. Also, their "bagels" are not real bagels but bread in bagel shape.
The closest thing I've found (other than NY deli) is Adrian's in the Corporate Woods shopping center. But a real Jewish deli would be great. Somewhere to get not just great corned beef sandwiches but matzoh ball soup, latkes, lox bagels and other delights. If one is out there, I'd love to hear about it.
Charles, this is priceless. I actually like both D'Bronx locations, but no -- they aren't really delis exactly.
But man, their greasy Crown Center latkes are pretty amazing, in their own gross way.
Meesha:
The prices at Shapiro's are not cheap -- lunch for three was over $60. But it was worth it to get such extraordinary food. I'm still dreaming about that cake!
I imagine prices have something to do with it. Going to a place like Jason's Deli will probably cost over ten bucks for lunch and you still get a sandwich and chips.
Trailer: As a native of Indianapolis, I'd question your comment about Indianapolis ever being "a much smaller city than Kansas City." It's always been much larger -- definitely in population. But your observation about the urban exodus in Kansas City is correct -- the urban core is a lot stronger in Indianapolis, probably because there's no State Line dividing the metro area. Not that any of this has much impact on the restaurant scene.
The delis were always part of Jewish communities and our community moved out towards Troost and now is in Johnson County. KC, unlike many other major cities, didn't have any institutions that could survive it. Many people brought their deli in via truck from Chicago.
But we do have BBQ and the best breakfast (Cascones) in the US in my experience.
A very good reason Kansas City doesn't have delis is because almost every old neighborhood was abandoned-- including downtown. Indy was a much smaller city than KC so there probably wasn't as big of an exodus out of the urban parts of the city. Very sad we trade our culinary traditions of the city for spread-out suburbs, but that's what happened. Buid new culinary traditions.
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