{"id":9924,"date":"2012-07-18T08:00:38","date_gmt":"2012-07-18T12:00:38","guid":{"rendered":"http:\/\/www.yiddishecup.com\/blog\/?p=9924"},"modified":"2012-07-17T10:48:08","modified_gmt":"2012-07-17T14:48:08","slug":"alices-restaurants","status":"publish","type":"post","link":"http:\/\/www.yiddishecup.com\/blog\/2012\/07\/18\/alices-restaurants\/","title":{"rendered":"ALICE’S RESTAURANTS"},"content":{"rendered":"

<\/p>\n

Pre-kids,<\/strong><\/span> my wife, Alice, and I ate out a lot.\u00a0 We mostly went to dives. That was our hobby.\u00a0 <\/em>Dives <\/em>as low as Krisplee on East 82nd<\/sup> Street and Euclid Avenue, and Albino\u2019s at West 44th<\/sup> Street and Lorain Avenue.<\/p>\n

At home, Alice cooked a lot of tofu.\u00a0 That\u2019s why we ate out a lot.<\/p>\n

We don\u2019t go out much now.\u00a0 I can\u2019t stand the long waits, the so-s0 food, the noise.\u00a0 I\u2019m my dad.<\/p>\n

\"\"Alice published<\/strong><\/span> a restaurant guidebook, Alice\u2019s Restaurants<\/em>, in 1981.\u00a0 The book sold particularly well at the airport bookstore.\u00a0 Alice\u2019s oddest recommendation was the cafeteria at Metro General Hospital.\u00a0 She liked the beef stroganoff and Viennese tort there.\u00a0 (Alice was a nursing student.)<\/p>\n

I liked Draeger\u2019s, an ice cream place at Van Aken.\u00a0 I wasn\u2019t into balanced meals.<\/p>\n

Here are a couple recommendations from the book:<\/p>\n

\"\"<\/a>

Alice, 1977<\/p><\/div>\n

(Still around)\u00a0<\/strong><\/span> Balaton, Corky & Lenny\u2019s, Flat Iron Cafe, Mad Greek, Mamma Santa\u2019s, Hot Dog Inn.<\/p>\n

(Dead)\u00a0 Zosia\u2019s, Gerome\u2019s, Art\u2019s Seafood, It\u2019s It Deli, Vegetaria, Radu\u2019s, Aurora, Draeger\u2019s, El Charro.<\/p>\n

When we had our first child,\u00a0 our eating out petered out.\u00a0 Alice wrote a baby book, but never published it.\u00a0 I can\u2019t remember what the book was about, other than babies.\u00a0 Oh, it was The<\/em> Bye, Bye Book<\/em> — how to\u00a0 prepare your kid psychologically if you left town for a day or two.<\/p>\n

Our kids <\/strong><\/span>— now grown — became foodies.\u00a0 Maybe we left them home too much.\u00a0 A lot of 20-somethings became foodies.\u00a0 A baby-boom friend described his grown kids\u2019 religion as Foodism.<\/p>\n

\"\"<\/a>

Alice in stains<\/p><\/div>\n

Alice — the original Foodist — sold street food.\u00a0 She never made a dime, but she made a name for herself.\u00a0 In the mid-1980s, Alice was the first to sell sushi rolls in Cleveland.\u00a0 This was at the Coventry Street Fair.\u00a0 Few locals knew what sushi was.\u00a0 Alice made vegetable rolls.\u00a0 She grossed well, but her expenses were high.\u00a0 She paid a Korean-American friend, Mike, to help.\u00a0 Mike lent an air of authenticity — not that he knew anything about sushi.<\/p>\n

Alice did <\/strong><\/span>tabouli at the East 115th<\/sup> Street Fair.\u00a0 Tabouli was a loser.\u00a0 Why?\u00a0 It wasn’t that good. \u00a0 And a Cadillac with musicians playing in the trunk\u00a0 —\u00a0 next to Alice’s booth — was a lot more entertaining.<\/p>\n

Alice sold falafel at the Coventry fair.\u00a0 She called that operation Queen Alice\u2019s Falafel.\u00a0 We ate a lot of falafel because she was always tweaking the recipe.\u00a0 She did falafels for a couple years.<\/p>\n

Alice is talking tacos lately.\u00a0 Our son Teddy is talking pad Thai.<\/p>\n

Foodists.<\/p>\n

—-<\/p>\n

SIDE B<\/strong><\/span><\/big><\/em><\/p>\n

THE JEW OF HOME DEPOT<\/big><\/big><\/strong><\/p>\n

Carl Goldstein,<\/strong><\/span> a landlord friend of mine, wants to be a docent at Home Depot when he retires. He goes to Home Depot at least twice a day, six days a week. That\u2019s more than 600 Home Depots visits per year. Carl owns and manages double houses on the East Side of Cleveland.<\/p>\n

\"\"

Carl Goldstein, 2011<\/p><\/div>\n

He said, \u201cHome Depot saved my life. Before they came to town, I used to go out to Builders Square on Wilson Mills. That was the ruination of my life. After Builders Square, I would take the freeway to DIY on Chagrin, and then to Seitz-Agin [hardware] on Lee. And I still wouldn\u2019t have everything I needed!\u201d<\/p>\n

Carl worked at a plumbing supply store for seven years; he sold hot water tanks, boilers, Flushmates and plumbers dope. Carl\u2019s father was a plumber in Flint, Michigan. Carl has a collection of Corky toilet flappers and other odds and ends in his truck. He gave me a Niagara water-saving shower head. ($5.13 from Woodhill Supply. Too specialized for Home Depot.)<\/p>\n

I \"\"bought<\/strong><\/span> more Niagaras. I have about fifty now. I switch shower heads when tenants move out. (Bad business to switch shower heads on current tenants.)<\/p>\n

Carl wants Home Depot to hold a storewide scavenger hunt. The first contestant through the Home Depot check-out line with all the correct items wins. \u201cI\u2019m a shoo-in,” Carl said. “Second place would be Marc Apple.\u201d<\/p>\n

\u201cMarc Apple?\u201d<\/p>\n

\u201cHe’s a<\/strong><\/span> Cleveland Heights contractor,” Carl said.<\/p>\n

There are two Jews of Home Depot in Cleveland.<\/p>\n

—-
\nRead Max Apple\u2019s The Jew of Home Depot and<\/em> Other Stories<\/em>. (Max Apple is not related to Marc Apple.)<\/p>\n

Next: The Jews of Home Depot (Atlanta): Bernie Marcus and Arthur Blank.<\/small><\/p>\n

—<\/span>
\n \"\"<\/a>I wrote about Alice, hot weather and money at today’s CoolCleveland <\/span><\/a>website.<\/span><\/p>\n

 <\/p>\n

—<\/span>
\n \"\"<\/a> Alice and dance leader Daniel Ducoff on the front page<\/span><\/a><\/span> of the Cleveland Heights Sun Press<\/em>, 7\/12\/12.\u00a0 (Well-written article<\/a> about Yiddishe Cup by Ed Wittenberg. Photo by Jim Olexa.)<\/span><\/p>\n","protected":false},"excerpt":{"rendered":"

Pre-kids, my wife, Alice, and I ate out a lot.\u00a0 We mostly went to dives. That was our hobby.\u00a0 Dives as low as Krisplee on East 82nd Street and Euclid Avenue, and Albino\u2019s at West 44th Street and Lorain Avenue. At home, Alice cooked a lot of tofu.\u00a0 That\u2019s why we ate out a lot. […]<\/p>\n","protected":false},"author":3,"featured_media":0,"comment_status":"open","ping_status":"open","sticky":false,"template":"","format":"standard","meta":{"footnotes":""},"categories":[23,19,12],"tags":[],"class_list":["post-9924","post","type-post","status-publish","format-standard","hentry","category-cleveland-full","category-family-history-not-boring","category-landlord-biz"],"_links":{"self":[{"href":"http:\/\/www.yiddishecup.com\/blog\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/posts\/9924","targetHints":{"allow":["GET"]}}],"collection":[{"href":"http:\/\/www.yiddishecup.com\/blog\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/posts"}],"about":[{"href":"http:\/\/www.yiddishecup.com\/blog\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/types\/post"}],"author":[{"embeddable":true,"href":"http:\/\/www.yiddishecup.com\/blog\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/users\/3"}],"replies":[{"embeddable":true,"href":"http:\/\/www.yiddishecup.com\/blog\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/comments?post=9924"}],"version-history":[{"count":10,"href":"http:\/\/www.yiddishecup.com\/blog\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/posts\/9924\/revisions"}],"predecessor-version":[{"id":10544,"href":"http:\/\/www.yiddishecup.com\/blog\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/posts\/9924\/revisions\/10544"}],"wp:attachment":[{"href":"http:\/\/www.yiddishecup.com\/blog\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/media?parent=9924"}],"wp:term":[{"taxonomy":"category","embeddable":true,"href":"http:\/\/www.yiddishecup.com\/blog\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/categories?post=9924"},{"taxonomy":"post_tag","embeddable":true,"href":"http:\/\/www.yiddishecup.com\/blog\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/tags?post=9924"}],"curies":[{"name":"wp","href":"https:\/\/api.w.org\/{rel}","templated":true}]}}