Kossar's Bialys
From Wikipedia, the free encyclopedia
| Kossar's Bialys | |
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 Kossar's Bialys
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| Restaurant Information | |
| Established | 1936 |
| Current owner(s) | Juda and Debra Engelmayer Daniel and Malki Cohen |
| Food type | Bakery |
| Street address | Grand and Essex Streets |
| City | New York City |
| State | New York |
| Country | United States |
| Website | Kossar's Bialys Web site |
Kossar's Bialys (Kossar's Bialystoker Kuchen Bakery) on the Lower East Side, Manhattan is the oldest bialy bakery in the United States.[1][2]
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[edit] Background
The bialy gets its name from the "Bialystoker Kuchen" of Bialystok, Poland. Polish Jewish bakers who arrived in New York City in the late 19th century and early 20th century brought their recipe for the mainstay bread rolls baked in every household and made an industry out of it.[3]
Kossar's Bialys, known as Mirsky and Kossar's[4] when Isadore Mirsky and Morris Kossar founded it in 1936, is one of the few remnants of what was once its own industry in New York City with its own union association, the Bialy Bakers Association, Inc[5].
Originally located on Clinton Street, Kossar's Bialys moved to its current location at Grand and Essex Streets in the early 1960s after a union dispute and subsequent fire destroyed the building.[5][6]
Kossar's Bialys was the starting point for former New York Times food critic Mimi Sheraton's research for her 2002 book, The Bialy Eaters: The Story of a Bread and a Lost World.[7]
[edit] Present day
In 1998, Juda and Debra Engelmayer and Daniel and Malki Cohen purchased the bakery from Morris Kossar's son-in-law and daughter, Daniel and Gloria Kossar Scheinin.[8][9]
Kossar's Bialys also makes bulkas (small hero sandwich size loaves), pletzels ("onion boards"—focaccia-like flatbreads smothered in onion and poppyseeds), sesame sticks and other baked goods.
Kossar's Bialys is on the Lower East Side and Lower Manhattan tour circuit.[8][10][11]
[edit] See also
[edit] References
- ^ Food on the Lower East Side: Kossar's Bialys (html). Lower East Side Tenement National Historic Site website. “The oldest bialy bakery in the United States, Kossar's is also one of the last bastions of homemade, classic New York-style bialys. Kossar's also bakes bagels, sesame sticks, bulkas and pletzels.”
- ^ Colleen McKinney. Profile: Kossar's Bialys (html). New York Magazine.
- ^ Paul Solman (WGBH Boston) (5 April 2001). Baking History (html). The NewsHour with Jim Lehrer. “Sheraton loves a good bialy—an onion-flecked roll that's distantly related to the bagel—and believes the bialys made here at Kossar's Bakery are the best in the city, the country—quite possibly the world. She speaks with some authority, having spent seven years researching her new book, The Bialy Eaters.”
- ^ Allegra Jordan Young (Winter 2006). Roy Mersky and the Future of Libraries (pdf. Note: a google search for "Mirsky and Kossar" will find html version). UT Law, the magazine of the University of Texas School of Law (Cover story, p. 26, about Isadore Mirsky's son Professor Roy Martin Mersky). “Roy Mersky’s mother, Rose Mendelsohn, was raised in an Esperanto-speaking Utopian community. She married New York City businessman Isadore Mirsky, whose sense of order was so refined that he used no paper to run what many consider the world’s best bialy bakery, Mirsky and Kossars. (Roy Mersky’s surname was changed by a high school registrar’s spelling error.)”
- ^ a b Suspicious Blast Damages Bakery (html). The New York Times Business Financial section, Page 52 (Abstract) (February 20, 1958). “The Local had been striking since Feb. 1 against Kossar’s and six other bakeries, all members of an owner’s alliance called the Bialy Baker’s Association Inc.”
- ^ Bialy (html). barrypopik.com (Includes additional text from The New York Times Business Financial section article).
- ^ Mimi Sheraton. Book Details: The Bialy Eaters: The Story of a Bread and a Lost World (html). ebooks.com. Broadway (2000) ISBN 0767905024, ISBN 978-0767905022. “My obvious starting point was Kossar's Bialy Bakery on Grand Street, the main stem of New York's Lower East Side. I knew Kossar's as the source of the very best bialys in the city and, as it would turn out, in the entire country. I called Danny Scheinin, who in 1956 took over proprietorship of the bakery from his father-in-law, Morris Kossar, a partner in the business originally known as Mirsky and Kossar.”
- ^ a b Claiborne Smith (10 November 2003). Guided by Cell Phone: An 800 number brings Lower East Side history to life (html). Newsday. “For the segment about the shop, the tour's producers interviewed Debra Engelmayer in her small basement office and included her comments in the tour. Engelmayer explains how the store's founder, Morris Kossar, used to stand over the bakers and say, 'More onion,' and 'That's not right, don't do that.'”
- ^ Nadine Brozan (3 February 2002). For Low-Cost Co-op, a Pricing Quandry (html). The New York Times. kossarsbialys.com. “(Photo caption) Juda Engelmayer and his wife, Debra, who jointly own Kossar's Bialys with their brother-in-law and sister, Daniel and Malki Cohen.”
- ^ Anne McDonough (December 21, 2005). Hear Here! (html). The Washington Post p. C02. “Best of all, at Stop 13, the last on the tour, Jerry points out the shop Kossar's Bialys. I inhale a doughy aroma and go inside to look over the selection. They really are scrumptious.”
- ^ History, Heritage, and the Cutting Edge—A Nimble and Eclectic Visit (html). New York Like a Native. “Our tour includes a visit to Kossar's Bialys, the world's best bialy bakery.”
