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I can state unequivocally that Poochie's did not steal that sandwich from any one else. My Dad's office used to be located across the street from Poochie's and he basically invented that sandwich by special requesting it from (then owner) Harvey Bernstien. Eventually, it made it on to the menu. I'm not 100% sure, but my Dad might have even brought his own salami for the first couple of times.

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Steve Z.
Photographer/Pseudojournalist

"The only time to eat diet food is while you’re waiting for the steak to cook." - Julia Child

Interesting, steve, thanks. I was just hedging myself against any future flame posts.

Not that I'm denying that stevez's dad may have introduced it to Poochie's, but I suspect variations of this sandwich have existed as long as kosher salami.

Fried salami sandwiches, much as described, were in regular rotation at our house when I came home for lunch from kindergarten. Bubbe usually served it on an onion roll, but sometimes on challah.

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LAZ
Dining Chicago
Index to LTHForum Recipes, 2004-2008

Of course. Where do you think he got the idea? But up until Poochie's started serving them, I had never seen one offered in a fast food restaurant. Even today, most places that serve a salami sandwich use thin, wimpy slices of salami (I'm talking to you, Boobie's) instead of the slabs that Poochie's (and presumably HP Schmaltz) uses.

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Steve Z.
Photographer/Pseudojournalist

"The only time to eat diet food is while you’re waiting for the steak to cook." - Julia Child

Got to say the last few times I went.the corned beef and pastrami were excellent. Glad they are improving once again. With new bread and the new sandwhich they should be great again.

In reading this thread, everyone needs to be aware of one thing - the owners of HP Schmaltz are constantly tinkering with their food. Suppliers are changed, recipes revised, things added and deleted based on what sells, customer feedback and the work they do sampling different food both from suppliers and also on periodic trips to visit other delis (I think they go to New York a few times a year and have sampled most of the delis in the region, including New Jerusalem - one of these days I plan to get a list of recs from Howard and go on my own Manhattan deli tour). The changes are not frantic - if you go in every week, you will find things pretty much unchanged from week to week. But if you compare what they were selling at the beginning of this thread to what is on offer 2 years later, at least half of it has changed.

Corned Beef and Pastrami comes from a different, and much better, source. Pickles have changed, for the worse IMO. They used to be a very fresh, crispy whole pickle and now are a more common deli spear. I understand that is about to change again later this month. Suppliers for most baked goods have changed, and I think we all look forward to new, better bread. The rugellach in particular is very good now. And the list goes on.

Two points then: if you like or dislike something, tell Howard and he most likely will look into and do something about fixing the things people do not like, and do not assume things are the same as when EC dissed the Eisenberg Corned Beef, because that is no longer the case.

I still find Schmaltz quite good. I can quibble with variations in quality - have had some end of day Pastrami that probably should have been thrown out as it was a bit rubbery, and there was a period of time when the chicken soup varied greatly from day to day both in terms of the broth (richness and salt level) and how (over)cooked the meat and vegetables were, but they seem to have that under control. The breads are not as good as they should be, either, but we all know that.

But they do offer generally very high quality deli food, and they also understand what that is. In my mind, most Chicago delis suffer from mediocre ingredients, and also ignorance as to what good ingredients should be.

One last note, since I seem to be doing a Schmaltz update - I noted someone asked about their special soups above. They are made in house and are interesting. Not all of them are to my taste, but some are very good, indeed. I tend to get stuck on Matzo Ball Soup, just because it is such a satisfying treat when done right and rare in these parts, but having scanned the schedule for the month, I could easily go have soup 3 or 4 days a week and be quite happy.

Nosh good.

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d
Retired, gone fishing, and exploring my curmudgeon within

David,

My last trip there, probably at least 3 or 4 months ago resulted in some pretty sad bagels and rugellach. In all previous visits both of these were good. The bagels seemed to have a different and unpleasantly airy texture and the rugellach were downright nasty, managing to be both dry and dense at the same time (there's a punchline in there somewhere.) Anyway I chalked it up to places have bad days sometimes. Do you know if either of these supliers were changes within the last six months? I thought the bagels were H&H and finished on site. The previous rugellach were buttery and flaky with a nice variety of fillings but not sure where they came from. We also had a marble babka once that was pretty awesome.

Sounds pretty awful, Tony. I know there was a change in Rugellach provider within the last year because they gave me a sample - but it was very good. I have not heard anything about changing bagel providers.

Will check and report back.

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d
Retired, gone fishing, and exploring my curmudgeon within

Finally stopped in last Saturday for a sandwich. Husband and I split the corned beef with cole slaw and Russian dressing (the New York?). Overall flavor was excellent but we felt that the corned beef was a little chewy. I'll definitely go back though and try a few more things. It's close enough for a quick lunch and certainly better than most of my options in the area. He was doing a great business and that's always nice to see. Very friendly people.

FYI - Schmaltz has permanantly closed their Downers Grove location.

Aw crud! We haven't been out that way in about three months, so this is news to me.

Does anyone know if this means their Schaumburg expansion plans are also on hold?

Kim

Spoke with Howard over lunch today and things seem to be going well for them, the DG location just turned out to be impractical. They are looking for new locations, though it did not seem like anything was firm including Schaumburg. They also are trying to expand the Naperville location.

Meanwhile, they have replaced the bread and bagels with better suppliers (bread does seem better, have not tried bagels since they went from test to full production), have gone to roasting their own turkey breast in house rather than buying cooked breasts (not a big deal to me since I am not eating turkey breast, but if I was I imagine this would be a major upgrade, from cold cuts to fresh roasted) and are completely reworking the store layout over the coming month to "have a better flow." He compared it to Manny's but then said it would not be like a cafeteria, so I ended up confused.

Excellent split pea soup today and I was able to satisfy my hankering for a salami sammy, so life is good.

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d
Retired, gone fishing, and exploring my curmudgeon within

fYI, we are working hard to expand the Naperville store by years end. It looks good as we expand into the space to our north. Our plans are still in place to go schaumburg next. Truth be told, as a owner/operator, Downers Grove was a great but expensive reality check on our progress as a expanding concept. I refuse to sacrifice quality for the sake of sales or growth. Heck we are still a baby at only five years old trying to tweak and improve our quality, variety, and focus. Schaumburg ahead, but improved speed, more seating and more variety in naperville first. Thanks for all the great comments, and keep feeding the good and bad to me! howard

id been trying to get over to Schmaltz for a while to try this place out but a better option always came up(Fabulous Noodles, Katy's, or heading down to Chicago). Finally got there last night for dinner around 5:00 p.m.

Gotta say we came away pretty unimpressed.

The good:

the black and white cookie
the $2 off coupon I had

The average:

the corned beef, decent
the pickle

The bad:
the russian dressing - no pop, too sweet
the marble rye - too thick and not grilled
the roast beef - really flavorless
the size of the understuffed sandwich

We ordered an overstuffed corned beef Sloppy Paul. Not one of the better reubens I have had. I eat alot of reubens, & how I do them at home, and how I have always had them prepared when eatin out, the bread spent some time on the flattop grill(crisps up the rye, melts the swiss, etc), this version was an ungrilled thick marble rye that I didnt like . The Russian dressing had no zip, and was too sweet(at least for how I make/like Russian dressing), the kraut was ok, and the corned beef was decent, lean, and some decent flavor.

We also got a Boston Common - roast beef, horseradish sauce, lettuce tomato on dark rye. The dark rye was much better than the marble, but the beef wasnt that good(no flavor), and a skimpy portion. Horseradish sauce was nice(they need to mix a little of this into their Russian dressing).

The bagel chips were forgettable.

I guess my favorite item was the black and white cookie. Nice shortbread, chocolate and vanilla.

$17 for the meal. I doubt we will be back, it is what it is.

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I got a real good mind.

Before Cotton was King: http://www.grubseeker.blogspot.com

Jim, I agree. However; what i do is buy pound of 'fatty' pastrami for 12 bucks and go home and make a KILLER pastrami rueben!!! Ithink that the pastrami at HPS is as good or better than Manny's...Enjoy! GO SOX!!!!!

right on, if I was to go back pastrami carryout would be something I could see doing.

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I got a real good mind.

Before Cotton was King: http://www.grubseeker.blogspot.com

Stopped by Schmaltz today for a warming lunch in the snow, and, to my surprise, I have an early nominee for my best dish of the year.

I was hungry and undecided, and finally chose the daily dish - roast chicken and mashed potatoes. It was good - nicely seasoned chicken, pretty skin, and excellent mashed potatoes. Skin was not crisp, chicken had been held a while and then reheated, though it was done well, with no real defects. Not bad at all, just nothing wonderful there.

While I was eating, the owner and I got into a discussion as we usually do, and he offered me a taste of something, as he usually does. It was a taste of their newest sandwich, the Chris. I believe the normal sandwich is served on a roll, not the little egg roll I had, and has a touch of mustard which I did not have. Hard to imagine it would be better.

Wine and stock braised short rib, shredded from the bone, served in the reduced braising liquid (with the vegetables included, finely chopped) topped with a touch of melted, smoked Gouda. The cheese was a perfect, subtle complement, noticeable only as a nice, rich, smooth texture, the smokiness way in the background. The meat was tender, rich, perfect. God, it was good.

Not sure how much it costs, or what it will be like with the mustard added, but I will return soon to check it out. If you like braised short ribs, you will love this.

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d
Retired, gone fishing, and exploring my curmudgeon within

That sounds really good! I wish I had one of those sandwiches right now, although I'd have to be convinced about the cheese part.

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Steve Z.
Photographer/Pseudojournalist

"The only time to eat diet food is while you’re waiting for the steak to cook." - Julia Child

After seeing it featured on Chicago's Best, I felt compelled to make my first trip to Schmaltz Deli a couple of weeks ago and I came away very impressed. Since one person in our party is a regular customer at Schmaltz, we were served a variety of items to try, many of which were excellent. He definitely paid (for our entire party) but I get the feeling that he was charged a nominal fee and not full price. Still, I would have been more than happy to pay full price -- and then some -- for the excellent quality food we were served.


Schmaltz Deli - 1512 N Naper Blvd, Naperville



Roast Beef on Pretzel Bagel with Horseradish Sauce
I didn't think I'd like the pretzel bagel but in this application, it really worked...especially with the massive mound of roast beef and potent horseradish sauce.



House Pickles, Bagel Chips
I loved these house pickles. In fact, we had great pickles throughout our meal. And the bagel chips, house-made, from house-baked bagels, were tasty, especially with a dusting of parmesan.



Cole Slaws
Creamy on the left, vinegar on the right. I'm not a huge fan of cole slaw and neither of these did much to change that.



MaccaBeast - Pastrami, Hot Dog, Spicy Deli Mustard, Jewish Rye Hero Roll
Decadant as it was, this was a tremendous sandwich. The pastrami is from Sy Ginsberg in Detroit (as is the corned beef served at Schmaltz). The hot dog is a proprietary dog made locally for Schmaltz. Being my first MaccaBeast (hopefully of many), I was glad to have it like this but I could definitely see adding sauerkraut and grilled onions to it next time for .49 per topping. The corny rye roll here was sensational, too.



The Kris - Braised Short Rib, Grilled Onions, Smoked Gouda, Spicy Deli Mustard, Hero Roll
Another excellent sandwich. The tender, boneless short rib was really flavorful and it matched up beautifully with the cheese and onions.



Smoked Corned Beef, Cole Slaw, BBQ Sauce
I liked the ultra-thick slabs of smoked corned beef here but the sandwich didn't quite come together for me...mainly because I didn't like the slaw and thought the bbq sauce was a bit too sweet. Still, I'd love to try this interesting take on corned beef in another sandwich or maybe even in an omelet.



Bagel Assortment
Bagels are baked in-house. I thought they were very good texturally, however they lacked a little bit of sourness throughout the chew and were somewhat flat-tasting. Still, it's hard to knock a place for making their own bagels, especially when the toppings are applied go generously.



Lox and Assorted Items
That's lox on the left and nova on the right, at least that's what I remember being told. In any event, the lox on the left was lovely with a nice oily smokiness that was delicious. The lighter fish on the right was just too salty for me. The pickles, the olives and the macaroni salad were all superb, as were the whitefish salad and the lox spread (in the small cups in back). This plate -- filled with house-made items -- really showed me how dedicated Schmaltz is to being a real deli. Bravo!



Grilled Salami on Rye with Grilled Onions and yellow mustard
I'm not sure where this salami is made (we were told but I don't remember) but this was the best grilled salami I've ever had that I didn't make for myself. The salami was dense, a bit fatty and had just enough garlic. I can't say enough about the rye bread, either. It was great.



Spinach Knish
Because we hadn't already eaten enough -- -- a couple of knishes were brought out to us. This is the spinach and potato version.



Brisket Knish
As much as I enjoyed the spinach version, this one was even better. But I was pretty darned full by this point, so one bite is all I had of each.



Sweets Assortment
Since overkill seems to almost always follow excess, I wasn't entirely shocked when this plate of desserts landed on our table. There was a towering slice of fudgy chocolate cake, a couple of varieties of rugelach, some swirly, cheesecakety-type items, black and white cookies, rainbow cookies and maybe some other stuff that I'm forgetting. I had small tastes of almost all of it but I wasn't really in a position to judge any of it because I was d-o-n-e, DONE!



Rainbow Cookie
I wanted to post a shot of this because it reminded me of this thread, in which the OP was seeking a place in Chicagoland for rainbow cookies. And yes, Schmaltz was definitely mentioned in that thread.

Schmaltz was every bit as good as it looked on tv. And in spite of how many items we tried, I feel like I barely scratched the surface. More than anyplace else, it reminded me of Kenny & Zuke's in Portland, OR, where (at least the last time I was there) nearly everything on the menu was entirely made, baked or pickled in-house, from scratch. Living in the northern suburbs, where there's a relatively large Jewish population, it's surprising how lackluster the deli food is around my home. There are a handful of places that are very popular but in my opinion, none of them come close to Schmaltz. Even after this single experience, I really can't think of a deli in Chicagoland that I prefer over Schmaltz. I've often joked that the best deli in Chicago is Shapiro's in Indianapolis but now that I've tried Schmaltz, I'm not sure I can say that anymore. I look forward to bringing my deli-loving son to Schmaltz. I think he'll really dig it.

=R=

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I just wanna live until I gotta die. I know I ain't perfect but God knows I try. --Todd Snider

Twitter: ronniesuburban

I was looking forward to giving that thick cut corned beef a try but instead I wound up with this:



Do you have to specify thick cut when you order? I have to say, what I wound up with was sort of bland and lifeless.

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-Josh

An amuse bouche at breakfast is called a Bloody Mary - Scott Manlin

Not sure. I didn't do the ordering but as I posted above, what we had was smoked corned beef and for all I know, it may be prototype. In any event, I'm surprised that you found the corned beef bland, though. The Sy Ginsberg pastrami we had at our lunch was not only excellent, it was notably better than Vienna.

=R=

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I just wanna live until I gotta die. I know I ain't perfect but God knows I try. --Todd Snider

Twitter: ronniesuburban

I've got a couple of clients out that way so I'll give it another shot (trying either the pastrami, or maybe specifying that I'd like the corned beef cut thick).

I was surprised about the corned beef too, to be honest. Everything looked right, and the place certainly had the right vibe, but it just didn't work for me. Hey, at least it wasn't re-heated in a microwave, which seems to be standard practice in the Loop.

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-Josh

An amuse bouche at breakfast is called a Bloody Mary - Scott Manlin

Lol, I figured you hadn't made a dedicated trip. We didn't have the standard CB but the sandwich in your picture looks really good. Too bad it didn't come together. The grilled salami, Maccabeast and Kris sandwiches were all outstanding. Looking at the menu, there are several other great-looking sandwich offerings. As soon as it's feasible, I plan on taking my son down there. I'm pretty sure he'll love it.

=R=

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I just wanna live until I gotta die. I know I ain't perfect but God knows I try. --Todd Snider

Twitter: ronniesuburban

From a tweet I received from the restaurant this morning:



So there you go. Social networking at its finest.

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-Josh

An amuse bouche at breakfast is called a Bloody Mary - Scott Manlin

I confess to being the mysterious organizer of the food orgy reported by Ronnie. There was some gap between the sandwich sampler I ordered and paid for, and the orgy of food delivered. Thanks to Schmaltz for their generosity.

Ronnie's photos and report pretty much cover our lunch. There were some things I enjoyed a bit more (I am a fan of their bagels, and also to my surprise, find the pretzel bagels particularly tasty - had a pumpernickel pretzel bagel prototype there last week that was great), and others a bit less than Ronnie, but those are nitpicks.

Yes, the house-smoked corned beef is a special, possibly to become a permanent menu item at some point, but not for now.

Schmaltz is a solid deli. The food is generally good, reliable as far as deli standards - chicken soup, matzoh balls, kreplach, corned beef, pastrami, bagels. Most of it is very good, and they are interested in getting feedback, because they are constantly trying to improve. One example is the bread - when Schmaltz started, the bread was an issue. Over the next year, and multiple iterations, they kept at it until it was right. Today that bread is a strength, no question.

Where Schmaltz stands out is in the new, different and adventurous things they offer, and the continuous experimentation. The Kriss, the house-smoked corned beef, the salami sandwich, the maccabeast, and more - these are all delightful, unusual (some more than others) offerings. So, while I am very happy to have a local deli when I need a fix of corned beef or pastrami and matzoh ball soup, I am more likely to try one of the newer offerings, or return for one of the unique sandwiches. Their menu has great breadth, and they sweat the details to get every item right.

I had forgotten how good the salami sandwich is, and I need to go back soon to have another.

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d
Retired, gone fishing, and exploring my curmudgeon within

I had a business lunch at Schmaltz a couple weeks ago. I was a little disappointed with my meal this time around. One of my dining companions ordered a daily special of brisket.

Schmaltz Brisket Dinner


Although I didn't get a chance to taste this, it didn't look very good to my eyes. I'm almost glad the person who ordered this didn't offer any tastes. The brown gravy alone would have my Bubbe spinning in her grave.

Schmaltz Corned Beef on Rye


Schmaltz Potato Pancake


My corned beef on rye (with pre-applied yellow mustard) was dry as the Negev. I'm not sure what happened there. In the past, the corned beef has been a succulent, fatty standout. This time, not so much. The hubcap sized potato pancake tasted like it was made from leftover mashed potatoes, with a smooth consistency that I just didn't like. I prefer my pancakes made from grated potatoes. That may have just been a style choice. I can't say for sure because Schmaltz seems to be constantly tinkering with its products and preparation methods.

I've had some great meals at Schmaltz in the past, but this time it just didn't work for me.

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Steve Z.
Photographer/Pseudojournalist

"The only time to eat diet food is while you’re waiting for the steak to cook." - Julia Child