It was a beautiful day today, so i ventured over to Lincoln Square, one of my favorite neighborhoods. After a matinee at the Davis, i stopped at Gene's Sausage & Deli (pictured above) and bought more meat products than i usually consume in two months. Gene's is in the location that was previously home to the late lamented Delicatessen Meyer. There is no way that anyone could truly replace Delicatessen Meyer in its heyday (before the business was sold to some fool who managed to run a popular and successful business completely into the ground within two years), but rather than try, the owners of Gene's tore the old shop down and completely rebuilt it in 2009. While this always makes me a little sad, the new building is a beauty (as is that cow above the front door!); and the new owners kept Meyer's great old neon sign and mounted it at the top of a sweeping stairway to the new second floor. I like Gene's a lot; it's a friendly, family-run business, which is always nice; plus, they make a mind-boggling variety of sausages, arrayed behind the deli counter in row upon row. And in the summer there's a rooftop beer garden. Still, i have to confess that i miss those old German and Romanian ladies who used to work behind the counter at Meyer, switching languages mid-sentence and bossing around the customers like your old German Oma.
