Jersey Joe Walcott & Coney Island, By Joe Ortiz • Recipe: Hot Potato Knish

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Jersey Joe Walcott & Coney Island

By Joe Ortiz

Previous Episode: The family doctor paid a visit to help me through an aspirineating spree and Mom soothed my tummy with a plate of Pasta Aglio e Olio. •••

Iwoke up feeling better. I knew I had the chance to go somewhere with Dad because he often took us out on Sundays, and I didn’t want to spoil it by complaining.

After breakfast he sat me on a phone book on the sofa, propped up my feet on a large can of Italian plum tomatoes, and started to shine my shoes.

He slapped his hand into the wax. Olive tan in color, his hands and arms looked like leather, the same shoe leather he was reputed to be such an expert at repairing. He spread the wax with his fingers—first rubbing them into the polish, then onto the shoes—building up a rhythm, like shadow boxing. When he used the brush, he worked it so hard my feet fell off the tomato can. He did the final buff with the canvas shoe rag, which snapped and popped in his alternating handwork, as if he was punching at you with jabs and pauses, imitating Jersey Joe Walcott for me. As far as I knew, the snap and pop of the rag was the sound of leather meeting skin in a prizefight.

Then he just halted short and said, “Ya wanna go ta California?”

Before I could answer, he counter punched, “Well, maybe we’ll go ta California this winter.” A few more pops of the rag and he stopped: “But maybe we’ll go fishing today.”

Dad lifted me off the pillow and stood me on my newly shined shoes.

Sure, I wanted to go fishing at the beach. But with Dad we never knew what we were in for. Would there be some glitch? Some so-called work Dad had to do? Would he ask us to be accomplices in one of his crazy schemes? Would he take us for a long subway ride, only to realized that he’d forgotten his money and we’d have to turn right around and go back home?

Later Dad devised some makeshift fishing lines, wrapped around an old stick so you can hold on with one hand and throw the hook, bait, and sinker end with the other. Instead of those cool lead sinkers to weight our line, Dad used tobacco bags filled with sand. He found some cruddy sticks in the alley behind the shoe shop, so Laura and I didn’t expect much. We felt odd and slightly abused at having to carry those contraptions on the subway, but we were still excited to get out of the projects.

Even back then the subway stop at Queens Borough Plaza looked like a grotesque, steam-punk space station, serving several lines heading off in different directions. Once we caught the BMT line and Dad became distracted trying to look up a woman’s dress, Laura leaned over to me and said, “Maybe this time we’ll actually get our lines in the water.”

Soon, we got off that first train to change lines. Little did we know, but the trip would take us eight subway changes. So, we rode and stopped and caught another train. Then we did it all again. Like with the aspirin, I stopped counting after I got up to seven fingers. Laura and I started to get fidgety, so Dad launched into a story that gave him the captive audience that would slowly bring him out of his Sunday hangover and us out of the agony of the long ride.

“Lotta people think I’m the smartest shoemaker in New York, Laura,” he said.

“Grimy Eddie comes in last week wit a pair of fifty dolla shoes, wit a knife cut across the toe. Dey’re wasted and nobody can use ‘em. So, I talk him inta givin’ me ten dollas. That’s almost enough fa Joey’s doctor bill.”

As the train slowed down and pulled into the station at Coney, Laura whispered:

“Daddy always ends a story at the good part—the stuff Mom doesn’t want us to hear.”

Dad marched us past the hot dog stands; past the rides; the colorful shops with Kewpie dolls and oversized Teddy bears; the stacked leaded milk bottles you had to knock over with battered baseballs. Breezing right by all the color and excitement, Dad walked swiftly ahead of us, constantly looking back, and saying, “Come on kids, get going.”

Laura saw the disappointment on my face. “Nevermind,” she said. “Don’t even ask. This is Coney, but you and I are going fishing. There’s no money for all this good stuff.”

When we finally arrived at the beach, my father dragged us down to a bait shop, where he forked up 15 cents for a bag of live anchovies. My sister and I perked up. Dad had never gone this far before. Maybe we really were here to fish.

Eventually, far from the boardwalk, we walked out halfway onto the pier and Dad threw down our gear. He baited up our lines and heaved them out into the sun-speckled ocean, and said, “You kids wait here and fish for a while. I’ll be right back.” Joe Ortiz’s memoir, Pastina — My

Father’s Misfortune, My Mother’s

Good Soup, became the framework for the musical Escaping Queens, which ran at Cabrillo Stage in 2012 and 2013.

In July, The Capitola Soquel Times began the exclusive publication of various episodes from the book — including a recipe that helps shape each installment. You may have read one of the pieces in the Times a few months ago entitled, “Pastina, Food for the Soul — The Night Freddie the Bookie Showed Up with the Gun.”

The idea of weaving anecdotes about food with an ongoing narrative came to Joe after reading Heartburn by Nora Ephron.

“Using recipe descriptions to help tell a story seemed the perfect way to weave the angst of a father’s chaotic life with the salvation of a mother’s cooking,” Ortiz explains. n

“Okay,” Laura said, “We’ll be right here.” She must have known from the tone of his voice and her teenage wisdom that Dad would be gone for a while, but I was in a glaring dream. Fishing. At the beach.

After a few hours, I got bored and started throwing rocks, shells, bottle caps into the ocean to see if I could hit one of those million glittering specks of light reflecting off the water.

“Joey, will ya stoppit?” Laura said. “You’re scaring away all the fish.”

“How d’ya know?” I said.

“Well, you don’t see any of them biting do ya?”

“Ortiz” page 9

Recipe: Hot Potato Knish

This was one of the foods I smelled when Dad took me to Coney Island. Their aroma was intoxicating.

When we passed the boardwalk that day to go fishing, there were two cowboys in the bar singing “Good Night, Irene” and the knishes smelled so good, I’ll forever link those two memories in my mind.

I enjoyed the smells of the knishes so much that I thought I’d include my own fabricated recipe. Like Dad’s fabricated fishing lines, they work just fine when you don’t have the real thing. Serves 6 1 pound stewing beef 1 onion, diced fine 2 tablespoons butter salt and pepper to taste ½ teaspoon cinnamon 1 egg ½ cup chopped parsley 6 cups mashed potatoes (firm) 1 cup breadcrumbs 2 cups vegetable oil for frying

Salt and pepper the surface of the beef. Fill a medium stockpot with water and add the beef. Turn up the heat to high and when the water comes to a boil, turn the heat to low. Cook the beef long and slow, around an hour or so until it is still a bit pink inside. Remove and set aside.

When the beef is cool, shred it into thin strips and chop fine. Heat the butter in a skillet and add the chopped beef, onion, salt and pepper, and cinnamon.

Sauté the mixture 8 to 10 minutes over medium heat, until the beef is browned, and the onions are caramelized. Allow to cool. Then add the beaten egg, half of the breadcrumbs and parsley.

To fill, take 1 cup of mashed potatoes and shape into an oval ball with your hands. Use your finger to poke a cavity in the center of the mashed potato oval.

Place about 2 to 3 tablespoons of meat mixture (1/6 of the mixture) into the cavity and then cover it over with some of the mashed potatoes. Prepare 5 more knishes the same way.

Roll the knishes in the rest of the breadcrumbs.

Heat the oil in a skillet until very hot. Add 2 to 3 knishes at a time and fry, first on one side, then on all the other sides, until golden brown.

Serve hot with spicy mustard or mayonnaise flavored with a bit of horseradish. n •••

Note: This is a conceptual recipe, so you’ll have to make some adjustments as you go. Let me know your feedback via email: joe@ gocapitola.com