David is my pal, keeping me from getting too frisky on the page. Here he relates his “fascinating” (ahem) resume from his formative days in the culinary corner.

Cooky Cat
My Early Culinary Roots
By David D. Wronski

When I was a boy I liked food. (Still do.) All kinds. Maybe except for canned okra and canned green peas. And my Polish mother’s spaghetti. And that pickle soup with bowtie noodles that I still feel queasy about in remembering. (Please, Polish dill pickle soup is great, don’t let me dissuade you. Just, maybe not with noodles of any kind.)

My checkered so-called career in food began early. In the broad sweep it encompasses me as avid eater, shopper, experimenter, explorer, home preparer, caterer, restaurant cook, cooking instructor, institutional kitchen manager, and now—arguably the pinochle of my career—as a writer/editor. In that last capacity I advise my friend Cooky Cat editorially, slip in a few words here and there. Click to go see him.

As a growing boy I had a healthy appetite. Spinach? Keep it coming. Coney Island chili hot dogs, my record is 5 at a sitting. Not up to Nathan’s Coney Island Hot Dog Contest standards; but, not too shabby for an 8 year old lad.

At home, we ate well. My mother was a scratch cook, with a solid background in the traditional Polish standards. I didn’t much take part in the kitchen, except for the front and back end jobs; prepping vegetables and taking out the garbage. But I did observe. And I believe that some of my natural ability in the kitchen may have been inherited that way.

My one fairly regular homage to my mother is what I call the summer chopped salad. A chunky mix of garden tomatoes, cucumbers, and sweet onions. Oil and vinegar dressing, but with a good dose of sweetness. That extra bit of sugar is from mom. I sometimes alternate with honey. Try it; you’ll like.

The other thing from my mother was the admonition to keep the kitchen secrets. In other words, what happens in the kitchen, stays in the kitchen. If you have some kitchen disaster on your way to the table, don’t serve that news with the meal. As dear mother would so often say, “No one the wiser”.

The first thing I recall ever preparing myself was many a snack plate of canapés. Not your snooty little airy tidbits, but a boy pleasing, belly stuffing concatenation. My favorite at the time was the careful assemblage of Cheeze Wiz on Ritz crackers, and on each a garnish of a half of pimento stuffed olive. Even now, that and a cold beer and . . . the boy is back! But maybe now with a thin wheat cracker and some righteous aged artisanal Cheddar.

My dad pretty much stayed out of the kitchen. Those were the days where the division of labor was pretty well delineated. He worked by the sweat of his brow to put the food on the table, so he deserved to have it lovingly prepared. His one job that I vividly remember was to prepare green beans with papers spread on the kitchen table to collect the trimmings. Once, however, he did make something very special. Cured green olives. He got a recipe from who knows where and put up several jars of cracked green olives. It was a pretty exotic seeming recipe with those olives in jars surrounded by all kinds of unidentifiable herbs and spices. The end product was delicious; but very, very bitter. Similar to the kind you can get in a good store selling Middle Eastern foods.

Just to mention, on several occasions I would sauté a big mess of sliced onions in butter as a late night snack. Accompanied by some good Polish rye bread. A meal in itself. (Totally unsociable breath-wise the next day, however.) This is almost a guilty admission for me. Imagine, a plate of sautéed onions. Oh yes, now I recall, with ketchup.

A regular Saturday night ritual was the Jackie Gleason show, followed by the Lucky Strike Hit Parade. (LSMFT, if you know what I mean.) Part of the total experience was a whole pepperoni pizza in front of the television. The thing was though, I made the pizza myself, from scratch. With a little help from Chef Boyardee and his famous Pizza Kit. Most Saturday’s for quite a long time I would make the dough, oil a large round pizza pan and lay out the sauce, cheeses, and liberal amounts of sliced pepperoni. My brother taught me to accompany my spicy pizza with a large glass of cold milk. Good advice. I’ve since graduated to beer with my pizza, but milk still does the trick.

Even at a young age I was adventurous, food-wise. There was the venerable J. L. Hudson Company department store in Detroit, Michigan. I combed the entire store as a boy. It had an international food department, rather forward thinking for the mid-1950s. It was there I saw a demonstration of the first Amana Radar Range. I also tried a tin of fried grasshoppers from their gourmet shelf. Tasty, but no takers at home for more of those or other exotic insectavora for the family table. Now I notice the food shows are gradually featuring the insects, and especially from Mexico. It’s still off my map as a general staple. Besides, where in tarnation do you get those things, anyway?

Moving on to my high school days, my very first job was at my Uncle Phil’s bakery, the Northtown Bakery in Detroit on 7 Mile Road just west of Van Dyke. Right after school on Fridays, I would bus over and work straight through to 6:30AM the next morning. Half hour lunch break at midnight. My first chore was to chop onions and mix with salt and poppy seeds for the onion rolls. They gave me a dull table scraper to chop the onions in a 5 gallon tin in which jellies and fruit pie fillings were packaged. Uncle Iggy would sometimes let me score the French loaves with a razor blade, but I never got it to his satisfaction. At the end of my shift I had the task of filling and glazing the jelly donuts. Since I am a lifetime jelly donut aficionado, when I had my hand on that filler machine I made sure that those things had a good dose of jelly.

I was no slacker as a youth and dear Uncle Phil paid me 75 cents per hour. I asked for a raise and got a dollar and change more the next pay envelope. “I asked for a raise, Uncle?” “I gave you one, 10 cents more.” I quit. Phil was a wealthy guy. No wonder, with the way he paid. He was surely out to teach me the value of a dollar; but not so much a lesson in my own self-worth. And, like other wealthy big shots in some families, he was looked up to, even sucked up to. My parents were upset that I should quit on Uncle Phil. But, I was adamant. No further mention.

Very soon I was offered a job to replace my brother’s good friend Bob at his Uncle Norb’s butcher shop. 12 hours straight every Saturday, starting at 6:00AM. But, within a year, I was taking home $24 dollars for the day; and that to a young lad was some serious change. Spending power.

Norb Szcygiel was a great boss and teacher, and I watched him carefully in his cutting skills and his outgoing charming way with the customers. “Tell me, is that meat tender?” many a customer would ask. Norb would often respond, “Lady, it’s as tender as your mother’s heart”. I tried it out on a certain customer, and the last I saw of her was her back as she stomped away, cursing and screaming out about how her mother’s heart weren’t tender. Not everyone is your customer; for what you’re selling, or for your jokes either.

But overall I did learn to kibbitz with the customers. And, to this day, I am well-known as a world class kibbizter. Not always successful, but mostly.

And, I did learn skill with a knife. The butcher shop was a small stall among many at the historic Gratiot Central Market, adjacent to the wholesale food delivery terminal near Downtown Detroit. We did not have any power tools except for the meat grinder and the steak tenderizer, for so called “cube steak”. (That’s a device with double rollers with small sharp and sturdy multiple blades. A thinish slice of tough meat is passed through and the rollers score-cut the grain to make it more tender.) Everything else was cut by hand. That’s with a knife, a cleaver, and a hand saw.

This teenager that I was became quite a proficient meat cutter. My biggest boast is in being able to take a whole lamb carcass and cut it completely into chops. That’s starting with having to split the carcass down the back with a cleaver then with a knife and cleaver cutting up the rest. The round bones required a wickedly sharp hand saw which Norb taught me to use properly and with which I never once had an accident.

The job in the butcher shop lasted through college until team sports events took me away on weekends. Norb’s sons were making appearances at the store and they became the next generation of help for the big Saturday selling day.

So now what. First a great and warm thank you to those Uncles who employed me and taught me how to work and develop hand skills. Phil, Norb, and even Iggy.

The other things that I did in the culinary field were in the adult years, so I won’t go into the particulars much since this is about my experience as a youth. Let’s just allude to having been in on the first wave of fusion cuisine. Arguably, maybe even one of the first to experiment in that area. Co-owner of the acclaimed Polish Pavilion, caterer to the stars—of Brooklyn anyway. Then on-site party manager and head waiter for a prominent New York City caterer. Bar manager of the infamous Club Taboo, an afterhours illegal party scene somewhere on the high floor loft space of a mid-town Manhattan warehouse. Training in very high quality and strict vegetarian cooking while on staff at an ashram; and later supervising the meal preparation there and training and overseeing a volunteer staff. And, cook at Whole Wheat and Wild Berries health food restaurant in the Village.

So now I am in service to the top Cooky Cat. He runs a tight ship in his kitchen, and I run a tight grip on the editorial of his eponymous blog.

Thank you, my friend Cooky Cat, for giving me this space to show some of my stuff. There’s a nice kitty.
The Michigan State Fair


I got the idea for this essay from the video for the song inserted at the end. So I will spare you the verbiage and get to it as soon as I can get there.
    
Yet, some words are indicated. "Bare" with me.
    
You know how as a grade school kid you probably looked forward to the summer recess? For me just before summer was was a time of the most exquisite longing. Just thinking about the coming THREE WHOLE MONTHS OFF! from classes filled me with giddy delight. And an aching longing of the most unendurable kind; when will it ever get here?
    
Capping the summers of fun was the State Fair. The Michigan State Fair is claimed to have been the first in the country, going back to 1849. In 1905 the State Fair got its permanent location in Detroit thanks to a group of citizens led by Mr. Joseph L. Hudson, the founder of that great and, alas, now disappeared eponymous J.L. Hudson Department Store. Hudson's rivaled Macy’s for size and was a wonderland for me. They had EVERYTHING. I could go on and on about my times in that store, but will save that for later. [Just a sneak peak... I had a big crush on Christmas Carol. I loved her from afar. She would arrive with Santa at the end of the Thanksgiving parade and climb onto the overhang platform at the store's main entrance. She was my Lady Gaga: the brightest red coat, white stockings, patent leather shoes and hair to match (the shoes, that is). Also, as pretty a thing that I had ever seen. She swept me off my feet. I had the experience one year after that parade of being swept along by a crowd. Not off my feet, thankfully. But close. Escaped, though.] Sadly, the flagship location in Downtown Detroit on Woodward Avenue was demolished in 1998.
    
The Michigan State Fair also ended, in 2009, due to spending cuts. But by then it was no longer the spectacle that I remember from my youth.
    
Being Michigan, and Detroit, the State Fair always saw a big show from the auto manufacturers. In my youth, that would be Ford, Chrysler, and General Motors. Any others, and imports, were strictly side shows. The difference from the annual Downtown Cobo Hall car show was that at the State Fair, it was a people’s show. The car models were all there to touch and sit in. Hands-on was the rule.
    
Of course, there was a lot of food. The two items that seemed to be regular staples for me were the French fries sprinkled with malt vinegar and the frozen custard. The fries were thin cut, crisp and the only time that I ever ate them with vinegar as a condiment. Delicious, but it didn’t fly in my parents’ home, so only once a year. The frozen custard is still something that I am always on the lookout for. Light and airy, rich and creamy; it was there before Dairy Queen and never equaled since; though DQ is still as ever a nice treat.
    
Also, there was the opportunity to look at all the farm animals up close and the farm equipment and all the displays of amazing new products. The slice-it-dice-it Veg-O-Matic guy was always guaranteed to drop jaws at his speed and finesse. That, there, was a pitchman.
    
The State Fair was an important window on the world. I felt like some hick kid being exposed to the world of things outside the boundaries of my small town mentality. Not just the kind of exposure you get from books or watching television. At the State Fair you got hands on, direct contact. Up close with no adults hovering over to keep you in check. We crawled around the Michigan State Fair like the true explorers that we were.
    
If summer was the jewel of the year and the State Fair was the capstone of that season, then the midway was the ultimate experience, and a most indelible one. Besides the usual rides — no biggie, since we had the real deals all summer long at Jefferson Beach Park and Eastwood Park — there were the so-called attractions. Those money rakers each featuring a wise mouth barker on stage in front of hand painted signs promising the excellences and live oddities on view just on the other side of the curtain. Step right up, step right up! Tickets, please. But, as you may recall yourself, the reality never met up with the hype.
   
And, in the center of it all was the Girly Show. Live beautiful sexy ladies who will reveal for you all their secret charms. Also, just behind the curtain. For a price. For many years all’s I could do was stand there and listen to the barker and his tempting spiel and be filled with fantasy and nervous wonderment. Simultaneously full of Catholic-boy conflict between the fear that what would be just behind that curtain would guarantee me a swift trip straight to hell and the impossible to ignore delicious feelings of . . . of . . . all sorts. Sweaty palms. Does my nervous fidgeting show?


Well here it is. The Girly Show. The song, just wonderful. Step right up. Step right up! (It’s not over ‘til the fat lady smiles. Then, it ends unceremoniously. Let's go, folks. Make way for the next bunch (of suckers). Move along. That's right.)


To My Blue Collar Roots

Back When Dogs Could Talk
Wayne Kramer


Back in the day when dogs could talk
In the soft white belly of the beast
Dairy queen madmen chased the girls
And muscle cars ruled the streets.
Back in the day when dogs could talk
Dared to dream of something more
Not a place on the line to punch in time
Owe your soul to the company store.


Back when dogs could talk
Back when dogs could talk


In a chevy coupe we cruised and schemed
To rule the world thru rock and roll
And laughed till our sides ached at what we saw
And hoped we'd live before we got old.
Back in the day when dogs could talk
Dropped plenty acid, listened to coltrane
Pissed off our parents, angered the police
With guns and guitars both loud and profane.


J.Edgar Hoover's got his panties in a bunch
As the white panthers rise to the occasion
In black leather jackets and M-1 carbines
Reefer smoking and slogans blazing.
Not that I want to turn back the clock
Back to the day when dogs could talk
Were doing righteous work, we cannot be stopped
Back in the day when dogs could talk.


This goes out to all the people
that make their money
By the sweat of their brow
This goes out to all my blue collar workers,
All my loading dock workers,
All my carpenters, my plumbers,
My assembly line workers, my united auto workers,
Postal workers, city sanitation men,
Cab drivers, bartenders, waitresses,
All my state and federal employees,
My food service workers, gardeners,
Day laborers, tool and die workers,
Auto mechanics, child care workers,
Musicians and road crews,
Your’e the salt of the earth,
And I love you.
You are somebody.
My Player Days
(True or false, you decide)

My Uncle Morty was a player. He had a reputation, as they say, for having a certain way with the ladies. I don’t recall ever seeing him with the same companion more than once. Once when I was a boy he gave me this advice on women.

“Dear nephew, here is a line that is guaranteed to succeed with the fair sex. As soon as you can after you first meet a lady whom you fancy, say this, ‘I am so moved by you, in every way, I must speak candidly or I will never forgive myself if I don’t. You, dear lady, are the kind of woman with whom I would share myself wholeheartedly and completely, and before whom I would unhesitatingly lay my soul bare.’ “

He never said much of anything else. Except for things like “How’s it going kid?” or “That’ a boy!” or “Go get ‘em tiger!”

Well, Uncle Morty, here’s my report.

In my early days I was shy with the girls. Somehow I had it that showing a sign of interest was revealing too much. Somehow, not manly. But, eventually I did try out the line with some very interesting, if mixed, results.

Now, I knew even when he gave me that line that it was insincere to the core. However, it took me a long while to understand the true facts of life. The opposite sex was thoroughly on to the deception, but they also much more innately knew that it was all a play in the first place; and that the rewards went to the best player. Showing your stuff apparently was what the ladies like you to do. If I knew then what I know now . . . I probably wouldn’t be around right now to be writing this little recollection.

I like intelligent women. But, among those, some are more ruled by the head and others more by the heart. I’ve had many interesting experiences with that line. A few slapped faces and more than a few instantaneous meltings in my arms. Two, however, were the most memorable, the nadir and the zenith of my experience with women.

My first attempt with Morty’s sure-fire opener was with a cheerleader from the other school at an after game party in high school. “I am so moved by you, in every way, I must speak candidly or I will never forgive myself if I don’t. You, dear lady, are the kind of woman with whom I would share myself wholeheartedly and completely, and before whom I would unhesitatingly lay my soul bare.“ As she chewed her gum and drank her smuggled in bottle of beer, she said to me, “Well, that’s really nice. So what’ya have to say for yourself.”

Then, in college at a friend’s parents’ party I met a beautiful unattached woman of a certain age. A Mrs. Robinson type, and dressed for (sexual) success. “I am so moved by you, in every way, I must speak candidly or I will never forgive myself if I don’t. You, dear lady, are the kind of woman with whom I would share myself wholeheartedly and completely, and before whom I would unhesitatingly lay my soul bare.“ And, this time, “Well, that’s nice. You sweet thing! I would give myself freely to a man who speaks to me like that. Your Venus has risin. So, what’ya say we go upstairs where we can be alone and I can watch you take off your clothes. And we can explore each other’s ‘souls'.”

“Well, that’s nice”? Is that some kind of female equivalent?

Somewhere in between those two I found the woman of my dreams. And, it is nice.


It Must Be Jelly, 'Cause . . .


Paczki, pronounced "Poonchki" is the name of the famous Polish jelly doughnut. It's so good that it makes you want to go-nuts!

When I was a boy in high school being shaped up by the Jesuits my cousin Kenny moved from Harper Woods, Michigan to Orange County, California. He was henceforth known as the "California Kid;" so dubbed by our Uncle Phil. (Kenny currently lives in Orange County so the experience must have been formative.)

Uncle Phil was a baker; in fact, he owned and operated several Polish bakeries in the Detroit area at one point in time. I was a rather shy kid and I remember his withering greeting. He was missing the first to joints on his right index finger. How this happened I never learned. When I came by his home to visit he would invariably shake my hand and rub the stump into my palm. It was a soul draining experience. I'm sure he meant nothing by it except to tease me. I'm glad he stopped there and didn't give me a goosing for good measure.

Uncle Phil had a wicked sense of humor. At our summer cottage a fly once found its way into my ear. Phil quipped, "it probably went out the other side." On another occasion, I had persuaded my folks to buy me a pop gun, the double barreled kind that shoots corks.  I went with my mother to the dime store to buy it. I was attempting to show her how it worked. The gun had to be cocked by breaking at the breach. The spring action was very tight; and, as I struggled to cock it, it slipped my grasp and caught me in my little private personal part. Ouch! The store was a few blocks away from Phil's Northtown Bakery and I was taken there first before going to the hospital. Uncle Phil grinningly speculated that it might have to be cut off. Tough love. Later, at the hospital, that prospect was all I could think about. Imagine this little innocent boy nervously asking the doctor if it was going to be cut off. Phil!!!

Years later as a young man I visited with him and we had some real conversations. He was a good, hardworking man. Phil spent most of his time working hard in his bakery, cigar butt clenched firmly in his teeth as he kneaded dough. He became quite well to do, living in a beautiful house on Lakeshore Drive in Grosse Pointe Farms, Michigan, just down the road from HFII (that's Henry Ford II, of automotive fame).

His wife Genevieve was my father's sister.  Aunt Gene was so beautiful in every way. Always most kind to me, kind in reverse proportion to Phil. She is the only human being who is allowed to call me Davey. To all others, it's David, if you please. They had a badminton court in their back yard and I loved to go there to play. Also, to go across the street to the Farms Pier to swim in Lake St. Clair during the summer; to skate on the frozen lake in the cold Michigan winters. One time I vividly remember visiting for lunch. They had these trendy colorful anodized aluminum tumblers. I got a nice ice cold lemonade. Trouble was, it tasted like 50% dishwashing liquid. Big time. Tact and timidity prevented me from pointing that out. Years later I now surmise that dear cousin Marlene put that mickey in my drink. Marlene!!! A chip off the old block? Well, later I evened the score. Once we went to the beach for a swim and Marlene was going into the water just ahead of me. I was the first to notice that her one piece bathing suit was not zipped up. Wicked little Davey starts running after her, yelling at the top of his voice, "Marlene, Marlene, get into the water, quick!" Everyone on the beach was put on notice. Marlene was embarrassed, of course. (As planned.) She admonished me that I could have been a little more discreet to tell her. She never suspected that I did it on purpose. Hah! How's that for quick on the feet?

But, I also remember Marlene was the one who took me aside one day to teach me the gentlemanly art of opening a door for a lady and helping with a seat. Also, how to dance the au courant Chicken. Thank you, Marlene! But... gotchya!

When cousin Kenny left for California his job at the bakery came open and I stepped in. Every Friday afternoon after school I would go directly to the bakery, arriving at around 4:30 PM working through the night until 6:30 AM. I would take a half hour meal break at around midnight. My job was to assist the other bakers in preparing many of the baked goods for the big Saturday sales day. This schedule was particularly gruesome during the summer school recess period. I learned about the blues going on the bus to the bakery on those hot, humid summer Friday's.

After arriving and putting on an apron my first task was to peel a half dozen Bermuda onions and chop them fine in an empty 5 gallon can (the kind that fruit fillings came in bulk) with a dull table scraper. I would season the chopped onions with salt and poppy seeds. This was the topping for the onion buns. They were great fresh; hard as rocks the next day. I was allowed to do this job pretty much unsupervised and was impressed that they would entrust the blending to me. They ere keeping an eye on me though; once I put in too much salt and was admonished to ease up.

All this time the bakers were kneading dough into individual loaves. Uncle Iggy (he wasn't my uncle, he was Ken's; but I called his that anyway) was a stone serious tool of a man. He had a gray color about him. Austere. I assisted him in moving various rolls and loaves to the proofing trays (which Uncle John, Ken's father, had made special for the purpose---he was a carpenter by trade). Iggy was quite adept at making kaiser rolls and seemed to keep the knack of twisting the dough coil into the right shape a secret from me. He did, however, attempt to teach me how to cut the slashes in the french loaves. I seemed to always cut too deep and he would bluster and fume in his exasperation with my lack of skill. I don't know if I was a good student, but I know that you don't encourage learning by highlighting the student's ignorance. May he rest in peace.

Then I had to help my Uncle Zawodski (that was his last name and that's the name he was known by, "Zawodski") load the large oven with hundreds of loaves of bread. He was a short robust man, and bald. Think Mr. Clean. He had forearms the size of hams; very strong. He also lived in Grosse Pointe (there's money in bread) and took great pride in his lawn. It was manicured like a world class putting green. He had a special mower that was very hard to push and he would trim all the edges by hand on his hands and knees. Polish folks are known as hard workers. All his bushes were trimmed in a simple geometric topiary style; just so. There were deer on the lawn and a gazing ball on a concrete pedestal. Wow!

When the bread was ready to come out of the oven my job was to stand to the side at a large wood top table. Zawodski would shovel about 8 loaves at a time from his peel onto the table. That peel must have had a 10 foot handle, long enough to reach to the back of the oven. You learned right away that you couldn't stand behind the baker when the bread was coming out of the oven. It went so fast that handle must have been moving at 80 mph. I had a few near misses. My job in assisting with the finished loaves was to brush some of the tops with a corn starch and water solution. This would glaze the crust and give it a little crispy crackly texture. Then with thick heat proof gloves I would stack the loaves onto wire racks to cool.

It seemed that most of the bread was Rye. Plain and Seeded. The latter was called Russian Rye, loaded with caraway seeds. There were an assortment of White Breads: French style hand shaped, some baked in in pans with round tops, and some Pullman style baked with a cover on top to make a square slice. There were also the Challahs. These were in one, two, and three pound loaves. This bread is braided from three dough coils. The dough itself was rich in egg yolks which were delivered to the bakery in 5 gallon tins. My job around this item was to open a tin of egg yolks, stir it up, and brush the proofed loaves gently (Iggy would flip if I pressed too hard.) The smell and sight of hundreds of fresh egg yolks at around midnight would make me woozy. It was stomach wrenching. Some loaves were also covered with a streusel topping. The bakers pronounced it "strizzle." Never knew the correct term until years later. It was also a mystery what it was made of---tasted mildly sweet, crumbly, with a buttery orange note. Music to your taste buds, anyway. A vivid memory was when my brother's first child, Christopher, was born and my dad stopped by the bakery in the middle of the night to tell me. I was particularly impressed that he took the trouble to come over to tell me personally. The other bread that I would be remiss to not mention is the behemoth, the Godzilla of all breads, the 5 pound Russian Black Bread. It was black, man. This was sold by the pound. My job was to smear some stuff that resembled cement on the top just before it went into the oven. It made a nice crust. I was the pinochle of the baker's art.

The very last thing that I did before the end of my shift was to assist with the paczki. In the back of bakery, behind the great oven, there was a vat of oil heated to fry the doughnuts. My mentor for this procedure was one Mitchell Mazur. He was a dead ringer for Ely Wallach and quite the jokester. From him I learned the answer to that age old puzzle, "how many wrinkles in a bull ass?" Trust me, you don't want to know. Or, bend over and let me count. One time, to impress me I'm sure, he spit into the hot oil to test if it was ready. I knew that the heat would kill any untoward bacteria. But people did seem to smile after taking a bite of Mitchell's doughnuts, so maybe some of his jovial essence remained. When the paczki were done on both sides (he used a stick to flip them over) he would lift 2 dozen at a time out with a wire rack previously set into the bottom of the vat. We must've made some 12 dozen in all. After the doughnuts were fried I would prepare a large bowl of sugar glaze, a bowl of granulated sugar, and a bowl of powdered sugar. Then I would load the jelly dispensers with 1) raspberry jelly, 2) prune butter (that's "povidla," pronounced "povidwa" in Polish---or also known as "lekvar")---my personal fave, and 3) custard--a close second. These contraptions could hold around 4-5 quarts of filling each. They had a plunger attached to a handle and a spigot at the bottom. I would take the still hot paczki, spike and load each one with the designated filling and toss them top side down into the appropriate sugar topping. This was a multiple challenge. First the doughnuts were still very hot. You had to handle them very delicately or they would scrunch up. Iggy had gone home by now but the mere thought of screwing up brought me eye to eye with wrathful Ignatz. The sugar glaze was also quite hot and it would cling to you fingers. Ow! Ooh! Ouch! Almost time to go home. My one satisfaction around this was that, since I myself like lots of filling in my paczki, I gave every one of them an extra goose. There's an old Polish expression which reads best in the original; translated it goes, "making love is like making a paczki." Think about it. (My personal cure for premature ejaculation was to conjure up an image of Uncle Iggy. "All night long," as the song goes.)

Now my uncle Phil was one to teach a kid the value of a dollar. This slave job of mine paid 75 cents an hour. I worked diligently and even felt a little guilty taking my meal break. I asked for a raise. My next pay envelope had $11.90 instead of the usual $10.50. This increment was so small I approached Phil asking about my promised raise. His response, "I gave you one, 10 cents an hour." Well I didn't see how I was going to get my butt to Lake Shore Drive at that rate. So I quit. Finally stood up for myself and to uncle Phil. Finger! I'll give you a finger!

(Soon after my brother's friend Bob Orlowski graduated from law school and gave up his Saturday job at his Uncle Norb's butcher shop. I landed that spot and in a year was taking home $25 for a 12 hour day. But that's a whole nother story. Onward and upward, however.)

Not long ago I visited Detroit and looked up that old Northtown Bakery on East 7 Mile Road a few blocks west of Van Dyke. Still there, now owned by a Bulgarian gentleman. All the old fixtures were out in front. The Balkan style (I presume) merchandising of the new owner included cheap sneakers arranged in the glass cabinet---where they used to display cakes---soda pops, and a small assortment of what we shall leave described as "sundries." And an indescribable third world dinginess throughout. In back it was like a time capsule. Not much changed from when I walked out with my 85 cent an hour pay envelope. And that familiar dense greasy, buttery aroma of countless baked goods; the odor crammed over the years into every pore in the walls, floor, and ceiling.

I took one look around and exclaimed, "UNCLE!"