carolan n.
Yelp
This is a rememberance piece, a thumbnail sketch of how Petticoat Lane was in the 60's.
A noisy conglomeration of stalls yes but so many owned by old Jewish merchants who stood there on Sunday mornings eyeballing the motley crew of people who came ashopping, looking for delicacies only the old Polish and Russian Jews could still produce. Barrels overflowing with pickled green cucumbers in salty brine, you could spear the ones you liked and pull 'em out to be wrapped in waxed paper. Long strings of bagels fluttered in the air. Not the humungous stuff they sell nowadays but these were small and round, baked brown and crisp on the outer and filled with the lightest, whitest bread on the inner - absolutely yummy. There were rounds of farmers cheeses and caraway cheeses and yellow dutch cheeses. Milky white yoghurt, thick and creamy (none of your chemicalized, non fat rubbish) in kegs that could be spooned into small bowls, or big ones if you so desired. Large pots of smetna which is sour cream filled with shredded cucumber, and enormous vats of creamy yellow or white butter cut into shapes and sizes to your heart's desire.
There were pickled onions and pickled fishes, herring and kipper and whitefish, and lots of smoked salmon to put on bagels with cream cheese.
Later in the day when the purveyors had gone home to their little houses in the nearby streets of that largely ghetto area, you could still wander down the Lane and see the pulled down shades of those people - the last remains of an age swiftly passing, till today there is nothing left but the tawdriness of our 21st century.