by Eric Miller
While many neighborhood business districts have struggled over the years to maintain enough foot traffic to support themselves, Pittsburgh's Strip District has continued to hum with pedestrian traffic for more than a century.
The markets, restaurants, and sidewalk vendors lend an tantalizing fume to the air that can be accommodated only with the tastes of fresh vegetables, chicken kabobs, and warm bread. With more variety of tastes than San Francisco's Chinatown, and more variety of prepared foods than the markets in other cities, Pittsburgh's Strip District is the envy or urbanites elsewhere.
It all started when the Pennsylvania Railroad set up produce warehouses just outside the city's downtown. The trains brought the produce in to the Strip, where it was sorted and transported to grocers around town. But it didn't take long to realize the freshest stuff came from the source. Merchants set up to sell vegetables and fruits right off the trains, and bakers used the easy access to grains to make bread nearby.
Soon a trip to the Strip was a weekly tradition for Pittsburghers. Before most cities rub the sleep from their eyes, every Saturday morning Pittsburgh's Strip District is humming with activity. From fresh fish to Amish pastries, there's no better food or more fun to be had anywhere than in the Strip.
Saturday is a good time to get in line for breakfast at De Luca's, a standing tradition with a list of "best breakfast" awards. A full stomach isn't the best thing to have when it's time for food shopping, but parking places are hard to come by, so allow your senses to convince you to pick up enough food for the week.
The Pennsylvania Macaroni Co. is the place in the city to find the best olive oils, meats, and cheeses, pastas and tomato products. (If you can't visit Pittsburgh, you can shop virtually at www.pennmac.com). The next stop has to be Wholey's Market (www.wholey.com) for the widest variety of seafood products anywhere between the oceans. The atmosphere in Wholey's captures the emerging Asian presence in the strip, and signs advertise specials in English as well as Chinese, while posters address Vietnamese employees.
The Strip is also the best place to find Asian groceries, or get a bowl of pho noodle soup: stop by New Sam Bok's or Lotus. Renya Foods offers one of the city's few places to find food items from South America and Mexico. If it's cheese you're looking, for you'll find it at the Pittsburgh Cheese Terminal and Penns Woods Organics offers selections for those shoppers inclined to the natural.
By this time all that shopping has made you hungry again. Not to worry: Wholey's also offers prepared food. Even better, one of the food stands along Penn Avenue can satisfy your desires with deep fried vegetables or a bean pancake.
Pittsburgh is also a great place to get ice cream. A chain of corner stores called Isaly's invented the now famous Klondike Bar. The roots of Klavon's Ice Cream Parlor stretch back almost as far. Klavon's Pharmacy in the strip opened in 1920 and was a social fixture until 1979 when the doors closed. But tradition was preserved inside for twenty years and uncovered in 1999 when the family re-opened the pharmacy as an ice cream parlor. A visit is a trip back in time, and a perfect opportunity to rediscover root beer floats and penny candy.
If you thought your day in the Strip ended at sundown, you're wrong. If you went home now you'd miss the sandwich that's grown to be a sort of symbol of blue-collar Pittsburgh. Primanti Brothers (www.primantibros.com) is the place for strangely delicious fried cheese or capicolla topped with cole slaw and greasy fries. It's served by gruff Pittsburghers with an attitude not unlike that expected in a fraternity house kitchen, so don't expect niceties or a smile. This is the kind of food you'll want to wash down with a cold Iron City brew (www.pittsburghbrewingco.com).
After all that, you may notice one thing missing: a 24-hour drug store where you can find an antacid.
Eric Miller is a New Colonist Editor.
