Smoked Fish Returns To TriBeCa
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On Chambers Street in TriBeCa, a construction project has uncovered an old painted sign for a fish shop called Petrosino & Sons. It would seem to be the relic of a long-gone era in the neighborhood. But fish — in this case smoked — are back on the next block, with the opening of Original Zucker’s (146 Chambers St. at West Broadway, 212-608-5844) last weekend. The T-shirts worn by the staff of this lox-and-bagels purveyor say, “A New Tradition.” “Groovy young people like throwbacks,” the proprietor Matthew Pomerantz said last Saturday as the place bustled on its first day of operation. By noon, the shop had already run out of sturgeon and sable, sourced from Acme Smoked Fish in Brooklyn.
Mr. Pomerantz knows from bagels and lox, having co-founded the popular Murray’s Bagels shops in Greenwich Village and Chelsea. “We’re trying to be authentic but capture what people want, so we have smoked fish but also a Cimbali espresso machine,” he said. Later this month, Zucker’s — it’s the maiden name of Mr. Pomerantz’s mother — will begin serving breakfast, including the Leo: lox, eggs, and onions.