Scenes From the Old Neighborhood : Memories of eating on Fairfax Avenue

For seven years, I lived in an apartment so close to Fairfax Avenue that I could open my living room windows and breathe in a full-course meal. The lightest southerly breeze would send in the peppery scent of Sichuan food stir-frying at Yung Hwa. Or if the wind blew from the northwest, the spicy aroma of falafels filled the room. From due west would come dessert: the thick, sweet fragrance of butter cookies baking at Canter’s delicatessen.

It was not a bad deal, even though opened windows also meant that less pleasant things would waft inside. If cooking food is what the Fairfax District smells like, its aural signature is a white noise made up of honking horns, screeching tires and loud conversation. This was the snarled dialogue fragment that once floated up from the street: “Red! They’re gonna send you to the coo-coo house . . . “ When I timidly peeked down to the sidewalk below, I saw two palsied, wrinkled women squaring off, one of whom had hair dyed the vibrating color of a cherry Popsicle.

Several months ago, I left the din behind me, and moved into a sun-drenched place in a seriously serene area. When my mail comes through the slot and hits the tile floor it sounds like a sonic boom. Now I only think about the old neighborhood when I’m hungry, daydreaming of food within walking distance: of a fruit cup from Canter’s delicatessen (crisp, juicy pieces of melon and pineapple tucked into a French jelly glass); or of a skinless grilled-chicken pita from the corner Middle Eastern food stand with the name that’s embarrassing to say out loud (it’s called Eat A Pita); or of a warm poppyseed bagel with cream cheese, shaved purple onions and a slice of ripe tomato from the Royal Bagel.

It’s true that for a single city area, Fairfax is unparalleled for cheap, expedient dining. (The peak luncheon experience in my new neighborhood was a pitiful sandwich--a watery scoop of tuna, apples and raisins between two slices of razor-sharp rye toast--which swiftly took up residence in my garbage can.) But what I really miss are the familiar faces, proving that food always tastes better when you like the person who is taking your money.

In a way, eating at a neighborhood restaurant isn’t about the food at all. It’s about proximity and reliability and the relationship that develops between you and the proprietors. You watch their children grow, and you accustom yourself to their unique interior decorating schemes. (Who chose the translucent plastic panels of autumn leaves for the ceiling of Canter’s? I’ve always wondered. And exactly what kind of mood were they going for?) Outsiders don’t notice subtle menu changes--pasta salad with roasted peanuts at Canter’s, for example. But when you know a restaurant, you sense the hope owners invest in these weird little culinary brainstorms.

I’ve always had the notion that once someone has seen you through a particularly bad case of the flu, they become a kind of a member of your extended family. This sickbed intimacy was initiated when I’d stagger into a Fairfax restaurant looking feverish and deranged. While I may have frightened the customers, the Canter’s countermen--surely the kindest fellows on the planet--responded by passing over white Styrofoam tubs of chicken broth, assuring me that their special ratio of noodles to kasha to liquid would do the trick. Lily, the slim, quick-talking proprietor at Yung Hwa, had the most restorative tonic--a cure-all that escapes me now, but had something to do with a large order of her silky won ton soup and endless cups of hot water with lemon.

Being a repeat customer means feeling comfortable, even arrogant, in your knowledge of the little things. For example, the waitresses at Damiano Mr. Pizza have the life span of gnats; it’s doubtful that you’ll ever see your trembling server again, so tip generously. Eating this establishment’s fuggazetta , a double-layered Argentine sauceless cheese-and-ham pizza, with a side of minced sauteed garlic, can be a near-religious experience. But purchasing a single pizza slice is a bad idea. It’s a triangle of leftover pie, covered with a layer of not-quite-melted mozzarella, which shields your choice of topping like a rubbery pup tent. Mr. Pizza’s Mitchell Kitay is what one hopes for in a young pizzeria owner: He’s friendly, streetwise and--when he isn’t pitching his mother’s homemade cheesecake or his limousine service--capable of passing on startling information about the neighborhood. It was he, after all, who gently explained to me years ago that, no, my two neighbors were not nurses, but were employed in a far more lucrative branch of the human services.

Back when I first moved into the neighborhood, Eat A Pita used to be a garden shed-sized place called Me & Me. (“What does the name mean?” I once asked its muscular Israeli short-order cook. He told me, “You and you.” Oh.) Several years ago, actress Julie Newmar took over the property--she owns the land parcel--and began busily retrofitting it in a style that manages to salute both architect Frank Gehry and “Miami Vice.” Around the original structure they’ve put up bars, gratings, a roofed patio, picnic tables and space heaters--most of which have been dipped in pink or turquoise paint. The food is still satisfying, and even cleaner-tasting: smoky schwarma , green salad with feta and firm Greek olives, garlicky baba ghanoouj , parslied rice steamed in a chicken stock, and astringent, marinated cold turnips stained magenta from soaking in beet juice. All this is consumed in the small piazza, with the nasal wail of Tel Aviv pop music blaring, near an intersection that features the three items necessary to insure spontaneous street theater: a bus stop, a high school, and a traffic light. Anything can happen at this corner . . . and has. Once, when I was heading homeward, I spotted a corpulent woman standing calmly at the ordering counter, dressed only in an extra-large brassiere and panty-girdle.

Recently, when I drove through the area, it looked grubbier, more graffiti-scrawled. I couldn’t decide if the street had begun to sag or if absence makes the eyes see clearly. But what remained the same were the shuffling pedestrians: Fairfax is still the only neighborhood where the elderly own the sidewalks. And Canter’s is their eating hall. It’s not just that it’s open 24 hours or that it serves homey dishes--soft blintzes, wizened baked apples. There’s a sense of democracy that prevails there-- everyone has to plead to place their order. It sums up the best of what Fairfax has to offer. In my younger days, when three a.m. still seemed a perfectly reasonable time to go on a bagel run, I wandered into Canter’s and was greeted by this vision: a dining room full of customers wearing feathered Indian headbands. And it wasn’t only eccentric, pale-skinned rockers wearing the paper hats. So were old men dressed in rumpled outfits of plaid and stripes, wearing their party hats with looks of shy pride. It was one of the waitresses’ birthday, I was told. Everyone wanted to help celebrate.