THE WEEK OF JANUARY 27, 2005
Reader Is Guide For This Tasty Tour
Of The Wurst In German Pork Stores
We have an interesting letter from Thomas Wiegand of Franklin Square, L.I., who
This display of various Karl Ehmer sausages served as the back cover for a brochure which was a supplement for the May 29, 1988 issue of the New Yorker Staats Zeitung Herold newspaper. Note that it lists the location of Karl Ehmer’s main store and manufacturing plant at 63-35 Fresh Pond Road in Ridgewood.
has contributed a number of letters in the past. This time we have a mouth-watering subject: “Ridgewood’s German Pork Stores ... Making the Best of the Wurst.” Mr. Wiegand has provided us with a treasure trove of information as well as some interesting photos and other materials. For this reason, we are presenting his latest contribution in two parts, beginning this week.
He writes: “German immigrants to the USA brought their trades with them. They found work as brewers, engineers, bakers, machinists and butchers, to name a few. Butchers especially brought with them the recipes and techniques to make the tasty sausages and meat products that are enjoyed by millions today.
“In Ridgewood, particularly, pork stores featuring German-style meat products were almost everywhere. The larger chains such as Trunz and Merkel had stores throughout Queens and were in every major shopping center, including Ridgewood’s Myrtle Avenue. Merkel’s plant was in Jamaica, south of the Long Island Rail Road station. Trunz had its headquarters in Greenpoint alongside the Brooklyn-Queens Expressway. However, as the population changed, by 1970 Merkel was out of business, and Trunz made a major change and sold meat products made by other manufacturers. Within a few years it was also out of business.
Ridgewood was the home for a number of smaller establishments in which the meat products were made in the store. Karl Ehmer started this way in 1932 in Manhattan. In 1941 he moved to 61-14 Myrtle Ave. in Glendale. This store was very successful, and on Nov. 2, 1950, he moved a block away to 62-10 Myrtle Ave. into larger quarters. By November 1958 he outgrew this and moved to a much larger store and a large manufacturing plant at 63-35 Fresh Pond Rd. at Menahan Street. Today, Mark Hannsler, one of Karl Ehmer’s grandsons, is the president of Karl Ehmer Inc. Mr. Ehmer owned five farms on Noxon Road in Lagrange, N.Y., where he raised cattle and hogs for his products. He disposed of the farms several years before he passed away in 1989.
Schaller & Weber’s Pork Store, located at 56-54 Myrtle Ave. in Ridgewood, as photographed in November 1987, shortly after the store closed.
“Ferdinand Schaller and Anton Weber in 1937 founded the firm that bears their names. Both Ehmer and Schaller came from Stuttgart, Germany. Schaller and Weber’s main store and plant was on Manhattan’s Second Avenue near East 86th Street. The main store remains there, but larger production facilities were opened on 46th Street near Ditmars Boulevard in Astoria. Schaller and Weber and Karl Ehmer became friendly rivals. Oddly enough, both feature store fronts in beige and maroon with brown lettering.
“Another immigrant from Stuttgart, Karl Bayha, in 1948 brought his expertise to Ridgewood and opened his Forest Pork Store on Forest Avenue and Woodbine Street, a Ridgewood landmark. It opened a branch store on Jericho Turnpike in Huntington, L.I.
“All these stores sell excellent meat products. I will leave it to the readers as to which store and product they prefer.
“Let’s turn the clock back and imagine that we are visiting a Ridgewood pork store in the mid-1960s. In the sparkling-clean display window are packages of Brandt Zwieback, jars of pickles, boxes of Tortenböden for making quick desserts and cans of imported sauerkraut. Hanging from above are strips of landjaeger and rings of touristenwurst (both with a salami-like flavor) and slabs of double-smoked bacon, all tempting you to come inside.
“Open the door and breathe deeply. There is a wonderful aroma of smoked meat products. On the left are refrigerated cases holding more types of liverwurst than can be imagined. Some are spread on bread, some are sliced and some are steamed and eaten hot. On the top where the salamis and cervelat (soft salami) are, there is a ‘Take-a-check’ machine. Push the lever down and get a ticket. When the butcher calls your number, you are the next customer to be waited on. If you are lucky on a Saturday morning (the pork store’s busiest time of the week), the hot leberkase comes out and the butcher might give you a piece. (More on that later.).
Morscher’s Pork Store, located at 58-46 Catalpa Ave. in Ridgewood. The slogan on the sign translates to “Wurst decorate the table.”
“In the next refrigerated case there are sausages for cooking: bratwurst, bauernwurst, knockwurst, weisswurst, frankfurters and wieners. Also, there is the heavily smoked Westphalian ham and the flat bauernschinken (farmer’s ham). Try these with melon slices in place of prosciutto.
“Next are a lightly smoked round Prague ham and boiled ham. Maybe a Virginia-style ham is there, too. Wait! Now come the cold cuts or bolognas. Everyone knows regular bologna but here is Krakauer (named for Krakow, Poland), a small ham bologna. See a large ham bologna, plus bierwurst, head cheese, a coarse meat loaf sometimes called Vienna loaf, and kalbsrouladen and gelbwurst (these last two are made with veal). Blood and tongue loaf and plastic cups of meat salad (diced bolognas, pickles and mayonnaise, with a dash of Maggi seasoning) are there, too.
“In the next case are steaks, roasts, chicken, ground beef and all the standard meat selections. On top of this case are smaller Westphalian hams, smoked pigs’ knuckles and that leberkase. Up above hang rings of krainerwurst and kielbasa (both Polish and Hungarian style).
An old Trunz sign on the side of a building became the last vestige of the store near 118th Street and Jamaica Avenue in Richmond Hill. The store was housed downstairs at 117-14 Jamaica Ave.
“As you are making your meat choices, behind you are shelves displaying Wild’s and Munzenmaier’s pumpernickel and rye bread, plus Silver Bell Lithuanian rye breads, Steiner’s or Meyer’s egg noodles, Knoll’s and Panni potato dumpling and potato mixes, bottles of Maggi seasoning (which gives a beefy taste to food—try it on salads), envelopes of Maggi and Eto soup mixes. See Dr. August Oetker’s baking products and cake mixes (he was a chemist, not a medical doctor). There are boxes of Pompadour tea bags, bags of imported cough drops Em-eukal (pronounced em-oy-CALL), Anifen and Bavarian malt drops. Rounding out the display are six-packs of Kraftperle, a dark, sweet nonalcoholic malt beverage from DAB (Dortmunder Actien Brauerei), and an assortment of Bahlsen cookies from Hanover, Germany. A small refrigerated self-service case offers fish products, cheeses and tubes (yes, tubes) of mustard.
“Behind the meat cases, Globe Slicing Machines slice your Westphalian ham paper-thin, and signs reading ‘All pork products must be cooked thoroughly’ hang on the immaculate tile wall.
“Big Globe-Stimpson scales (No digital ones yet. It is the mid-1960s.) weigh your purchases, and one of the ‘easy listening’ stations (WRFM or WTFM) is playing on the radio. All done? Now it is time to pay. The butcher will hand you a receipt showing what you owe, then you pay the cashier at a small booth. (Forest Pork Store still uses this practice.) That way, the butchers behind the counter do not handle the dirty money. Your receipt gets stamped, and you pick up your order. Before you leave, if it’s a Friday or Saturday, the butcher may bid you ‘schöne wochende’ (nice weekend)! Then you rush home with the leberkase while it’s still warm.
“The delicious tradition continues today at the Forest Pork Store, Morscher’s, the Glendale Pork Store, Karl Ehmer and Schaller & Weber. Enjoy!
“Behind the scenes at Morscher’s Pork Store, Herb Morscher Jr. (a cousin of Josef Morscher, the founder at 58-46 Catalpa Ave., Ridgewood, and a native of Gottschee, Austria) showed me the production area, consisting of the smoke room, drying room and the walk-in refrigerator where rows of Tirolerwurst were hanging. Herb Morscher told me that they supply wurst for local Oktoberfests and Schlactfests. The store also produces meat products catering to Ridgewood’s Eastern European residents.”
Old Timer’s Note—We imagine that by now, many our readers are in the mood for a nice serving of bratwurst, knockwurst or some other delight as described above.
We wilI present the concluding part of Thomas Wiegand’s article—with a list of butcher stores that operated in Ridgewood and Glendale in 1960—in next week’s issue.
If you have any remembrances or old photographs that you would like to share with our readers, write (“regular” mail, please; no e-mail) to the Old Timer, c/o Times Newsweekly, P.O. Box 860299, Ridgewood, NY 11386-0299. All photographs will be carefully returned to you.