A zaftig dining experience

My wife, Karen, and I had a truly serendipitous dining experience Sunday afternoon.

We were returning home from Virginia, where we had been visiting our nephew Adam and his family, including their newborn son, Joshua.

Driving back along I-95 as lunchtime approached, Karen couldn't work up any enthusiasm for the food offerings at the highway rest stops (Who could?). She decided she had a yen for deli food.

Our GPS can find different kinds of restaurants and their proximity to our route, so we decided our best bet was to detour up the west bank of the Delaware through Philadelphia. The closest deli was the Famous Fourth Street Deli in the Queen section of Philly.

We arrived at the deli, which fortunately wasn't too crowded in mid-afternoon. We were quickly seated, and as Karen perused the menu and the framed photos on the wall, she noticed that the deli owners were from the family that had owned several delis in Brooklyn under the name "Radin's."

"I think my mother used to work there," Karen exclaimed. She said the Radins, Lubins and Cowans were part of her mother's extended family. We also noticed that the "ungashtupt" sandwiches on the menu were named for the various locations of the family's delis, including the "Lee Avenue," a pastrami, turkey and swiss combo. "That's the one where my mother worked," she said.

The regular sandwich menu offered a choice of "regular" and "zaftig" sizes. I opted for a "regular" size chicken salad sandwich and a bowl of matzo ball soup. As it turned out, both of them were HUGE. The matzo ball was the size of a grapefruit, and the sandwich was way too big to finish at one sitting. I finally finished it at the office at lunchtime Monday.

I asked our server how much bigger the "zaftig" would have been. "You see how much space the lettuce and tomato take up?" she asked. "In the zaftig the meat would take up that much more space."

After we finished eating, we introduced ourselves to owner Russ Cowan, and sure enough, he and Karen turned out to be second or third cousins! He remembered Karen's mother, as well as other family members that Karen knew. "That's your Aunt Molly right there," he said, pointing to a picture of deli owners gathered for a dinner dance in 1937.

It was really surreal that the GPS led us to this unexpected family reunion. Could there be a divine hand in those signals coming down from those satellites?

For anyone who appreciates authentic Kosher deli food and who isn't on a serious diet, I highly recommend the place. The sandwiches aren't cheap, but you can definitely get a second meal out of them.

The Famous Fourth Street Delicatessen is located at 700 South Fourth St. at the corner of Bainbridge Street, Philadelphia.