viCARIous: Delis of Riverside Avondale

[thelakelander]

^Based off the article, I tried the burger from Pinegrove at lunch.  I stuffed it down and it was just as good as advertised.  Unfortunately, it now feels like nap time and I still have a few more hours of work to go.

[urbanlibertarian]

Energy drink time!

[David]

You know what 2(3):30 in the afternoon feels like...

I'll try out one of these "aged steaks" that pinegrove deli speaks of on their website soon. The concept seems a bit gross to someone who's never heard of it (old meat?) but i'm sure it's delicious.

[Captain Zissou]

I don't know about the Underwoods part, but that history of Zoe's is off. 

Zoe's kitchen used to be a restaurant in Birmingham, AL owned and operated by Zoe Cassimus.  Her son John approached her in 1998 and asked about expanding.  They opened a second location in Hoover, AL and then grew it from there.  The first Zoe's probably looked a lot like Whiteway's or Gina's.  It wasn't til much later on that they took the current appearance. 

If you search for John Cassimus, you'll find plenty.  He's a serial entrepreneur and very accomplished guy.  I saw him speak a couple times at UF and spoke with him at length a couple years ago.

[coredumped]

Stans on Beach has a GREAT steak in a sac:

http://maps.google.com/maps?oe=utf-8&client=firefox-a&ie=UTF8&q=stans,&fb=1&gl=us&ei=6o2rTNyROIvOswbY9fm9BA&ved=0CCUQtgMwAA&radius=0.16&sll=30.288213,-81.585143&sspn=0.002492,0.004608&split=1&rq=1&ev=zo&hq=stans,&hnear=&ll=30.289218,-81.584757&spn=0.002474,0.004608&z=18&layer=c&cbll=30.289197,-81.584581&panoid=SsbhtzkmFrz06OVn_m_gcg&cbp=12,221.16,,0,14.43

But I must now try the Shiek, I didn't know they had them too!

[simms3]

I don't know about the Underwoods part, but that history of Zoe's is off. 

Zoe's kitchen used to be a restaurant in Birmingham, AL owned and operated by Zoe Cassimus.  Her son John approached her in 1998 and asked about expanding.  They opened a second location in Hoover, AL and then grew it from there.  The first Zoe's probably looked a lot like Whiteway's or Gina's.  It wasn't til much later on that they took the current appearance. 

If you search for John Cassimus, you'll find plenty.  He's a serial entrepreneur and very accomplished guy.  I saw him speak a couple times at UF and spoke with him at length a couple years ago.

I believe Zoe Cassimus is related by blood to a Zoe my age who's family is from Birmingham (she is Greek like Zoe Cassimus, and I think she might be named after her).  The connections to Zoe's Kitchen and Underwoods are local, even if they weren't started here.  The local family and the Cassimus family are related.  The mom here is a Cassimus and the father here is a family member of the famous Jeweler family (which runs the oldest continuously operated biz in the country, or something like that).  The father's family bought Underwood, and now the father is the long time president of Underwood.

It's no accident Zoe's Kitchen is expanding here and has a large presence here.  I went to a party at a mutual friend's beach house (mutual with the AL family, the local family, and my family), and John Cassimus was there and in charge of the grill .  He made stuffed burgers.

[lux]

tarzan does not own all of the sheiks. he owns one of them. the sheik was the first to use the camel rider name in their slogan, but was not the originator. it's hard to go back and try to figure out who was the first to offer the camel rider in jacksonville.

majority of the arabs who live in jacksonville are christian, especially the ones who own delis and restaurants around town.

[tayana42]

Great report and responses.  Love the Pine Grove Deli!

[Ocklawaha]

Yea Jax has a lot of Arabs who are ironically now mostly Catholic or even Episcopalian.  Toney Sleiman and his huge family can be counted in, the Salems, the Batehs, the Farahs, and the list goes on.  Love how much they have influenced Jax culture.  I swear we have more Arab delis and hookah restaurants per capita than anywhere I've ever been.  Have the Filipinos or Croats influenced Jax as much? (2 other ethnic groups that have much higher than average concentrations here)

Jacksonville.

The population density was 374.9/km² (970.9/mi²). There were 308,826 housing units at an average density of 157.4/km² (407.6/mi²). The racial makeup of the city was 64.48% White, 34.03% Black or African American, 0.34% Native American, 2.78% Asian, 0.06% Pacific Islander, 1.33% from other races, and 1.99% from two or more races. 4.16% of the population were Hispanic or Latino of any race. The largest ancestries include: German (9.6%), American (9.3%), Irish (9.0%), English (8.5%), and Italian (3.5%). Jacksonville has, as named by the United States Census the 10th largest Arab population in the United States.

OCKLAWAHA