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Platters Restaurant
Judy Florman
2020 Murray Ave., Pittsburgh, Pa.Tel.: (412) 422-3370Open Mon.-Thurs.: 11 a.m.-9 p.m. Sun.: noon-9 p.m.
Pittsburgh, Pennsylvania, is a city of multiculturalism, and there's nothing more multicultural than the city's first (of only two) kosher meat restaurants. The proprietors of Platters Restaurant, located in the Jewish neighborhood of Squirrel Hill, offer a variety of dishes to please any palate.
Ari Naiditch, number two son of eight - assisted as general manager by father Pinkus - opened Platters as a Chinese restaurant three years ago, then became more eclectic, adding deli and Eastern European. Though the menu still features mainly Chinese creations, from an extra-crispy vegetable eggroll and black-pepper chicken, with snow peas, mushrooms, pineapple, onions and its signature black-pepper sauce, to a full-flavored Szechwan beef laced with a vegetable medley, there's also a delectably traditional matzah-ball soup and a serendipitous Pastrami Vivace, a tangy sandwich of grilled pastrami sauteed with onions, olives and mushrooms, topped off with their specialty fried eggplant cubes. Mother Terry serves up mean apple and pecan pies.
Pinkus, who honed his craft as director of kosher food for Pittsburgh's hospitals, celebrates his love of early jazz with tunes from the 30s and 40s, and photos that capture that era in Pittsburgh. Black-and-whites by Teenie Harris chronicle moments in the gigs of early-century local African-American greats, shot against the background of a once-Jewish neighborhood. Dizzy Gillespie is caught lounging between sets, Cab Calloway perches on Duke Ellington's piano lid and a young Ahmad Jamal sits on a trumpet case to reach the ivories. But all is not musical: there are synagogues from the Hill, a bust of Pittsburgh Pirate baseball great Roberto Clemente, who ran a Jewish rescue mission in San Salvador, and Eleanor Roosevelt giving a speech at the county airport. Prices at Platters range from $2.25 to $4.95 for appetizers; $8.95 to $13.95 for main courses.
Good Taste
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