Mile End Deli fits right in with Birmingham’s eating ethos. The kitchen crafts hot dogs; cures and smokes brisket, turkey, and salmon; bakes bagels and breads in a wood-fired oven; and makes cream cheese, sauerkraut, mustard, pickles, and sauces in-house.
Founded in 2010 in Brooklyn, New York by Joel Tietolman, it evokes the restaurants in the Mile End neighborhood of Montreal that he enjoyed while growing up there. Birmingham now hosts the only location outside of New York (previously there was a location in Nashville, Tennessee).
Mile End is the latest high-quality import by Nick Pihakis, co-founder of Jim ’N Nick’s Bar-B-Q. Pihakis, who sold the barbecue chain in 2017, also convinced James Beard Award-winning whole-hog pitmaster Rodney Scott to open his second eponymous barbecue restaurant in the Avondale neighborhood (the original is in Charleston, South Carolina).
Mile End blends elements of an Ashkenazi Jewish deli and a French-Canadian diner. It’s the only place in town where one can find both Chopped Liver Toast ($5.75) and Hoyt Dogs in a Blanket ($6), coarse-ground beef hot dogs baked in puffed pastry and rolled in a mix of salt with sesame and poppy seeds.
Of course, the restaurant serves poutine, Montreal’s contribution to bar food, which is French fries topped with gravy and cheese curds ($6). Poutine topped with smoked meat—a Montreal take on pastrami—is $11.
Mile End’s Matzo Ball Soup ($7) will draw tears of joy, with its rich broth, big pieces of well-seasoned tender chicken, celery, and large-dice carrot. The matzo ball is perfect, a slightly sweet, soup-cooked orb of unleavened flour, egg, fat, and water that is airy, yet sturdy enough to hold together in the broth.
Breakfast is served all day, so there’s no excuse not to try a tender bagel with cold-smoked salmon, cream cheese, purple onion, assorted pickled vegetables, and capers, available either in a shareable platter called The Eli ($18) or Mile End’s signature open-face “Beauty” sandwich ($10.75).
Smoked salmon also stars in The Leo ($10.50), a breakfast plate with scrambled eggs, caramelized onions, and rye toast.
Mile End is on the ground floor of the LIV Parkside residential complex. The interior is airy and bright, with lots of tile and a semi-open kitchen and bakery. Seating includes a white marble bar and dark-wood tables inside; a comfortable patio out front overlooks an entrance to Railroad Park.
The restaurant serves locally-roasted Seeds coffee, and features a full bar. Its “Noshy Hour,” available after 4 p.m., includes discounted beer, wine, and $5 small-plates from the menu’s Nosh section. In addition to Hoyt Dogs in a Blanket and Chopped Liver Toast, noshes include smoked-and-crisped Pastrami Chicken Wings (normal price is $6.50) and Potato Latkes (normally $5.50). All go well with adult beverages.
Latkes at Mile End are filling inch-thick cakes of shredded potato and onion that are crisp on the outside, but soft and savory inside. They are served with sour cream and applesauce.
On the breakfast menu, house-baked eggy challah bread is the base for French Toast ($10.25), served with maple syrup and fruit. An order of Buttermilk Pancakes ($10.25) comes with maple-glazed bacon (which also is sold separately as a $4 breakfast nosh). Avocado Toast ($9.25) includes a poached egg.
Bagel sandwiches—choose your bagel flavor among plain, poppy seed, sesame or everything—include the ribeye Steak ’N Egg ($9.25) and Sausage Egg and Cheese ($6.25).
Vegetarians have a few choices among bagel sandwiches: the cream-cheese topped Schmear ($3.50), Egg Salad ($5.75), and New Year ($5.50) with sliced apples, arugula, and honey-walnut cream cheese. The restaurant also started serving a daily selection of Hero Doughnuts in late summer.
Lunch and dinner options focus on hearty sandwiches, with an addition of the Za’atar Grain Bowl ($10) that mixes quinoa, tabbouleh, marinated vegetables, pickled onion, and a hard-boiled egg. Za’atar is a seasoning blend of thyme, oregano, marjoram, toasted sesame seeds, and tart powdered sumac.
Impossible Burgers (a meatless option) are available, for an upcharge, as a substitute on the Cheeseburger ($10.75/$14.75) and The Big Juicy ($12.95/$16.95). The Patty Lamell sandwich ($15.95) always features the Impossible Burger.
House-smoked meat appears in breakfast items like Smoked Meat Hash ($10.25), and the Classic Breakfast ($10.75), served with eggs, latkes, and rye toast. It also is part of The Mile End platter ($21), along with corned beef, smoked turkey, a Hoyt Dog, and accompaniments.
Those elements also appear in various sandwiches: Smoked Meat ($12-$18 depending on size), corned beef in the Classic Reuben ($12.75), turkey in both the Grandpa ($10.25) and Turkey Reuben ($10.75), or nestled in a fresh-baked Hero bun for the Hoyt Dog ($6),
The pounded and fried Chicken Schnitzel sandwich ($10.75) includes maple bacon and pickled green tomato. And any good deli must have meat “salads,” in this case chicken ($9.75) and spicy tuna ($11.25).
For dessert, choose among New York-style cheesecake, a plate of assorted cookies including triangle-shaped Hamantaschen and black-and-white cookies, or the chocolate-layered bread Babka ($5.25-$6.50).
Eat at Mile End often enough and you may end up speaking Yiddish with a French- Canadian accent.
Details
Mile End Deli | 1701 1st Ave. S. | 205.538.8011 | Mon.-Sun., 8 a.m.-9 p.m. | mileenddeli.com