Uptown Market

October 11, 2019

At 7 am today we got a new neighborhood food store.  Inspections were passed; staff were being trained; products delivered and recipes retested; shelves are being stocked.  It’s Uptown Market just across the street from us and I think it will be a major addition to our neighborhood.

IMG_2134

“Our neighborhood?”  What is our neighborhood?

We are not a classic Washington neighborhood like Cleveland Park that came about at the turn of the Twentieth Century when the extension of the streetcar made  possible living in “the suburbs.”   Everyone knows Cleveland Park; it’s a national historic district.

I am not clear even about what to call our neighborhood.  Is it Van Ness or Forest Hills?   I would have called it Forest Hills years ago.  But that was before the University of D.C. expanded and became such a presence in Van Ness which is now is a built-up jumble of not-so-attractive buildings that dominate a neighborhood of pleasant and comparatively modest homes.

Whatever it is called, I have a lifelong relationship with this neighborhood.  The first house I bought, in 1970, is on the dead end of 29th Street just below Albemarle, half a mile from Bread Furst.

My relationship with the neighborhood started even before that. My first real job after college was at ABC News.  Its Washington bureau then occupied the second floor of a Deco strip mall on the east side of Connecticut Avenue.  It was a wonderful block.  Hess Shoes at the corner of Albemarle, Shanghai Garden a few doors down, a large People’s Drug Store on the north side of the mall, Kitchen Bazaar, a terrific local kitchenware store.  And I could have breakfast at the Hot Shoppe across the street where the Burger King and Zips Cleaners are now.

4195348704_4f9b0d4575

The neighborhood was not a food destination, however.  The little strip mall had two or three little restaurants.  My boss, Howard K. Smith, the newsman, didn’t care much for Chinese Food so we didn’t often go to Shanghai Garden in the peculiar little red and white building just beyond the mall.  But he liked Carmack’s and so we lunched there two times a week.  There was no retail food store in the strip but a building across the street had been constructed 50 years earlier to be a Safeway at a time when supermarkets were much smaller stores.

That is the building we now occupy.

Those were the days when Washington’s retail food was dominated by two chains, Safeway and Giant.  They controlled 80 percent of the food retail.   They were not challenged.  There were mom and pop stores to be sure.  A bit to the north there was a great one, Clover Market across from Higger’s, the drug store.  Noah Steinberg, the son of the owners of Clover Market works in our pastry kitchen.

Now, today there is a change.  As of today we have Uptown Market that in some respects a throwback to the era of neighborhood food stores, and I think it’s going to be wonderful. I went to look again yesterday to look at the store, so my information for you is impeccably fresh.

Fresh like the fish they are going to sell.  Like the meat they are going to butcher.  Like the baguettes we are going to bake for them.

Some readers may know Santi Zabaleta who immigrated from Spain in 1999 and eight years later took over a purified water store on Bethesda Avenue and opened a Spanish foods-oriented market.  Later he added a butcher shop across the street and still later opened Kensington Wholesale Fish.

IMG_2188

Now he and his partner Adam Leichtner take over a large space across the street from Bread Furst in the apartment building the B.F. Saul Company built to replace the little mall atop which I worked in 1961.

So we have another real food store  in Van Ness, Forest Hills, UDC, or whatever we are called. It starts today with beautiful Spanish cheeses including a raw milk Manchego, an aged one, and even French cheeses because as Santi generously admits, “Nobody makes cheeses like the French.”

The whole chickens I saw yesterday look fresh and beautiful.

IMG_0045 2

 

 

 

 

 

 

 

 

IMG_4394 2

It is wonderful for me to see a beautifully tied veal roast in the meat case.  The butcher is French, again a throwback to The French Market, the Georgetown market to which I was devoted for many years.

There’s wine too and beer although hardly the selection offered by Calvert Woodley, a great anchor of the neighborhood.  And there are those special Spanish foods in addition to some of the basics that will provide convenience to the neighborhood.

IMG_2182

As you might gather I am excited to have another food store between the commercial strips of Cleveland Park and Chevy Chase Circle, our own neighborhood food store.   I hope that others will come to this neighborhood to shop — I am sure that they do too — but this store is for Forest Hills, Van Ness, etc., whatever we are.

 

 

 

 

 

 

  1. Paul Boudreau says:

    Thanks, I’ll definitely visit.

  2. marionnestle says:

    Nice! And they are using your bread. Even better.

    *From:* Bread Furst [mailto:comment-reply@wordpress.com] *Sent:* Friday, October 11, 2019 9:38 AM *To:* marion.nestle@nyu.edu *Subject:* [New post] Uptown Market

    Mark Furstenberg posted: “At 7 am today we got a new neighborhood food store. Inspections were passed; staff were being trained; products delivered and recipes retested; shelves are being stocked. It’s Uptown Market just across the street from us and I think it will be a major a”

  3. What a wonderful essay, Mark, You and the uptown market have great chemistry. The yeast is rising! It makes me miss my old neighborhood.

  4. Anonymous says:

    Yours is a wonderful piece, that in very few words captures so much. That you care about this neighborhood and community shows up every day. Thank you. I recall all that you mention (even from before having moved here, to Forest Hills) and share your sentiment about its name. There was China Closet, too, across from great Kitchen Bazaar, and the strip mall configuration of shops above Giant, and the Safeway in the Gold’s Gym space and a little antiques shop in the former Deco building where Uptown will now be. Uptown and all that you describe are very needed and most welcome–the breadth and quality of offerings, and indoor and outdoor seating. They have already been a generous neighbor by catering the annual fundraising event for Main Street and being a part of the conversation. All very exciting.

  5. Marjorie Share says:

    Yours is a wonderful piece, that in very few words captures so much. That you care about this neighborhood and community shows up every day. Thank you. I recall all that you mention (even from before having moved here, to Forest Hills) and share your sentiment about its name. There was China Closet, too, across from great Kitchen Bazaar, and the strip mall configuration of shops above Giant, and the Safeway in the Gold’s Gym space and a little antiques shop in the former Deco building where Uptown will now be. Uptown and all that you describe are very needed and most welcome–the breadth and quality of offerings, and indoor and outdoor seating. They have already been a generous neighbor by catering the annual fundraising event for Main Street and being a part of the conversation. All very exciting.

  6. Paul Boudreau says:

    Maybe slightly off topic but still neighborhood oriented. I recently bought a 1948 GE table radio from a friend in Fresno because of what was stamped on the bottom:

    DOWD’S RADIO & ELECTRIC COMPANY
    4418 CONN.. AVE., N.W.
    (illegible) 2-7300 WASH. 8, D.C.

    ZIPS Dry Cleaners is currently at that address. Anyone remember Dowd’s?

  7. Anonymous says:

    Enjoyed your reminisces but have a few comments. Bread Furst is definitely in Forest Hills. Previously west of Connecticut below Albemarle might have been alternately called North Cleveland Park, but never Van Ness which is historically only a street, not a neighborhood. Also, the shoe store on the corner of Albemarle was Hahn’s. Here’s a link to an article I wrote about that shopping strip for the Forest Hills Connection https://www.foresthillsconnection.com/news/in-the-1950s-connecticut-and-albemarle-was-a-shopping-destination/ So glad Bread Furst and Uptown Market are in our neighborhood! Ann Kessler

    • Thank you for this correction. It was Hahn’s. And thank you for sending your essay. I don’t agree with your certainty about the name of the neighborhood. “North Cleveland Park” is an invention of realtors; and although the Van Ness neighborhood is a recent name, the growth of UDC and the naming of the Metro stop seem to me to have legitimized that name.

      • Ann Kessler says:

        I found a map of the Connecticut Avenue Uptown Center (that’s Van Ness to Albemarle) from 1954 at the Historical Society of Washington. I can’t see a way where I can send it to you through the Bread Furst website, but will drop it off at the bakery, with your permission. Ann Kessler

  8. Anonymous says:

    Please let me know when you wish to come to the bakery so that I can meet you there. mark@breadfurst.com

    • Ann Kessler says:

      I’ve sent you an email with an attachment and a lot of links to photos at the Historical Society’s website. Today at the Historical Society I took photos of real estate atlases from 1945 and 1954. There was a Safeway at the approximate location of where Giant is today. I had no idea… Let me know if you want me to email them or we can meet any day this week at Bread Furst. I just made my regular Tuesday visit…Ann Kessler

Leave a Reply to Marjorie Share Cancel reply

Your email address will not be published. Required fields are marked *