Ah, New York, New York. My heart went all a-flutter when I spotted the Statue of Liberty down below as we circled Newark after 7 hours of flying.

It felt that it took us longer to get through immigration than to actually fly across the continent – queues in newark immigration is ridiculliously crazy, even worse than what I remembered JFK to be, which was annoying. We waited so long that our luggages were already removed from the carousel as bags from the next flights were going around it. You’d think that’s the end of the drama wouldn’t you? Nooo…more await us at our lovely rental car counter! After a super long wait at Newark’s Dollar rental car (never, EVER rent from them – they were horrendous – two hours late with car delivery and not apologetic AT ALL) we were let free at last to roam the freeways of the great state of New Jersey. We found Elvin’s studio in Whippany without a glitch – about 30 mins away from Newark.

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After a quick shower, we were ready to eat. Well, I was, bacon was bone-tired and after wolfing down the stale sandwiches offered up by Continental (he even wolfed mine down!). Why would anyone in their right mind eat that sort of garbage is beyond me. Stale dry roll with tasteless cheese – I much rather have a Ryvita. Anyway, it was onwards and upwards to the deli that me & Elvin had been plotting to go to for a couple of months – the infamous Harolds’ Famous NY Deli Restaurant.. We did get lost fighting the sat nav to find this place, as it was located in a semi-industrial estate – not quite what I was expecting at all.

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An unassuming front right smack at a Holiday Inn carpark hides one special little deli indeed, where everything in there is ANYTHING but little.

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They are REALLY not kidding, they are really the best in everything they do.

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Specialising in comically oversized deli food, Harold’s really do make food for giants. I was there for the comedy effect, but was suprised by the deliciousness. The comical sizes in no way stops it from producing one of the best deli food around – it was tasty, fresh and well flavored. I did the ordering for the four of us – there wasn’t much we could order as each portion ‘feeds 4-6′ . Uh-oh.

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We started off with a visit to ‘The World’s longest pickle bar’ – pickles of every variety

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After much persuasion from bacon not to pile my plate sky high with pickles I settled for a small selection. My favourite is the half-sour pickle.

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Love the old school scalloped frosted glass plates…reminds me of the 70s . It wasn’t long at all that our starter of the Jewish mainstay Matzo Ball in Chicken Soup appeared, complete with a tin mug as the scoop. The bowl was the size of a Lazy Susan – and the matzo ball was the size of a balloon. Scared yet? Here is the soup in comparision with our normal-sized plate of pickles.

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Elvin giggling at the size of our starter

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The matzoh ball was amazingly fluffy for something so large. I love the chicken soup – nourishing and tasty, like what chicken soup is supposed to be. I nearly did not order this, but the novelty of digging into a massive matzoh ball was too hard to resist…and I was glad I ordered it. Unfortunately we were unable to finish it due to bacon being full from his stupid stale sandwiches and elvin’s aunt seemingly on a diet…this was definately the place to check the diets in at the door!

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Stomachs full, it was time for our next course. We ordered the Large platter (feeds 3-5 apparently), consisting of your choice of two meats. We chose Hot Pastrami and NY’s best Corned beef. I wished we could’ve tried them all instead – but it would mean killing a whole adult cow.

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It was truly heavenley – tender fresh beef ( I couldn’t decide which one I love best – the hot pastrami & corned beef were both soooo good) eaten with pickles , some truly delicious coleslaw, spicy mustard and slices of bread.

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Me & Elvin posing with the platter of beef – ignore my shiny face – my skin always misbehave after a long flight

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Bacon & Elvin’s aunt did not eat much at all, leaving me & elv to munch our way through 1/2 a cow. We ate until we could not bear to move an inch anymore, and decided to just take the rest to go. There was still a good 1/2 portion left on the platter by the time the four of us were done with it – that was how much meat there were. Me & bacon had pastrami sandwices for breakfast for the next week….*burp*

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You’d think by now we would’ve been too full to even CONTEMPLATE dessert. Well, we very nearly. Elvin had his heart set on the World’s Largest slice of Chocolate Cake – but at this point we were so close to breaking point….However, we seemed to have projected our thoughts to our nice next table neighbours – they offered us their cake!! I had taken a picture of their cake (I asked nicely) when it arrived earlier, predicting that we would not be able to order it after wolfing down the cow and giant matzoh ball. Ahhh….the kindness of strangers warms my cockles. They even suggested that we wrap our leftover meat with breads and pickles from the pickle bar, perfect for tomorrow’s lunch. How sweet are they?

The cake in it’s full size – just compare it with the coffee cup behind it.

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And this people, is 1/2 of the slice of chocolate fudge cake that was donated to us. It took me & bacon another good couple of days having bits of cake for breakfast for us to finish this 1/2 of cake. Note that by the end of the night, this cake had been eaten by 8 people – and yet it took us another few days (more like 4) to finish it.

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On the way out, some giant cookies…

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Just compare my face with the rows of giant cakes in the chiller…

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The kitchen. Notice how unassuming the whole place is.

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Harold’s is an amazing place – reasonably priced ginorous portions of tasty deli food. It is not really near NYC at all, but well worth a side trip if you are driving through New Jersey. Obviously, go EXTREMELY hungry, and go with people….very hungry people. And be prepared to doggie-bag the rest home, the woman from the next table was right, nothing better than bread soaked with the juices of the leftover meats for tomorrow’s lunch. Mm mm good…

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Appetite for more? Well, click on the Man Vs. Food Youtube below!!

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Harold’s Famous NY Deli

3050 Woodbridge Avenue
Edison, NJ 08837-3460, United States
(732) 661-9100

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