"A Bowl & A Roll": A Cafiero's Memory

I have a feeling that, as long as keep this blog going (and maybe long after I'm gone), memories from people who experienced Cafiero's Restaurant will continue to flow in.

Over the years, I've written about the long gone South Brooklyn Italian joint more than any other subject. My posts have travelled far, and I've made connections not only to past patrons of the President Street eatery, but several actual descendants of owner Sharkey Cafiero and his relations.

Here's the latest memory, from one Howard Linker. It's a particularly lengthy and poignant reminiscence:

My best friend’s father was in the wholesale and retail poultry business and supplied Sharkey with his products. That couldn’t have been their only connection because of the way they were treated during their regular visits to Cafiero’s. My visits to Cafiero’s were during the late 50’s and early 60’s and always with my friend and his family, even when I had a son of my own (He was about two years old during his first and only visit to Sharkey’s). We always sat in the little Dining Room in the back. You had to pass through the kitchen to get there, so you got a good look at the four sauces on the cook-top and a huge dose of the delicious aromas. I do believe the menu was written on one white sheet of paper, however, other than the rolled stuffed steak, I never saw any of the items mentioned in your blog. I remember Veal & Peas, Veal and Mushrooms, Bragiole (not the rolled steak, but a large stuffed meat ball). Our favorite was pasta and meat sauce. We weren’t that interested in the pasta, it was the sauce we adored. What we really wanted was to finish the pasta and sop up the sauce with the best Italian bread I ever tasted (a Bowl & a Roll). No long thin sub shaped rolls, these were large bagel shaped breads about one foot in diameter and sectioned for easier tearing into fairly uniform chunks.

Desert was around the corner at a waterfront bakery I can’t remember the name of. Inside were immaculate polished wood cabinets with framed glass “windows” that revealed marvelous old world pastry treasures.

We were teenagers with gargantuan appetites and it was heaven!

The Inside of Cafiero's

For almost as many years as I've been writing this blog (seven and counting), I've been obsessively tracking the history of Cafiero's, a locally legendary Italian restaurant on President Street between Hicks and Columbia Streets. Once the haunt of judges, lawyers, mobsters and celebrities (including, Arthur Miller, Joe DiMaggio and Marilyn Monroe), it shut down in the 1970s when the owner, Sharkey Cafiero, decided it was time to retire. Sharkey remained in the house and would sometimes teasingly sit outside the restaurant, but steadfastly refused to sell the business or let anyone else take it over. (He had no children.) The building is still standing today, owned by artists who ripped out every trace of the restaurant save the bathroom.

Over the years, I've accrued quite a bit of information about Cafiero's. Some it is was gathered from locals who had memories to share; some from readers who had been to the place, or whose parents had. But the best information came from actual descendants of the Cafiero clan (various siblings and in-laws worked in the restaurant), who related memories or the clientele, the menu, the staff, and sometimes sent along photos. All of these photos were either of Sharkey and his wife, or of the exterior of the restaurant. But the Holy Grail for me (aside from a menu card, which I'm pretty sure doesn't exist; it wasn't a menu kind of place) was a picture of the interior. I figured I'd never find one, because it was a private joint; mobsters don't like to get their picture taken.

But finally, after six years of searching, I have one. It was sent to me by the grand-niece of Josephine Cafiero, who was married to Frank Cafiero, the restaurant's chef and Sharkey's brother. (The above exterior shot, from 1949, is also from her.) Here it is:

A thing of beauty and simplicity, is it not? Plenty of light, a great tile floor, soda parlor wire chairs. The white tablecloths were a surprise to me, since I've always heard the Cafiero's dining room was a no-frills affair.

Here's how a reader who had dined there described the interior to me years ago.

Sharkey would always greet the neighborwomen by saying hello Sophie dear, or hello Connie dear. He lived above the restaurant and his sister and her husband lived on the top floor. They only served lunch and one 6 PM sitting for dinner. There were 6 tables in the front, and you could walk back through the kitchen to the back room to find another 8 tables. 

That's about right, though I only see six tables in this picture, which is definitely of the back room. Love the mirror, the small radio, the large paned windows. And I'm pretty sure that's a pressed tin wall at the back.

Now, to find that menu card.

Arthur Miller Ate at Cafiero's, and Other Facts

One day I will write a book about Cafiero's, the Red Hook Italian restaurant that was a legend in its day, but is all but forgotten today. I have been slowly piecing together the history of this mysterious President Street eatery, which was a favorite of mobsters and judges, and today lives on only in the memories of the people who ate there before owner Sharkey Cafiero closed the place in the 1970s, refusing to sell the place to anyone else.

Over the years, I have heard from a few folks who told me they were relations of Shakey and Kate Cafiero, or regulars of the restaurant. To recap the history, Sharkey, who was born in Naples, owned the place. Wife Kate and Sharkey's sister Mamie (Marie) were waitresses. Sharkey's brother Frank was the cook, and apparently quite adept at flinging balls of dough at local kids with great accuracy. Everybody lived above the restaurant. The bill of fare would be based on what Frank could find at the markets that day. There were a few tables up front, but the real dining room for the locals was in back, back the open kitchen. The waiters were named John and Red.

So, recently I heard from Linda, who told me she is the granddaughter of Mamie. She wrote in to clarify a few points of Cafiero's history and also add some additional information. Sharkey's real name was Gaetano. He changed it to Anthony in the 1940s, though everyone called him Sharkey anyway. Linda believes there was indeed a menu, but it may have been added in the 1960s or 1970s. Sharkey closed the restaurant in 1975.



Of the food, she remembers the potato croquettes the best and said "I have yet to eat one as good, although I've had a few in Barcelona that came close. And there was something called a beef brasholatine [she's not sure on the spelling] they were famous for that my grandfather once showed me how to prepare. It really is a shame that we have none of the other recipes but I can give away one secret: they used lard to fry foods, not vegetable oil. Lard makes for a very tasty veal cutlet Milanese. I have such fond memories of Monday nights at Cafiero's. This was when they closed the restaurant. And my parents and cousins came for dinner in the restaurant."

The most important piece of information Linda sent along, however, concerns Cafiero's most famous visitors. Once of the earliest stories I ever heard about the place was that Marilyn Monroe and Joe DiMaggio has once eaten there. "It was Arthur Miller who accompanied Marilyn Monroe to Cafiero's," wrote Linda. This actually makes sense, because Arthur Miller spent a lot of time in Red Hook as a young man, and based his play "A View From the Bridge" on the dock workers in the area. He would certainly have know about Cafiero's.

"My Uncle Sharkey didn't know who she was—hard to believe that was possible—and called her 'girlie' as in, 'Please have a seat here, Girlie.' My family has been telling this ridiculously funny story for years."