Birmingham's Browdy's Delicatessen Closes After 96Years in Business--End of an Institution

 
It is my sad duty to inform the Roadfood community that Browdy's Delicatessen in Birmingham, AL (Mt. Brook Village) closed its doors on Wednesday, August 19, ending a 96 year run as the City's best deli.
 
Owners Stan Browdy and sister Marilyn Brody Leonard--the third generation of the family to run the business--made the decision on Monday and closed the doors on Wednesday. They cited the current economc downturn as a good time to call it quits.  Their respective children had no interest in running the venerable institution, so that's the end of it.
 
It's hard to believe I'll never have one of their deviled eggs or, especially, their Browdy's Delight--their rare roast beef served on a huge Kaiser roll, topped with cole slaw and Russian dressing.
 
 
The story from the Birmingham newspaper:
 
http://www.al.com/business/birminghamnews/news.ssf?/base/business/125075613228450.xml&coll=2
 
Thanks for all the memories, Browdy's.  The place will be missed.
 

Sad to hear about this. I only made it over that way a couple of times when I lived in Alabama, but it seemed like one of those "immortal" places that people wouldn't let die. Unfortunately, I was wrong.

That sucks!  I never got to go, but my other half is from Birmingham and he still talks about it 15 years after leaving.  It was one of the places he was going to take me when I go to meet his family this spring.  I think I'll neglect to mention they closed on his birthday when I tell him.

felix4067


That sucks!  I never got to go, but my other half is from Birmingham and he still talks about it 15 years after leaving.  It was one of the places he was going to take me when I go to meet his family this spring.  I think I'll neglect to mention they closed on his birthday when I tell him.

It does suck!
 
My slight reminiscences below that I posted to the al.com website (Bham News).
 
I guess you could take your hubby to Jim Davenport's Pizza Palace, around the corner from Browdy's there in Mt. Brook Village.  It hasn't been there for 96 years like Browdy's, but it's been in business in that same spot since 1964 (and I went there as a kid the week it opened way back then). I realize that is a small consolation, but Davenport's now becomes Mt Brook Village's oldest surviving restaurant.
 
Long may it thrive!
 
My reminiscence:
 
"Posted by PubliusIX on 08/20/09 at 12:23AM
As distinctive as Browdy's remained within Birmingham, it never recaptured the atmosphere of its original location in Mountain Brook Village, right in the intersection. The narrow aisles and cramped tables added more in New York atmosphere than they detracted in inconvenience."
 
I have to agree with Pubilus's comments above-- up to a point.
I too remember the original Mt. Brook Village location with the grocery store in the front---you wouldn't even know there was a full-service restaurant in the back if you didn't browse back in the back. That was certainly Browdy's at its best--I can still see Mr. Browdy--the father of this day's owners working the cash register even while he was wheel-chair bound at the end of his most productive life. Those were great times, great memories.
The new, last, location could not replicate that original Village location, but it did keep on serving great deli food, even if the ambiance was not the same.
I was a regular Browdy's customer from at least the mid-'70s and would always make it a must stop after I moved away in 1977--I don't think I missed a lunch there when visiting family thereafter, up until about last year when I made my last pilgrimage there. In a way, I'm glad that I didn't know that would be my last visit. Would I have been able to bear the thought that this was my last Browdy's Delight? Or my last deviled egg there? It's hard to accept now; better I enjoyed that lunch in blissful ignorance.
Thank you all three generations of the Browdy famly for all the great memories.
 
Tom Frieling
Athens, GA
tfrielin@uga.edu