Frankel's Delicatessen
The Frankel brothers cook their own grandmother's brisket recipe and pile it on challah. Fifteen seats, one line, and McCarren Park fifty steps away when the seats are gone.
Why go
Two brothers from New York run it, one of them in the band Holy Ghost!. The shop sits on the Greenpoint side of the Williamsburg border. It does two things most New York counters keep apart. The deli side is brisket and pastrami. The appetizing side is lox and cured salmon.
Katherine Lewin, in The Infatuation, rated it 8.0. She opened on the comparison that decides your Saturday: "Frankel's is not another Russ & Daughters. And it's not even close to Sadelle's. But it's just as worthy of your Saturday morning." She means format. Those rooms are a production with a long wait. Here the line moves. You order at the counter, hear your name and find a seat.
The house build worth learning is Combo #1. Pastrami-cured salmon, dill cucumber and scallion cream cheese on a Baz bagel. That is the crossover: a deli cure on a fish an appetizing store would sell you.
They bake their own babka and black and white cookies, and the coffee is pour-it-yourself and strong.
Order this / avoid
- Order: Combo #1 and a pastrami, egg and cheese. Add the latkes, which come with sour cream and apple sauce and are not optional.
- Order: Anita's hot brisket on challah when you want the family dish and not the fish.
- Avoid: planning to sit. Take the bag to the park.
What locals & experts say
- Katherine Lewin, The Infatuation, 14 January 2022, at 8.0:
From the lox, to the latkes, to the brisket, to the pastrami, egg & cheese, we haven't eaten anything here that didn't impress.
1
Good to know
- Getting in: no bookings, one counter, and the line moves.
- Jeff put this on the list himself, 3 September 2026.
Jeff's take (his words)
Not on Jeff's saved list. He named the place on 3 September 2026, in the paragraph he wrote on what New York is to him, and asked for it.
Verdict
should-visit — Keep the Recession Special in your back pocket. Two hot dogs and a soda ran seven dollars when Lewin wrote it up, and her own line is that you will not cross Greenpoint for a hot dog unless you live nearby. Her parting shot is the other thing to carry: on the way out you pass the crowd across the street waiting out a two-hour quote at Five Leaves, and she thinks they will realize what they are missing.