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Ronnie’s…What A Place!

By DAVID THEUS

I’ve been wracking my brain all week trying to think of a place to write about when it came to me... Right after I bit into a lovely ice cold pickle right from the jar.

Some of you know this about me, if not, now you do. I was born and raised just down state a little bit in a little town called Orlando. Now I jokingly tell my friends I was born BD - that’s Before Disney, but it’s true, for those of you that never made it there before Disney, it was a small town.

For such a small town, Orlando sure had a way of making it’s citizens feel all grown up and citified. There was a place on East Colonial Drive (Hwy. 50) some people knew it as, in the old Colonial Mall shopping center just across from the old Belk’s, right on the front of the strip called Ronnie’s - Coffee Shop - Restaurant, and Bake Shop. We locals all called it just Ronnie’s, or Ronnie’s Delicatessen.

As I savored that pickle, I started to remember the bucket of salt brine kosher pickles and sauerkraut, and coleslaw, that were always on the table for you to serve yourself from during lunch and dinner hours. From the time I was a child till until I was turning 30,, Ronnie’s was always the place for special occasions. My fondest childhood memories were going to Ronnie’s after church on Wednesday nights, waiting to be seated by the coolest guys dressed up in suits, waiving these massive menus high in the air announcing how many in your party to the other host eagerly awaiting to seat you in a booth specially prepared for you and your family.

The service was incredible. As soon as you were seated, little men scurried quickly to your table with water glasses and ice cold pitchers of water to serve and greet you before your waitress would arrive. Suddenly, there she was, this fragile older lady in all black came to your table with this massive tray bringing you all of the table treats, the bucket of pickles, the coleslaw, sometime sauerkraut, or cucumber salad.

If it was dinner, you could always count on a bowl of soup, chicken soup and matzo ball soup to die for. Of course as soon as you placed your order, she was back at your table with the basket of assorted rolls and real pats of butter served from ice onto your bread plate. The rolls... oh the rolls. There were pumpernickel with little pieces of onion baked right inside. They had salt rolls, hard rolls, soft rolls, my other favorite was this bread stick-looking thing that was covered in kosher salt and rye seeds all over the exterior. One bite with the inside exposed, then the real butter. You are starting to get the idea.

When I was a little kid I can remember my parents being served fresh brewed coffee and being served whole cream in the little porcelain creamers with their coffee. Man were those good. WhenMom or Dad weren’t looking, down the hatch the cream would go. I could go on and on.

I can remember as I got older skipping school and meeting my friends at Ronnie’s for breakfast served with these little assorted square pastry and getting an assorted box to go just to bribe your teacher with when coming back on campus. They wrapped them up and served them in these special boxes and tied it with this green ribbon and zipped the ribbon just like it was Christmas, no detail was missed.

The building itself was like you were in Paris or New York for sure. The architecture and the lay out was such high design, like nothing else ever seen in a town like Orlando.. It wasn’t like all the other restaurants of its day, this was designed well before conception, every detail from the cool swinging front doors to the marble counter and separate bakery area, to the main dining hall with this huge mural on the one wall that concealed the kitchen.

The lighting was incredible, it was the kind of place when you drove by, you found yourself trying to peer in the window to see if you could see anyone you knew was there. The same went for those that were patrons too. It was nothing to be seated and having dinner only to be interrupted by a host of friends that were driving by and saw you through the window.

I’m sitting here now and I can here the sounds and smell the aromas as I am writing. I can see someone’s "Magombo Extravaganza" being served for their birthday party and all the kids trying to finish this massive ice cream dessert in one sitting. I can see my Mom sipping her hot coffee and my Dad digging for the best pickle from the bucket.

I’m not so sure that some of my fondest memories are built around food experiences are a good thing, but they were times when our whole family were together. From my sister to my brothers and then me. It didn’t matter how old we all were, but all of us were there and we were still together. Those were good times.