The owner of the most famous kosher restaurant in the country and friend to stars across the world, Sidney Bloom, died recently.
His salt beef sandwiches, chopped liver and cholent have been enjoyed by the Jewish community and celebrities alike since he established M Bloom (Kosher) and Son in Whitechapel in 1953.
Mr Bloom, one of two children, learnt the trade from his father, Morris, an expert meat pickler, who owned a restaurant on Brick Lane. He opened his first restaurant in 1952, a year after his father died, and in 1956 he opened a branch in Golders Green Road. He died last month aged 82.
By 1996, the Jewish community in the East End had died out and Mr Bloom regretfully shut his Whitechapel establishment and stepped down from the business around the same time.
He continued to visit the Golders Green branch where trade was booming. Israeli prime ministers, politicians and American celebrities flocked to the restaurant.
A quiet, shy man, Mr Bloom left it to his wife Evelyn Razan (who died in 1990) to look after the customers while he kept an eye on the kitchen.
He lived off Regents Park Road, Finchley, for 60 years. He had a son and a daughter, and many friends in the borough. He was a charitable man, giving money to schools, yeshivas [rabbinical schools] and he gave away food parcels to the poor at the end of Friday's service.
A friend of fellow Eastender Charlie Chaplin, Mr Bloom on one occasion offered the silent movie star the opportunity to jump the queue for a table, but he declined.
When Frank Sinatra ordered a salt beef sandwich to be delivered to the Savoy, the silver tray on which it was delivered never returned.
Allegedly when Cliff Richard visited the Whitechapel establishment, the crowd outside was so raucous, the front window was smashed.
"He loved both the business and the family. He was born into it, it was part of life, it was an institution," said grandson Jonathan Tapper, who now runs the Golders Green business. I have got a lot to live up to. I'll never match it."
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