Our definitive history of Schwartz's Deli in Montreal

Walk past the corner of Saint-Laurent and Napoleon on any given day and you'll see the same scene that's played out for decades: a line snaking up the block made up of tourists and locals who're too hungry to wait until off-peak hours. Everyone's waiting for the same thing: The meat, rye, mustard of a smoked meat sandwich from Schwartz's.

First Schwartz's perfected Montreal smoked meat. Then it refused to mess with the formula for 97 years and counting.

A mythology thicker than brisket

Some say Reuben Schwartz brought smoked meat to Montreal. Others credit Benjamin Kravitz, founder of the long-departed Ben's Deli, with introducing the city to the sandwich. Both stories are wrong.

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