The last five years have happily marked the rise of new-wave Jewish delis across the country.

Russ & Daughters, the 100-year-old New York staple, expanded to include two new cafes. Mamaleh’s in Cambridge Massachusetts was nominated for Bon Appetit’s Best New Restaurant of 2017. Atlanta’s deli-meets-brasserie, General Muir, has been nominated for three James Beard Awards in just five years of business. It’s hard to look around any given city these days and not see an ode to the old-world deli. Even the gentiles are starting to kvetch about their brisket not being lean enough.

The recent announcements of two new Jewish-inspired delis opening in Seattle in 2018 is bringing attention to our city’s lack of historical deli representation. Dingfelder’s Delicatessen will open this summer at 1318 E Pine St., a vacant brick building directly across from Artusi in Capitol Hill. The brainchild of Vance Dingfelder and Stephanie Hemsworth, the husband-and-wife team behind Nourish Catering, Dingfelder’s promises authentic old-world eats. Schmaltzy’s, the latest project from the people behind Napkin Friends, is slated to open at the end of 2018 in the Ballard area.

Throughout the years, Seattle has always had one or two gems of Ashkenazi-influenced Jewish food. Mention the city’s lack of a good Jewish deli to any born-and-raised Seattleite and they’ll quickly give you the Brenner Brothers Bakery rebuttal. This family name was at the heart of Delicatessens in Seattle and the Eastside for more than 90 years. The last incarnation, Brenner Brothers Bakery in Bellevue, closed its doors in the late 1990s. Leah’s, a well-loved Kosher bakery in Ravenna, made the heartbreaking decision to focus on catering and shut its cafe doors in the late aughts. More recently, Stopsky’s on Mercer Island provided a breath of fresh air and house-made everything on the menu. But even on an island with a population that is 25 percent Jewish, the deli had trouble breaking even and it shuttered in 2014 (even though you can still get their addictive pickles).

It’s easy to blame it on the numbers. New York is home to more than two million Jewish people, the second most populated Jewish community in the world. Los Angeles has more than 600,000 Jewish people and Boston has 260,000 and counting. Seattle’s Jewish population, while growing rapidly, clocks in at just over 60,000. Such disparity hints to why Seattle’s top notch Jewish delis have found it hard to survive.

Maybe the secret to deli success is actually taking a step back from the lookalike Jewish cuisine that’s become synonymous with the East Coast. Can Seattle restaurants ditch the mile-high pastrami sandwiches and opt for a less obvious approach? The delis and Jewish restaurants that have thrived in Seattle find much of their success off the beaten path. Bellevue’s Gilbert’s on Main serves up lox, matzo ball soup, and house-made bagels on the same menu as more traditional items, proving part Jewish deli and part typical brunch spot. Roxy’s has been a Fremont staple for East Coast-inspired Jewish food for many years, but that doesn’t stop them from serving generous slabs of griddled ham with a plate of eggs benedict. One of the city’s most popular food trucks, Napkin Friends, has made a name for itself by serving up latke sandwiches—the most inherently Jewish dish you’d never find at Shabbat dinner.

“People are nostalgic for these old flavors, but in an approachable, modern way,” said Jonny Silverberg, owner and chef of Napkin Friends. “People will ask me: ‘Is your matzo ball soup as good as your grandmother’s?’ Well, no… it’s your grandmother. It’s not about how good the soup was, it’s about everything else that goes along with it. It’s not the actual flavor, it’s the memories that make the soup so good.”

With that in mind, Silverberg and team move toward opening their first brick and mortar, Schmaltzy’s. The plan is keep classic deli favorites as the inspiration, not the mandate. The Jewish faith, and the cuisine at its center, has always been about building community. With Jewish people making up just over one percent of the greater Seattle population, a business must continue to build new community to stay alive.

Silverberg hopes to do this with the latke sandwiches we’ve come to love, a deli full of house-smoked, house-cured meats, and even plenty of pork on the menu.

“It seems like 2018 is going to be a big year in Jewish cuisine,” he said.