That’s almost the text on the banner I put up in front of the deli today – the first day of the new menu. It actually says “Same lousy service”. At the end of the day, I don’t think I could be too much more thrilled with the menu. A few hiccups to be sure but overall a great success.
Joel Solish (@foodie411) and Andrea Toole (@andreat76) came in to taste the meatloaf sandwich, the mac and cheese and the fried chicken. Joel loved the chicken and he knows and loves good fried chicken, they both thought the Mac and Cheese could be stronger tasting. Given that these two have pretty sophisticated tastes I think the Mac and Cheese may be over powering for the average person if it was any stronger. We use Gruyere, medium White Cheddar and Parmesan on top.
Of course the banner is a tongue in cheek thing. I let the staff know ahead of time that it was meant in fun. I’ve been guilty of laughing at my own jokes my whole life even though its totally uncool. I still laugh every time I think of it because you know what? I’m not very cool. I can’t even fucking figure out how to upload photos on this blog.
This menu was almost six months in the making. I owe a serious debt of gratitude to Chef Dan DeMatteis for helping me put it together, Kitchen Manager Dan Rios for helping to execute it and Vivian Hui for the physical design. Of course, there are a host of others who contributed in lots of ways and its probably unfair to single out just three. But that’s the way it is with this entire endeavor. No, not unfair, this is a team effort.
Its taken over a year but I’m really happy with our team. I think a big part had to do with my own inability to understand the business and the kinds of people needed to fill the various roles. For all of my experience and education, it simply took time for me to grow into my own role. Of course, I don’t expect to ever stop growing and learning and I expect the same of my team and my business. It feels wonderful to see how we pull together to get the job of serving people great deli done.
