Deli-cooking and newspaper-reporting share two things right out of the gate. The first is the conceit that what is produced can have artistic value. The second is that whatever is produced must be handed over before a set amount of sand runs out of the hourglass, or it’s no good to anyone.
Many sandwiches, like many articles, are not art, being badly constructed with strange proportions, questionable ingredients or noticeably overcooked.
But at its best, for a reporter, the result is literature on a deadline. For the deli-cook, it’s a kind of golden ratio of fire and knives which can be expressed mathematically as 1:1 — the one perfect sandwich to satisfy the hunger of one customer.
But writing can live any which way — cold, hot, frozen, left out on the dashboard, doesn’t matter. Not so a sandwich, where presentation plays a part by whetting the appetite of the eye.
Critics are inevitable.
Online drama
What happened was Noli, “32 Lunch the Legend”, breakfast cook at Joe’s Deli in Kingston, posted a photograph of a bacon, egg and cheese on a roll on the Ulster Eateries Unfiltered Facebook page, a local coalition of feinschmeckers boasting over 22,000 followers, billing itself as providing “Real honest food reviews from foodies who don’t feel the need to sugar coat over-hyped cuisine.”
Very brave. Retribution was swift.
Mark Grant — “Needs more bacon.”
Kelsey Kerr — “Agreed. There’s more bread than anything else.”
Noli, distressed, defended his sandwich staunchly, often in all caps.
Noli — “We use MARIAH BEST BACON thick cut IN AMERICA , LAND O’LAKES CHEESE, #DEISING hard rolls!! I dare you to compare…”
Noli also pointed out that the photo he used was old, noted he was too busy to take photos at work, noted his age (61) and noted he was not a photography expert. He complained he was being bashed for no reason.
To which Kerr responded — “32 Lunch The Legend that’s cool, and I hope your business continues to flourish. But I don’t feel that I’m missing out on that sandwich.”
“What happened was,” Noli says, “I posted my bacon, egg, and cheese picture on that Eateries page and they started slamming me. Not enough bacon. Not enough egg. You didn’t toast the roll. So, I’m like, yo, you’re going by a picture!”
Noli always lived in Kingston, but somehow he’s got the deli-counter manner of a bodega cook in the Bronx. It lies in the unselfconscious conversational style—riffing banter, rapid-fire observations, and the occasional joke which loses control and goes over the high-side.
In the artificially sanitized environments where corporate climate control reigns, Noli would not do well. He is most at home in the free marketplace of ideas.
But to anyone who has spent any time camping out in the brutally eviscerating, take-no-prisoners hellscape of modern social media, (where only the insensitive survive) Noli’s reaction to his breakfast sandwich critics will sound familiar.
“Eight, nine hours on Facebook, getting blocked, blocking and then I was like, I don’t even know these motherfuckers. You’re like, hold up, they used to nail me at the diner, but at least it was one-on-one. Now, they’re nailing me from across the pond. Australians, Greeks, hating on me.
They’re all looking for attention. And I was like, ‘I got to stop.’”
Noli announced a Stuffed French Toast Extravaganza, to challenge his detractors to get out from behind their laptops and cell-phones and to meet him in the field of battle, to come to the Deli and criticize his breakfast skills if they dared. The French Toast was stuffed with bacon, egg and cheese.
“I am the Breakfast King,” Noli admits humbly. “Like, you ain’t slamming me, bro. I’ve been doing this for 41 years, man. I got a reputation.”
Noli used to have his own place off the interstate in 32 in Rosendale called 32 Lunch, where Truss & Trestle is now.
“I started it as a luncheonette, and then I became more of a breakfast place. The customers were coming in. They want the bacon, egg, and cheese. They start loving it. I go, great, because lunch is a pain in the ass.”
The kitchen Noli uses at Joe’s Deli is a minimalist set-up. A two-foot grill with two burners on the side and a deep fryer. A deli-meat slicer feeds the sandwiches, and coolers store the supplies
Rokosz Most: What’s the microwave do?
Noli: That’s just there for show. I’m not trying to microwave.
Face the Wrath
Even though Joe’s Deli is firmly in the Uptown Section of Kingston — on the corner of Wall Street and Linderman — socially, the block or two around Joe’s has a Midtown feel. On the day of the extravaganza, people call to each other on the street, regulars hang around at the deli where limited seating is provided — benches and a Formica table — and the PA speaker propped up out on the sidewalk lends the street the feel of a noon-time block-party.
Inside, wearing a mustache and mirrored aviators, Tim Kelly, aka DJTK, selects the music with Serato mixing decks and a laptop set above the deli display case.
Katrina Houser, co-host of Rise Up Radio on Radio Kingston is here as well, smiling and playing at hype-woman for the event. Speaking into the permanent record, she raises her voice over the techno to make herself clear: “All we’re doing is promoting Joe and Noli, we’re gonna have fun on Saturdays, they gonna do hot dogs and all that! Just bringing love to the community at reasonable prices!”
Noli has tied a blue bandanna around his head for the occasion — part Springsteen, part nunchaku warrior and breakdancer — and he’s a dervish in his station, hustling to keep up with the orders.
Business is steady, and Saul Renning, just in for a Rueben sandwich, says, “This is the kind of [thing] that I like down in New York City… because space is limited, people just try to shove everything into one place. You get some really weird dynamics going on. Like I’m going to get a haircut in an art gallery and then a seamster will sew up a rip in a jacket I brought in, or I’m learning to crochet with a group that meets in a ping pong hall and is serving empanadas, all at the same time.”
A lady walking by the deli pops in to complain about the volume of the music on the street. She’s got a drink in a plastic see-through cup in her hand. She says she can hear the music a block over.
“I don’t think she was just drinking lemonade,” says Noli after she leaves. “I mean, that’s fine. I don’t care. But it’s the middle of the day. Call the cops. Maybe they want some sandwiches.”
Members of the Kingston Police Department often frequent Joe’s Deli. As do members of the Fire Department and the Department of Public Works.
The French Toast Extravaganza went as well as Noli hoped it would, with pockets of being slammed interspersed with hanging around with people from the neighborhood. He plans to follow it up on Saturday July 26 with Texas Hot Dog Mania.
“I’m going to make it every other week because I don’t want to overkill it. We’re going to showcase it because I’m tired of people bragging about their stuff and they don’t realize we have the best stuff here because we care — I don’t let nothing go out that I wouldn’t eat myself. If I don’t feel right about that plate, you ain’t getting it. I’m not going to give it to you, bro.”
While delis are traditionally an aggressively meat-forward business, Noli does have plans to satisfy vegetarians.
“I’m going to do a homemade spanakopita one day. I’m going to showcase the gyro and my sister’s actually going to make the tzatziki sauce. She makes the best, like out of this world!”
Origin story
“Most people think I’m Italian,” Noli says, “because I don’t have that dark and poetic Greek look.”
Noli and his parents came over on a boat from Greece in 1969, Noli says. “I turned five on the way over here on the boat in the Atlantic. We ran into a hurricane or something. We got stuck in Newfoundland for 36 hours. Thought we were going to sink. My father was on his knees crying, why did I do this to my family?”
Noli’s father was a chef of longstanding at the old Gateway Diner. Cooking is in the blood.
“We came off the boat straight to Kingston,” Noli says. “56 years ago… And [Joe’s Deli] was the first store I came to by myself — my mom said I need like flour or sugar or whatever. I was like eight years old. So it’s very strange working here.”
“And this countertop is exactly what I had at 32 Lunch,” Noli says, tapping the Formica. “That’s my old spot. It was a luncheonette and then I became more of a breakfast place. The people created that, the customers who were coming in. They wanted the bacon, egg, and cheese. They start loving it. I go, great, because lunch is a pain in the ass. You’re all over the place with lunch. Different cheeses, melt this, do that, deep fry this, Swiss cheese that. I had one guy tell me at the diner, he goes, oh, these are the best French fries. I go, yeah, you can thank Cisco for them, you know? Like, what are you saying?”
Somewhere in there Noli says received his honorifics — The Legend. The Breakfast King.
Noli closed his business in Rosendale after 36 years for many reasons, but primarily relating to a relationship gone sour with the owner of the building. He was not interested in putting the details in print.
“[The building owner] has two daughters that are lawyers,” Noli says.
After a brief foray opening up the ill-fated Fat Cat Deli on Broadway — “she got rid of me after two weeks. She said, ‘This is not 32 Lunch,’ and I said, ‘It never will be!’” — Noli worked a shift with Joe and he’s called the deli home, seven days a week, ever since.
After the breakfast and lunch hours are past, Joe, also at the deli seven days a week, is both cook and cashier when he doesn’t have someone working the register. In between taking orders and getting the sandwiches to the finish line he rings up items the customers forage from the shelves.
But Joe doesn’t mind. He likes to cook. And he bakes a number of deserts. Tres leche. Banana crème. A frosted carrot cake gets special mention here — he uses coconut to sweeten it up instead of raisins.
With some deli workers, having a conversation in another language with someone unseen even while you’re handing money across the counter, it’s as if you aren’t there
Others are silent while they work, sphinxlike or possibly in a happier place in their memories while transacting business.
The ones who get the praise, and Joe is one of these, are welcoming, looking for distraction and conversation, eager to compare notes of what the world might be doing outside. It’s a public-facing business and like Noli says, the deli is like Cheers without the beers — everybody knows your name.
“Philotimo,” says Noli. “It’s very hard to explain, but it’s basically like everybody who comes in, you accept them as your own and you’ll treat them like they’re your family, and you love people, and you just want everybody to be happy.”
All modesty, while Joe declined interview for this article, both Joe and Noli are excited about a new hire, a relative youngblood in the kitchen, Texas-born Julio, who, working two jobs, has the right work ethic.
“He’s awesome,” Noli says. The guy hustles. I already told him, my sister bought me these knives with my name engraved in them. He’s getting them when I die. That’s how much I love this guy.”
Just around the corner
After weathering the criticism of social media, Noli now considers the possibilities of internet celebrity.
“These young girls, they came in and they said, you got a great personality. I think you can make it big on TikTok. I said, why shouldn’t I? What’s the big deal? I see all these idiots on there. I got game. I can maneuver. Skill and experience, brother. But let’s not brag too much.”
There was a moment during the French Toast Extravaganza that Noli felt compelled to breakdance. Lacking cardboard, he spun on his back on the naked tile floor.
“When I have music, bro, I just get wild,” Noli admits. “I started break dancing and it was good, but then they were filming and of course I messed up. I just did a little spin at the end. The second spin wasn’t as good as the first. But when you watch that video, I can’t believe how that’s how I look and act,” Noli marvels. “One girl called me an octopus. Even my friend last night, Cisco Johnny Mac, he goes, ‘I think you could be a TikTok sensation.’”
He joined TikTok. He joined Instagram. He joined Lemon8.
“I don’t even know what I’m doing. My wife’s like, what are you looking at? I go, I don’t know. I’m just trying to follow people so they follow me so I can get this TikTok shit going.”
Someone told Noli about his daughter who had racked up six million views, posting her own dog on TikTok.
“So I’m gonna call her up and say, Yo, I need your help. I need to get six million views! I need to get paid so I can take all my people to Greece!”
Internet fame is surely just around the corner.
Join the family! 
