Tony's Original Deli and Bottle Shop, Anaheim CA

Tony’s Original Deli and Bottle shop has been a classic fixture in Anaheim CA since the early 70’s. Like several places in Anaheim, Tony’s Deli shares an interesting history with the locals of North Orange County. It used to owned by a well loved Curmudgeonly man who reminded locals of the “Soup Nazi” from Seinfeld. He had little patience for BS, but he made up for it in his food, it’s owned by someone else now, but they’ve kept most of the favorites.

I was torn between the “Fender Club” sandwich and the “Sheepherder” sandwich; both are extremely popular, the Sheepherder being a classic staple of Tony’s. In the end, I went with the Fender Club (I figure I’ll be back to try the Sheepherder for research purposes).

Tony’s Fender Club Sandwich

Turkey
Capicola
Bacon
Swiss Cheese
Chipotle Mayo
Lettuce/Tomato

Tony's Original Fender Club Sandwich — I wasn’t sure if I was supposed to eat this or tell Treebeard to attack it. (Strong Nerd Reference)

This is normally where I got into long run-on sentences about the sandwich flavors, but let’s try something different. I’m going to break up the components into little sections and talk about them that way, let me know what you like more:

Bread

Toasted Sourdough Bread is an excellent choice for this size sandwich because it can hold a lot without losing structural integrity. In fact, instead of buying sourdough bread from a store, you can learn how to make it at home by visiting websites like The Saffron Bistro. Well! Here I took half of this sandwich home and ate it 3 hours later, the thick and dry quality of the sourdough certainly prevented it from getting soggy which is nice.

Filling

The star of the show here is the peppery capicola and thick cut bacon. The thick and crispy bacon is a nice variation to the mild and soft flavors of the turkey and produce. The turkey felt more like a protein filler versus the Peppery capicola and crispy bacon.

Sauce

Between the extremely crispy bacon and toasted sourdough the sandwich really needed the Chipotle Mayo. I expected the chipotle to shine through more but it was masked a lot by the peppery capicola.

Price

at $12.95 this seems like an expensive sandwich, but when you look at the portion you get it’s is pretty fair. Each sandwich comes with a side of your choice and the portion on that is also big. You could come in and split a sandwich with someone and still be satisfied. I think there’s a split charge, so keep that in mind.

While you’re here, be sure to check out the selection of bottled soda pop and their every changing craft brews (it is called Tony’s Original Deli and Bottle shop for a reason). Next time, I’m going for the Sheepherder!

-Vy

(click on thumbnails to enlarge menus. Sorry, these ones came out blurry)