NOVEMBER 21, 2025 | FEATURES | By Thomas Nielsen and Miles Katzen
Do you, like so many other CC students, come from the Northeast? The J.O.B. perhaps? Do you miss the sweet tastes of home? Do you yearn for the corned beef and pastrami from New York or Massachusetts—where they make them the right way?
If this describes you, you should try East Coast Restaurant and Delicatessen. Located just down Tejon St., across from Jack Quinn’s, East Coast Deli offers hot and cold deli sandwiches, as well as a bevy of soups, salads and breakfast options, and the meat is flown in from the East Coast every morning.
Does that sound gimmicky (and dubiously environmentally friendly) to you? Maybe so, but it doesn’t make a hot pastrami and rye taste any less good.
Upon entering, you’re unsubtly greeted with photos of the iconic skylines of the Northeast, like Philadelphia, Boston, and a pre-9/11 New York.
For some reason, Atlantic City and Miami are included with the bunch. A quick Google search led me to find that Atlantic City, in fact, has no signature food dishes.
The loud hum of the refrigerator and voices from the kitchen paired nicely with soft Christmas music in too-early November, and the meat-by-the-pound options harken back to your favorite deli of the past. It’s giving deli!
Even at peak lunch hour, plenty of seats were available, both in the booths, outside and at the bar. It seemed like most of the other patrons got their food to go. The service was excellent, and our waitress recommended the East Side Special, a breakfast bonanza of meat on top of eggs on top of biscuits with gravy.
She also recommended the Virginia Beach sandwich, described on the menu as “a triple decker of roast beef, turkey, ham, swiss cheese, coleslaw and russian dressing.” A review of these items is pending.
Our party of three got our food rapidly, starting off with the matzah ball soup. Served in a nice porcelain bowl with a blue checkerboard pattern, this hearty classic was salty, savory and scrumptious. Sometimes you don’t need to reinvent the meal, and the warm broth served only to excite our stomachs for the feast to come.
For sandwiches, we ordered the chicken parm and the New York reuben. Both sandwiches were packed to the brim with their respective meats. After stopping briefly to imagine the arduous journey of the pastrami from the Big Apple to the Olympic city, we dug in.
Our verdict? Delicious. Both sandwiches hit the proverbial spot, and the supplementary pickles and coleslaw were unflashy but important role players in the meal. The coleslaw was sweet, and could have used a little more vinegar and lemon, but this was about the only nit we could pick with our food. Salty, savory and dressed better than a BESoc major at the Business Careers Night, the reuben left little room for criticism—or more food.
The large portions left us full and ready to nap, though Miles swore he could go back and eat another round. While not exactly budget eats, this deli delivers the savory taste of East Coast cuisine in meat-by-the-pound form.
Price: Breakfast $8-15, Lunch and Dinner $15-20
Accessibility: 4.5/5. Accessible via the Zeb. Plenty of paid parking, and within biking/long walk distance.
Taste: 4/5. Even better when you’re really hungry.
Value: 4/5. Huge Sammies. You get what you pay for.