Austrian Bakery & Deli

This would be at home in both the "The Unbearable Blandness of Broadway" and the "Something--anything--near Diversey/Clark/Broadway" threads.

Be warned: avoid the Austrian Bakery & Deli on Clark at all costs.

I stopped by out of curiosity because it's in the neighborhood and looked rather charming. I left with a $7 "Vienna Pastrami" sandwich. Although the Boar's Head pastrami was a bit of a tipoff, I knew something was wrong the minute I was handed the bag with the sandwich and felt that it weighed a whopping fifth of a pound. Upon opening it I saw what amounted to a one and a half inch sandwich, 70% of which was bread. The mediocrity of the pastrami wasn't even discernible because there was so little of it and the paper thin slice of "President Emmental" cheese was equally obscured. The only thing I could taste was the tomato and two decent slices of rye bread.

My favorite part though was the side it was served with. Call me nuts, but when a "deli" asks me if I'd like "pickle or olives with that", I'd never expect my pickle selection to entail 7 or 8 sliced pickle chips reminiscent of middle school cafeterias and highway diners.

The place looked endearing from the outside but I'm now not the slightest bit surprised why it's always empty.


Austrian Bakery & Deli
2523 N Clark St

Ralph Wiggum wrote:Be warned: avoid the Austrian Bakery & Deli on Clark at all costs.

I have to disagree rather strongly. The baked goods here are quite nice -- the guy knows what he's doing.

Never had a sandwich there and never wanted to and your description is certainly not going to change that. But for a sweet snack (or dessert after a slice from Cafe Luigi) and a cup of Meinl coffee, this place fits the bill.

Every time I go by that place, I think of hungryrabbi as his writeup was my introduction to it...
http://www.lthforum.com/bb/viewtopic.php?t=2986

Holly of Uptown wrote:http://www.lthforum.com/bb/viewtopic.php?t=2986

I missed that thread. Sorry about that, merge away mods.


I guess the baked goods are a bit better than the sandwiches, which surprises me given that the sandwich I walked out of there with was rather pathetic and shows a complete disinterest in trying to put out a good product to their customers.