Dec 10, 2025 - Food and Drink
Paulie's brings New York deli energy to Oak Street
Add Axios as your preferred source to
see more of our stories on Google.
The Great Bambino at Paulie's in New Orleans. Photo: Carlie Kollath Wells/Axios
I'm so glad I wound up at Paulie's the other day for lunch.
The big picture: Paulie's is a New York-style deli on Oak Street with hot sandwiches, Italian desserts and other goodness.
- It's from Paul Tufaro, who opened Empire State Deli downtown in 2004. That location closed and he opened Paulie's earlier this year.
- The new space is large with lots of tables.
What I had: The Great Bambino with Boar's Head corned beef, pastrami, cabbage, Swiss cheese and housemade Russian dressing on rye.
- I loved everything about it, especially the dressing and the crunchy slaw.
- My husband raved about his classic chicken parm sandwich.
- We shared an order of crispy onion rings. Yum!
Zoom out: Garden & Gun got it right when Brett Martin wrote we're America's sandwich capital. Of course, we have poboys, muffalettas and banh mi.
- But now, we are getting more New York/New Jersey delis. Stein's has been here for years and now we've got Francolini's.
- And there's Sammy's, which is doing NY-inspired sandwiches at Carrollton Station and Bronx Bar.
- Lunch Sandwich Shop is also making fancy Italian options.