Deli Italia
There are those who visit Deli Italia strictly for prepared dinners (grabbing a pre-made lasagna for dinner on the way home from work is a brilliant idea for west-metro side commuters). Or they come for or Italian groceries — amaretti cookies, specialty olive oils, coffees, gelato and more. But meat fans know that it’s the deli case where the heart of the business beats.
A full range of cured meats from prosciutto to pancetta and beyond bulges from behind the case, begging to be sliced and slapped on a sandwich (or better yet, slapped directly on the tongue).
Here’s a savory wintertime idea: Instead of having your salami sliced, get it salami in a chunk, then cube, saute and spoon it over bruschetta.
Deli Italia, 1990 Wadsworth Blvd., Lakewood, 303-238-7815
Urban Pantry
Snackers with refined palates will dig South Broadway’s Urban Pantry, where the shelves are lined with luxurious domestic and imported goodies.
But the focus of this gourmand-stop is at the back, past the fine and focused selection of cheeses at the deli case. It’s neatly lined with exquisite cured meats, presented like so many baubles at Tiffany’s.
The lovely selection of salumi includes Petit Jesu, a favorite Italian cured salami, and crazy-good (albeit expensive) jamon iberico, the prized cured ham of well-looked-after Spanish pigs who forage in their acorn-studded pastures, which gives their meat a delicate, buttery but intensely porcine flavor.
Urban Pantry, 1242 S. Broadway, 303-777-5657,
Carbone’s
Not a lot of time is wasted on pleasantries at Carbone’s, a matchbox-size deli that’s been putting forth meat and sausage in north Denver for decades. Things go faster if you know what you want when you hit the counter.
Whether you’re here to stock up on artisan pasta, to pick up some fresh cheeses or to grab a couple of Italian sandwiches (get yours with a yin-yang salumi combo of mortadella and capicolla, or, if you swing that way, with soft, flavorful meatballs), don’t bail without picking up a pound or two of emphatically, but not assaultingly, spiced sausage. An excellent grill-tosser or pasta-sauce building block, it’s available loose or linked.
Carbone’s Italian Sausage Market & Deli, 1221 W. 38th Ave., 303-455-2893.
