Listen Up, La Mesa.

Alright, listen up, La Mesa. Let's talk Italian food. More specifically, let's talk Italian deli.

Here we are at BMH Italian Deli here on El Cajon Boulevard in La Mesa. And in our effort to support local business here in the Mason and surrounding communities, I want to introduce you to some people that make some great sandwiches. Probably the best here in La Mesa.

All right everyone. I'm here at BMH Italian Deli, and I'm here with Sammy Corine. He is one of the owners here at BMH, and he is the Sandwich Guru here. So Sammy, thanks for doing this with me.

You're welcome. Thank you for doing this.

And I want you to talk a little bit about the business. When did you guys open? How long have you been here?

Who is the RealtorDad?

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Well my sister and I have started this place about 17 years ago. And we both immigrated from Sicily.

Okay.

My whole family was born there. And Maria, or otherwise known as Momma, but she's my sister. And she's got all these recipes and everything is pretty much a lot of her brain trust. Our Mama's Juice is-

Oh, the Love Juice.

Mama's Love Juice, is Momma's creation.

Now, that's a salad dressing or a marinade?

Salad dressing and a marinade. We use it on everything.

I've used it before, and I've marinated chicken with it once, and I marinated fish with it another time. The fish was great.

What we try to do here, pretty much, is everything is home-made. All our sausage, our meatballs, our roast beef. Everything's home made. All our Tiramisu, our cannolis.

So you're not just a sandwich shop.

No.

You have Italian dishes.

We have Italian dishes. A lot of people come to me and say, "I'd like to have a linguini clam sauce for 12 people." So I'll make it for them.

Oh, so almost to order, almost.

Right. Everything's pretty much to order here. Definitely our sandwiches, of course with fresh bread, as well.

Fresh bread.

Our catering takes off. We've done many, many catering jobs.

Okay. And as far as your catering goes, do you stick local in La Mesa? Or will you spread out-

We pretty much go anywhere that anybody wants us to go.

What do you feel is your most popular sandwich?

Well, that's hard to say, because ... A popular ... We have this little thing that we do with all our people who make the sandwiches. "What is today? Today is a Southside sandwich. Today is a Ba-Da-Bing." But I would say that a lot of our sandwiches, the biggest seller of our sandwiches, just a regular Italian torpedo.

Torpedo, the classic.

Yes, ham, cut of Salami, jumbo Salami, and provolone cheese. They're simply made, but it's one of those places that are not common in southern California. If we were in the middle of Chicago, which that's where I grew up, and my sister and I grew up, there's places like this three or four on each block.

Yeah.

And they all do the homemade stuff, which is not what we're seeing here in southern California.

Word of mouth is what's been keeping us alive for quite some time, yeah.

Well, the locals know you, because I post on social media about when I get a sandwich and people always respond, "I love that place. Great sandwiches." So people know you. Not only do you do the cold sandwiches, but you have hot sandwiches, as well. Whether it's sausage and peppers and meatballs. Do you like to do a Philly steak? Or-

We do something similar to a Philly steak, it's an Italian roast beef with peppers and onions that have been cooked in the Au Jus that you dip it in.

One of our biggest sellers, I think, called the Ba-Da-Bing, which is ham, turkey and pastrami. And it's a hot sandwich, and it's great. One of my favorite sandwiches are the Betsy. The Betsy is a club sandwich. Bacon, cheddar cheese, turkey and avocado, and you can't go wrong with all those four.

Where can people find you online? Do you have any online presence?

Well, bmhitalian.com.

Okay. And the menu ...

And the menus are there. And you can get in touch with me personally. This is where you can come, where you could say, "Hey, wow! I ate some fresh food," and you can taste it, as well.

Awesome.

Well, Sammy, I want to thank you. I'm sure people are gonna see this and want to rush down here and get some sandwiches.

Good, good.

I definitely encourage it.

Come on down.

Thanks again so much.

Thank you, Chris.

And you'll be seeing me soon because you know I come in here [crosstalk 00:04:46].

I appreciate it, brother.

All right.

Thank you for watching another episode of Listen Up, La Mesa, where we support and feature local businesses here in La Mesa and her surrounding communities. If you'd like to feature your business on this show, please contact me directly. Thank you.