The 25 Best Delis in the World

The name means "to fuss around in the kitchen," which tells you everything about this Jewish deli in Knoxville's Old City. It started as a pop-up and grew into a proper room serving comfort food that bubbe would recognize but maybe not endorse, like matzoh ball soup finished with chili oil. The challah comes out of the oven daily, the babkas rotate flavors, and the sandwiches are large enough to warrant a to-go box. A James Beard semifinalist.

1. USA Today Restaurants of the Year
2. Michelin Guide Selected Restaurant
3. James Beard Awards 2026 · Semifinalist · Best Chef: Southeast · Laurence Faber

A butcher shop counter tucked into the municipal market by the Darsena canal, where the menu board lists sandwiches alongside grilled cuts and meatballs, and the meat is organic and pasture-raised. The chef will talk you through it if you stall at the board, which you probably will. Priced higher than the setting suggests, though the setting is a working market stall, so adjust expectations accordingly.

1. 50 Top Italy #6 · The Best Sandwiches
2. Eater The 37 Best Restaurants in Milan

1. White Guide Very Fine Level · White Guide
2. Eater The 38 Best Restaurants in Stockholm, Sweden

Half-pound sandwiches on Jewish rye, a proper Reuben, and homemade cake that sells out before dinner, this is a New York-style Jewish deli doing things the way delis used to. The family operation has earned a Michelin Bib Gourmand, which feels about right for a counter where leaving hungry would require genuine effort. Go early if you want the cake.

1. Michelin Guide Bib Gourmand
2. Salt Lake Magazine Utah Classics · Dining Awards
3. Eater The 29 Best Restaurants in Salt Lake City, Utah

The No. 19, a hot pastrami on rye with Swiss, coleslaw, and Russian dressing, is the thing strangers stop you to ask about when you're carrying it to your table. Langer's is an old-school deli, been around forever, with booths, a full menu of latkes and chopped liver, and breakfast served all day. The Michelin Guide gives it a Bib Gourmand, which feels about right for a place where the sandwich does all the talking.

1. Michelin Guide Bib Gourmand
2. Los Angeles Times The 101 Best Restaurants in California
3. Time Out #40 · The 40 best restaurants in Los Angeles you need to try right now

1. James Beard Awards 2026 · Semifinalist · Outstanding Bakery
2. Eater Baltimore’s 38 Essential Restaurants
3. Baltimore Beat 2025 · Best Anti-Atlas · Best of Baltimore

A modern Jewish deli operating out of an old firehouse in Ohio City, where the bread case alone causes problems for anyone trying to leave quickly. Babka, challah, rugelach, and knishes anchor one end of the menu; koji-cured pastrami sandwiches have become the thing people line up for. The chef earned a James Beard semifinalist nod in 2025, as did the pastry program, which tells you something about how seriously both sides of the counter are taken.

1. Eater The 38 Best Restaurants in Cleveland, Ohio
2. James Beard Awards 2025 · Semifinalist · Outstanding Pastry Chef or Baker · Alexandra La Valle
3. James Beard Awards 2023 · Semifinalist · Best Chef: Great Lakes · Allie La Valle-Umansky, Jeremy Umansky, and Kenny Scott

1. Le Fooding Le Fooding Guide

1. AAA Approved
2. Minnesota Monthly Top 75 Restaurants
3. Mpls St Paul Exceptional Cakes: Turtle Cake · Best Bakeries of the Twin Cities

1. Le Fooding Le Fooding Guide

The corned beef and pastrami sandwiches here are the kind that require a game plan before you pick them up. This old-school Jewish deli in Queen Village has been feeding Philadelphia for as long as anyone can remember, with a menu that runs from Reubens and smoked fish to cheesesteaks and a full breakfast. The Michelin Guide awarded it a Bib Gourmand, which tracks. Come hungry and do not make afternoon plans.

1. Michelin Guide Bib Gourmand

A light-filled New York-style Jewish deli in Atlanta, which already sets the scene. Black-and-white photos on the walls, display cases lined with cheesecake, and both a market counter and a proper sit-down room. The matzoh ball soup and smoked Nova platters read like they've been on the menu forever. Transplanted New Yorkers tend to show up looking slightly too relieved.

1. Michelin Guide Selected Restaurant

The telera rolls are baked fresh every morning at this Fruitvale panaderia and deli, which means the tortas built on them have a structural advantage before anything else is added. The chorizo con papas filling gets made a day ahead so the potato and spiced sausage can concentrate, then it's layered with avocado and a chile de arbol salsa that earns its reputation. Two indoor tables, a loyal crowd of regulars, and a sandwich that sells out early.

1. San Francisco Chronicle Best sandwich spots in the Bay Area
2. San Francisco Chronicle #63 · Top 100 Restaurants in the Bay Area
3. San Francisco Chronicle Best restaurants in Oakland

1. AAA Approved

1. AAA Approved

1. AAA Approved

The seeded rye bread is baked on-site, and the corned beef and pastrami get piled onto it over the counter, no table service involved. Davis Bakery is an old-school Jewish deli that has been around forever in Cleveland, still family-owned, still efficient in the way that only counter-service places can be. In a country where Jewish delis keep quietly disappearing, this one draws a line out the door without seeming to notice the trend.

1. Eater The 38 Best Restaurants in Cleveland, Ohio

A Polish deli counter tucked into the back corner of Buffalo's old Broadway Market, where the pierogies come stuffed with sauerkraut or farmers cheese and the czarnina, a sweet-sour soup made with dried fruit and blood, sorts out the curious from the committed. Polish sausage rounds out a short, unapologetic menu. The market itself draws extra vendors around Easter, but the deli draws regulars year-round who already know exactly what they're getting.

1. Eater The 18 Best Restaurants in Buffalo

1. Eater The 38 Essential Berlin Restaurants

Sandwich Hut is a takeout counter in Hope that builds Italian subs and treats pepperoncini less as a garnish than a core belief. The Allitalia stacks prosciutto, capocollo, pepperoni, and provolone under a generous drift of those crinkly green peppers. There are no tables to speak of, so plan on eating it on a walk, wearing some of it, and wiping oil off your jacket sleeve like a rite of passage.

1. The Infatuation The 27 Best Restaurants In Providence

1. Eater Where to Eat and Drink on Capitol Hill

1. Eater The Best Restaurants in Chicago’s South Loop

An all-day deli, market, and restaurant tucked into Echo Park's edge, sharing a complex with a bakery and a used bookshop, which is either very convenient or a plot to keep you there all afternoon. The team behind it cut their teeth at serious kitchens, and the menu runs from Clark Street bread sandwiches at lunch to a Zuni-riffing roast chicken at dinner. The room is casual and light-filled, the kind where people stop pretending they're just popping in.

1. Eater The 38 Best Restaurants in Los Angeles

1. Eater Where to Eat and Drink on Capitol Hill

1. Eater The Best Restaurants in Chelsea