Di Palo’s Fine Foods
Since I’ve been mentioning gift ideas with sausage and cheese in the same post recently, I can’t ignore Di Palo’s new online store, Di Palo Selects, as another option for the holidays. New Yorkers and die-hard Italian tourists know that they can get the best of Italy from the Di Palo family on Grand Street, but now they can get the same products without spending money on airfare. The Web site is powered by iGourmet.com but it’s less confusing because they’ve trimmed down the content to Lou Di Palo’s favorites. While there are the useful related items cross-sells, descriptions are not as overwhelming. I love the glossary page and the Ask Lou feature: you get both in person when you visit the store, which is the main reason why wait times are usually longer than my allotted lunch hour.
Some of my favorite meats and cheeses that I buy regularly from Di Palo’s:
– Piave
– Truffle cheese
– Crucolo
– fresh mozarella
– Prosciutto de Parma
– Prosciutto de Coto
– one of the sausages hanging from the ceiling
– spicy soppressata
I also restock on Di Palo’s olive oil, those glass-jarred tuna, marinated olives and artichokes, as well as Illy coffee. Lou’s brother, Sal, is my favorite. He sounds like Raymond from Everybody Loves Raymond and he makes sure that I always leave with a free treat. When it’s your turn at Di Palo’s, it’s really your turn and no one else’s. Now you can go online and every good thing is just a click away.
Di Palo’s Fine Foods is at 200 Grand Street corner of Mott in Little Italy, New York.
Related post/s:
Order your Di Palo’s goods online
And then pickle that soppressatta with herbs
I have gone through the trouble of signing up for several review sites just because I want others to know about my experience with Di Palo’s Fine Foods. Furthermore, I’m so mad I plan on continually posting my experience on these review sites until it becomes physically impossible for me to do so. In late November 2011 I called up to see if they have Sheeps Milk Ricotta Cheese. The girl named Jessica I spoke to said yes. In addition to that she brought up If I wanted to have it put on the side for me to pick up. To that I responded yes. After traveling all the way into the city, guess what? They sold out all the Sheeps Milk Ricotta Cheese. The women behind the counter said sorry because they didn’t hold the cheese for me. Whats the point in the girl I spoke to on the phone, asking for my name, and voluntarily asking if she could put it on hold for me to pick up? Thats not a real care in the world on customer service. The whole “take a ticket” and wait for your number to be called system there symbolizes how they think of their customers only as a number. Let me not forget to mention that the wait time was at least 45mins easy. After waiting around a packed store full of people for like 25 to 30 mins, and still around 20 numbers needing to be called before mine, I finally saw an opportunity where the lady behind the counter was not so busy. Thats when she confirmed that Jessica, her daughter, never held anything for me. Something stinks and its not their cheese!!!!!
Sorry to hear about your experience. I have also called ahead of time to pre-order items at Di Palo’s but I’ve never had a problem when it was time to pick them up. It sounds like an oversight on Jessica’s part and I can understand how frustrating it must have been to make your way downtown and not get what you want. Give them another chance though; they do have some of the best sheep’s milk ricotta.