Hey. My name is Heath Saraceno. I play guitar in Senses Fail. I go on tour. I eat food. This is the food that I eat while on tour.

Email suggestions to heathlovesfood@gmail.com if you know of a sweet spot I should try.
April 8
APRIL 5, 2009 San Diego, CA DIRTY DEL’S - THE CHARGER I received a bunch of emails from people in San Diego recommending all sorts of awesome restaurants, but unfortunately I didn’t get to try any of them.  I woke up in a parking lot by the baseball stadium with an hour to kill until load-in.  This was just enough time to get food before the bus left for the club. Garrett, Shawn and I were on our way to a Taco Del Mar or some other fast food taco joint that my VZ Navigator found (when in doubt, I always go for a place like this), and we passed this place Dirty Del’s.  The sign for “Boar’s Head” meats in the window is what drew us in.  Maybe we are deli snobs, but there are a lot of brands of deli meat, and Boar’s Head is really the only one that is consistently tasty and fresh.  Thumann’s is a good second choice, but their meats are usually really salty and dry.  We knew that we’d be in Canada in 3 days, then in Europe until mid-May and this was possibly our last chance to get a good deli sandwich, so we went for it. Del’s offers simple, standard ingredients and also a board with suggestions of specialty sandwiches.  The Charger sounded almost exactly like something I’d order at home - roast beef, cheddar, lettuce, tomato, mustard and mayo on a ciabbatta roll.  I ordered one, but asked for no mustard.  Then I waited. And waited. And waited. Really, I waited for about 30 minutes for this stupid sandwich. There was one guy who worked there, and after he took our three orders, two other people came in, then a dude wearing a Descendents shirt, then a mom with a 2-year old, then a guy who ordered about six sandwiches.  So he had to take all their orders and then he started making our sandwiches, all the while getting interrupted by the ringing phone. I’d have to say that this sandwich was not worth the wait.  The roast beef was fresh, although a little more overdone than I’m used to it being.  I had a big problem with the bread.  It was too thick and halfway through the first half of the sandwich, I was full from it.  Also, there was one thin slice of cheese.  As you can see from the picture, there was about 10 times the amount of meat as there was cheese, and that is an unacceptable ratio.  I ended up re-cheesing with my personal supply from the fridge on the bus. Dirty Del needs to A) hire more people, and B) figure out his ratios.  He’s got the most important part of his deli down, considering that he uses Boar’s Head meats.  It’s like the tools are all there, he just needs to learn how to use them correctly.

APRIL 5, 2009

San Diego, CA

DIRTY DEL’S - THE CHARGER

I received a bunch of emails from people in San Diego recommending all sorts of awesome restaurants, but unfortunately I didn’t get to try any of them.  I woke up in a parking lot by the baseball stadium with an hour to kill until load-in.  This was just enough time to get food before the bus left for the club.

Garrett, Shawn and I were on our way to a Taco Del Mar or some other fast food taco joint that my VZ Navigator found (when in doubt, I always go for a place like this), and we passed this place Dirty Del’s.  The sign for “Boar’s Head” meats in the window is what drew us in.  Maybe we are deli snobs, but there are a lot of brands of deli meat, and Boar’s Head is really the only one that is consistently tasty and fresh.  Thumann’s is a good second choice, but their meats are usually really salty and dry.  We knew that we’d be in Canada in 3 days, then in Europe until mid-May and this was possibly our last chance to get a good deli sandwich, so we went for it.

Del’s offers simple, standard ingredients and also a board with suggestions of specialty sandwiches.  The Charger sounded almost exactly like something I’d order at home - roast beef, cheddar, lettuce, tomato, mustard and mayo on a ciabbatta roll.  I ordered one, but asked for no mustard.  Then I waited.

And waited.

And waited.

Really, I waited for about 30 minutes for this stupid sandwich.

There was one guy who worked there, and after he took our three orders, two other people came in, then a dude wearing a Descendents shirt, then a mom with a 2-year old, then a guy who ordered about six sandwiches.  So he had to take all their orders and then he started making our sandwiches, all the while getting interrupted by the ringing phone.

I’d have to say that this sandwich was not worth the wait.  The roast beef was fresh, although a little more overdone than I’m used to it being.  I had a big problem with the bread.  It was too thick and halfway through the first half of the sandwich, I was full from it.  Also, there was one thin slice of cheese.  As you can see from the picture, there was about 10 times the amount of meat as there was cheese, and that is an unacceptable ratio.  I ended up re-cheesing with my personal supply from the fridge on the bus.

Dirty Del needs to A) hire more people, and B) figure out his ratios.  He’s got the most important part of his deli down, considering that he uses Boar’s Head meats.  It’s like the tools are all there, he just needs to learn how to use them correctly.