Small Bites

After Tim Henderson’s story on Jamaican food a few weeks back, Doug Watson gave me a call. He owns Poppy’s Deli in Mount Vernon with Rudy Guerrino, and he said they do jerk chicken like nobody’s business.

He sets up a grill in the parking lot late nights (4 to 11 p.m.) Friday and Saturdays and also after church on Sundays, and they fire up jerk chicken, jerk pork, steamed fish (usually red snapper) and corn. Sounds just delicious.

The deli is open from 5 a.m. to 10 p.m every day. It started out as an Italian deli, but now, with five cooks — one who’s Italian, two who are Mexican, one from the West Indies and one from Jamaica — it has a little bit of everything.

“Mount Vernon is a cross roads,” Watson said to me. “And we have a diverse population.” That means he’ll be cutting Boars Head meats for sandwiches at lunch, and serving up chicken parms and sausage and peppers for dinners. There are four specials daily: one fish, two chicken and one beef or pork. (He says the grilled salmon in garlic sauce is killer.)

They also do four soups a day — three regular, like split pea or chicken noodle, and one Caribbean, like cow foot or red snapper. I’ve got to check this place out. Anybody been? Please do report back below!

Poppy Deli, 420 E. Sanford Ave. Mount Vernon. 914-699-0145.