Mensch’s Deli, which New Trier 2012 alumni Jack DeMar, Eric Kogan, and Kiki DeMar originally started in Evanston, Illinois, opened its Glencoe location in early July as “A love letter to the Jewish Deli.” As a past reviewer of Honey Butter Fried Chicken, which vacated the same space in October 2024, I knew it was my duty to try its successor. 

At first, I spoke to one of the owners, Jack DeMar, who remains optimistic the restaurant will succeed. 

“So it’s like by sharing a kitchen and sharing expenses and utilizing the space for two different types of food and two different customer bases, it’s easier, I think, to keep the light on right” DeMar said. 

Basically, the owners’ plan is to increase the customer base through two different types of palates. However, I remained skeptical of a restaurant’s ability to remain in this cursed space (two restaurants both lasted in the space for less than a year), so I gathered my friends to try Mensch’s Deli, instead of its salad counterpart, since we indulge in a less vegetarian appetite. 

We walked through a long hallway, passing by the bone white walls of the sister restaurant Picnic, and down a new, big blue barn door to the left – a cool addition to the millennial aesthetic I witnessed at Honey Butter Fried Chicken. At first, I assumed the restaurant was tiny, as the tight hallway suggests, but once we got to the host stand, the room opened up to rows of wooden tables which featured a long ‘50s-style bar to the right. The far back offers a grassy outside seating area unique from any of the North Shore eateries. The left side of the restaurant also highlights the history of Jewish delis across Chicago and New York through pictures of the families that owned them. 

Once we entered the restaurant, we were quickly seated and handed menus. The drinks were first. My friends ordered a deli classic: a crisp black cherry Dr. Brown’s. Dr. Brown’s, a staple of any deli, is a bubbly and sugary drink that omits high fructose corn syrup and replaces it with cane sugar.

I decided to follow the less traditional route with a chocolate treat: the chocolate phosphate. Combining flavors of flavored syrup, soda water, and a touch of acid phosphate creates an uncommon drink. Ignoring the ongoing debate from which U.S. city it came from, diners around the United States capitalized the drink market during the Prohibition with a tangy non-alcoholic phosphate drink— especially in diners in the Chicago area. As a restaurant reviewer coming into this Jewish Deli, I had to try this historic Chicago-area drink. My friends were disgusted as I told them what it was, citing an unorthodox mix of flavors for a soda. To put it plainly, it tasted exactly like what a chocolate Sprite would taste like. Surprisingly, it was very refreshing, and something I would

recommend more as a treat and less of a drink.

Pretty soon after my test of the chocolate phosphate, our speedy waiter delivered my three (and a half) food plates: three chicken links, a huge classic reuben, and lox. I tried the chicken links first. I bit into a crisp outside layer, filled with tasty, hot chicken. Honestly, I was not expecting much, especially from a deli, but I was pleasantly surprised at how well the links pair with the rest of the food.

I conquered that plate and continued my mid-day inquisition onto the reuben sandwich. The reuben consisted of a cold cut of perfectly peppered corn beef

layered with a dijon mustard. Ordinarily, these ingredients wouldn’t taste amazing alone, but in a sandwich, they complement each other, mixing a strong scented mustard with a tasty cold cut of corned beef.

The lox stared me down as I dug in. Some people find lox absolutely vile, aka the

people at my table, but I enjoyed the tasty slices of smoked salmon. Contrary to popular belief, the flavor of lox is less fishy and more savory. The reddish-pink cuts supply a classic salty and refreshing taste. 

Overall, this restaurant surprised me. Most delis I have visited provide an

overwhelming amount of food on the plate, rather than the almost perfect serving size presented at Mensch’s Deli. The sneaky amount of space, speedy service, and tasty cuisine immediately forces me to award Mensch’s Deli a New Trier News recommendation. Hopefully, this restaurant overcomes the space’s curse of failed restaurants and becomes a staple of North Shore fooderies.