Stroh's Gourmet in Venice

Abbott Kinney in Venice is a street full of specialized little shops, selling everything from too-cool for-you artwork, clothes made for the beach and furniture that is more expensive than 2 months of my paycheck to purchase. In the middle of these stores, there's Stroh's Gourmet.

Stroh's has a great beachy atmosphere, with old style signs (my favorite one they have is an old style metal sign that says, "Chicken noodle soup"), old crates holding bags of chips, and friendly employees. Ordering your sandwich is easy, with friendly employee asking if he should throw the sandwich on the panini grill (yes!!) before he wraps it up to go. They also had the Cola Cola from Mexico, and Coca Cola Light (I think Diet Coke here) in those awesome bottles.


This is what I got Owen - a grilled on the panini multigrain turkey brie avocado sandwich.
Inside shot, but the picture is a bit washed out from the flash of the camera. It was a very rich sandwich, as the brie was probably a double brie, and the turkey was a bit salty. Actually, I have to say both sandwiches were a bit on the rich savory salty side - but TOO much so. I think I needed something to cut through the richness, maybe some greens, or something bland to offset such rich ingredients. If I get this again, I'm adding herby greens from a bag to this to even it out.


The sandwich I got for myself was a pretzel bread ham sandwich. I love the novelty of this sandwich, as the pretzel bread was very unique. The texture of the bread was very much like a pretzel, with a good outside crusty bite to it, and I love the shiny salt speckled-ness of it. The innards of the sandwich, as I said, were very salty, but this one had a very spicy mustard. I like spicy but Owen was kicked in the mouth by the strength of it. He added some kewpie mayo from the fridge, which I have to admit, helped the sandwich's taste.

Stroh's is a good break from frou-frou restaurants that dot this area, but next time I'll probably stick to Abbots Pizza Company. I've had better sandwiches (for instance, from Bay Cities) but the atmosphere and staff at Stroh's might convince me to come back. Not soon though.