The Dish: Your next great sandwich, on a sidewalk, on a Monday

As the cars passed by on Greenmount Avenue, chef Davon Pulliam used tweezers to garnish fresh slices of mortadella layered with roasted pork loin and melted fontina with thick slices of coriander fennel pickle he’d made himself. The resulting dish was complex and comforting, both bright and satisfying — less Cuban sandwich than culinary masterpiece.

Baltimore has no shortage of great sandwiches. We’re the home of pit beef and fantastic Italian subs. We’ve even got a punk rock sandwich bar and a panini spot in Hampden that just opened last week. Customers line up for egg sandwiches from a takeout window or at Café Dear Leon.

But some of the tastiest new ‘wiches in the city aren’t at a traditional shop: they’re at Tortuga Deli, Pulliam’s chef-driven pop-up and kombucha business. His grab-and-go sandwiches are on the menu at Sophomore Coffee in Old Goucher as well as at the Our House Baltimore play cafe. On Mondays, you can find him outside by Jinji Chocolate on Greenmount Avenue, with a propane-powered griddle and a limited but fabulous rotating selection of soups and sandwiches.

His zingy carrot ginger soup or hearty chicken noodle will send any fall cold running for the hills. One week, you’ll swear the roast beef sandwich with onions in both pickled and caramelized form is the best thing you’ve ever eaten. The next week, you’ll be declaring your appreciation for the Reuben, made with crunchy apple fennel sauerkraut.

With nearby eateries like Pete’s Grille and Red Emma’s both closed on Mondays, the pop-up is a help for area workers like Anita Mullins, who works just up the street and calls herself Pulliam’s “groupie.” For customer Kel Millonie, who lives in the neighborhood, it was the perfect pit stop after a visit to the Goodwill across the street. “That’s a really good Goodwill,” Millonie said. He loved the sandwich, too. “The homemade pickles really made it,” he wrote later in a text message.

Pulliam spent part of his childhood in Randallstown, and always knew he wanted to be a chef. He graduated from the Culinary Institute of America, which he compares to “Hogwarts, but for cooking.” Like the teachers in the fictional wizard school from Harry Potter, his instructors were eccentric, hyper-focused on their own field of expertise, be it fishmongery or knife skills.

Years after graduating, Pulliam got jobs at Hampden’s Basque-inspired La Cuchara, later working in Washington, D.C., at Anxo Cidery & Tasting Room, which has since closed. Eager to start his own business, he began making his own kombucha, a fizzy drink combining tea, beneficial bacteria and yeast. Unlike prepared food, kombucha is shelf stable, making it an ideal product for him to sell on his own. “You let it ferment,” he said, “and then you have it.”

He got married and became a dad. Like many chefs, Pulliam said the pandemic made him reevaluate his relationship with the restaurant world. For a sous or chef de cuisine, hours can be grueling: a minimum of 10 hours a day, often six days a week. So when the world reopened after the COVID-era closures, Pulliam and his wife decided he would stay home with their daughter, then a baby. His hobbies included waking up at dawn with his infant and placing her in a baby carrier while he worked in the garden. During naptime, he worked on his kombucha business.

The deli part came later. He appreciates the humility of sandwiches, and their accessibility. People will try things in a sandwich they might not be open to otherwise, he said. Plus: “My kids would eat a sandwich.” Ingredients that don’t sell get repurposed for family dinner.

Today, Pulliam is the primary caregiver for his two young children, ages 4 and 6, while his wife is an assistant principal at Margaret Brent Elementary School. Tortuga Deli is a means of following his passion for food on his own terms — while still being available for the 4 p.m. school pickup.

The project has grown up with the kids. Now, when his early-rising daughter pops up for the morning at 5 a.m., he puts her to work stamping paper bags with the Tortuga Deli logo. “She gets a penny per stamp,” he said.

His inspiration was the slow and deliberate turtle, or tortuga in Spanish. “We take our time,” Pulliam said. The logo can sometimes confuse customers. During a recent visit, Terry Veney wandered by out of curiosity. “I thought, ‘This cat’s out here selling turtle,’” Veney laughed. It wasn’t the first time someone’s made that mistake, Pulliam said.

Veney wasn’t eating, but he handed Pulliam a $5 bill just to show his support. Another customer stopped by thinking Pulliam was selling pit beef. Disappointed, she got back in her car. Someone else asked whether he was only open on Mondays. Maybe someday there will be a line of customers down the block, he said. Then he might add another day.

While Pulliam hopes to grow his kombucha business, he doesn’t see a brick-and-mortar in his immediate future. “I like the flexibility of not having to be stuck in one spot, especially with how the economy is kind of getting a little funky,” he said. And anyhow, customers, he thinks, “like to see you where they are.”

And on Monday, that means on Greenmount Avenue.