BLT Without the B? Plant-Based Alternatives are Finding Favor in Hell’s Kitchen Delis

Plant-based alternatives to New York City classics are being served up by Hell’s Kitchen delis and bodegas — and the neighborhood is snapping them up, according to Hamza Nagi, the owner of Superior Gourmet Marketplace (10th Ave between W40th/W41st St), who for the past year has partnered with the company Plantega to offer meatless sandwiches to his customers. 

Hamza told W42ST the classic versions of bacon egg and cheese and chopped cheese sandwiches are still his best sellers, but around 25 to 30% of orders are now for meals using meat alternatives like jackfruit, pea protein and seaweed. Albeit at a higher price point — a Plantega bacon egg and cheese will set you back $10, while a meat-based breakfast sandwich starts at $4.99, according to GrubHub. That’s partly due to the heavy subsidies the agriculture industry receives, according to the company’s founder. 

Plantega (think ‘plant-bodega’) was founded by Nil Zacharias during the pandemic and partners with bodegas across New York City by offering them the ingredients, recipes and training to make plant-based alternatives to everyone’s favorite deli orders. The brand gained some traction when Mayor Eric Adams went to a local bodega after winning the election in November 2021 to grab one of their sandwiches, and raved about the taste.

Currently, four Hell’s Kitchen establishments are serving up Plantega: Clinton Fruit Market (W47th and 9th Ave), H-Yard Gourmet Deli (9th Ave and W35th St), Superior Gourmet and Riverside Gourmet Deli (W57th and 11th Ave). The latter two are owned by Hamza’s family. The food at Hamza’s bodegas isn’t technically vegan by the strictest standards, since it is still prepared on the same grill as meat. He likes to describe it as simply a “plant-based alternative.” 

“It’s been great, I just love the fact that our customers enjoy it,” Hamza said. “It’s brought in consumers that usually wouldn’t walk into our bodega.” 

Hamza started serving Plantega in early 2023, after walking by a food sampling event on the Upper West Side and being impressed by it. 

“I said, Wow, this doesn’t really taste that bad,” Hamza recalled. “We never had options like that.” 

He’s also adopted it into his own life and is feeling healthier as a result. As opposed to eating meat, “you don’t have those crashes in the day. You don’t feel heavy,” he said.

Hamza’s family has been in the bodega business on the west side for many decades. Their oldest stores — Skyline Gourmet Deli and 7 Brothers, both on W49th Street — have been open for over 30 years and haven’t implemented Plantega yet, due to limited space for a separate refrigerator needed to keep the alternative meat. 

The most popular Plantega item right now is the fried chicken sandwich, Hamza said, although last month it was chopped cheese. His personal favorite is the BLT. 

You aren’t going to see Plantega anytime soon at every bodega and deli in Hell’s Kitchen, said Nil, the founder. His focus for the next year is ensuring that every neighborhood in New York City has a location within a close enough range for food delivery services, which is where he’s seen the most recent growth. 

“I think our priorities remain very much focused on New York City and our existing partners, and making sure that we bring on new partners that we think can be aligned with our goals,” he said. “And Hamza is a great example, he’s someone who gets what we’re trying to do, gets the impact it can make on his own business.”

It’s not just Plantega — Hamza’s been inspired to stock more alternative meat products in his store overall, like frozen plant-based bulgogi fried rice. 

Nil, who has lived in NYC since the early 2000s, has spent a long time thinking about plant-based foods, motivated, in part, by the greenhouse gas emissions the food industry, and animal agriculture in particular, create. 

“I found myself in 2020 reading about how restaurants in New York City were shutting down but bodegas were deemed essential businesses, and I’d been involved in the plant-based food industry for a few years,” Nil said. “I thought to myself, [a bodega’s] the last place I would go to find something plant-based — and why is it that New York City’s iconic bodegas are so far behind when it comes to healthy, sustainable products?” 

He then thought: “There’s like 13,000 bodegas in New York City and they are as much a part of the cultural fabric of the city as the subway system. If you could find a way to tap into that cultural phenomenon and create something that could showcase plant-based food and products in a way that was familiar, we may be able to get more people to try plant-based food.” 

Nil said he’s so far gotten mostly positive feedback from New Yorkers. “In some ways, it’s kind of blended into the culture of what bodegas are,” he said. “We didn’t want to change bodegas. I think they are a cultural institution in New York City — but we do want them to evolve.” 

Hamza sees a bright future for plant-based food, and hopes more people will start to give it a try. 

“When you get into plant-based it’s a whole new world,” Hamza said. “I just think in two to three years, plant-based won’t be just a trend — I think it will be something that everybody will embrace.”