Emil & Doris Colombo began Colombo's Italian Delicatessen in 1986 with the purchase of Francesca s Deli in Pacific Manor Village Shopping Center. The location had been an Italian Deli dating back to 1967 when Rose Blanda had established Roma Deli. Emil and Doris now in there forties were avid cooks at home and thoroughly enjoyed cooking for family and friends on the weekends. Emil (Sr.) had wanted his own business for years and sought a suitable location for 6 years before he and his wife Doris purchased Francesca?s. Emil Sr. enjoyed working in the kitchen and was a perfectionist about taste and preparation. He grew up in his family home cooking with his French (from the Pyrenees) & Italian (from Abruzzia) grandfathers. His mother Mae Colombo was admired by family and friends for her cuisine particularly her gnocchi, lasagna, ravioli, chicken, pork roast and home made sauces which are now carried on to the family deli?s. In fact it was Mae that first started our family in the food business. In the late fifties & sixties, Mae owned a catering business she ran with the help.
Of all the family her husband Frank Colombo, her children Em (Emil Sr), Barbara, & Madeline, her brothers Joseph & Robert Saraceni, her sister-in-law Helen, her sister Mary, her daughter-in-law to be Doris (& Doris sister Norina Costa. In fact, the pictures that adorn the walls of the deli are from those very same receptions. Mae was involved in the start-ups of two of her children?s business ventures: her daughter Barbara & son-in-law Dan Gallinetti in 1969: Woodside Deli & then in 1986 with Colombo?s De
