When the Stovanovic family, which opened the original Stanley's Homemade Polish Sausage on McDowell in 1989, closed up shop at that location last spring, they promised a new store right across the street in the months to come. That dream never materialized, although the Stovanovics still own a retail-only shop in North Phoenix.
See also: -- Stanley's Sausage Company on McDowell Moving
But here's the very good news for customers who love Stanley's first-rate Eastern European-style sausages and deli meats. The very same products are available in the very same location under a new name: So We Meat Again.
Owned and operated by Tim Colley and his family, SWMA is a neater, cleaner version of Stanley's, offering product that is 100% made in-house. Stanley's made about 70% of its product, buying the other 30% from European companies.
Colley, who recently renovated the big 60s-era smokehouse out back, plans to move Shannon's Deli Meats -- a 27-year-old Glendale company he also bought recently -- to the McDowell location at the first of the year so that all operations will be under the same roof.
Although Colley just opened SWMA in early November, word has already spread among local chefs about his top-notch products. His growing client list includes a number of Irish pubs (who buy corned beef and Irish bacon), Citizen Public House and Pig & Pickle.
After Keenan Bosworth (of Pig & Pickle) told me about it, I dropped in to see what was up. I sampled the kabonosy -- a thin, Polish stick sausage that's been smoked and air-dried. Firm-textured but fatty and redolent with garlic, this stuff is out-of-this-world. Ditto for the pastrami I ate on a hoagie roll (where's the rye bread??), the meat so fatty and luscious it dripped from the sandwich. The Spicy Hungarian sausage I ate like a hot dog was also terrific -- all juice and spice, its casing offering the requisite snap.
So don't worry about the goofy name. This place is dead-serious about its product.
