Palma's Bakery & Café Sorrento

It's World Baking Day! Indulge yourself today with some of Worcester's famous, locally made baked goods. And if you run into a baker during your busy day, stop them and thank them for being so awesome.

Just to name a few!

BirchTree Bread Company
On The Rise Baking
Palma's Bakery & Café Sorrento
Bean Counter Bakery Cafe
Wholly Cannoli
Crust Bakeshop
Baystate Bakery
Jennifer Lee's Bakery
LuLu’s Bakery and Café
The Queen's Cups
Giovannis Italian Bakery and Deli

The best sandwiches around……Chicken Mediterranian and Ham and Mortadelle with mozzarella, red roasted tomatoes,lettuce and tomato w/Olive oil and basil…..

If making Italian subs were an olympic event, this would be the medal podium according to all of your votes!

Gold: Belsito's Deli
Silver: Regatta Deli
Bronze: Palma's Bakery & Café Sorrento

We’ve already shared the full rankings of your favorite Central Mass Italian sub spots 🥪 based on all your votes (scroll to see it again ⬇️), but we just had to compare your top-3 head-to-head for ourselves. Here’s what we ordered at each place:

Belsito’s: “Famous Italian”
It’s famous for a reason! We’ve featured this sandwich a few times already, so if you want more details check out our previous posts! Salami, ham, capicola. Keep in mind - limited hours, cash only, call-in only, drive-thru pickup at Belsito’s.

Regatta: “Loaded Regatta”
Regatta can be quite polarizing. We have one group of people that loves it “hands down” - a very large group mind you, considering Regatta placed second in the voting. Another group is overwhelmed by the amount of bread and underwhelmed by the variety of meats (ham, salami) in their flagship sandwich the “Regatta Club”. We are here to bring both groups of people together by telling you about a whiteboard special, the “Loaded Regatta”! We attempted to order the Regatta Club with pickles and hots and were upsold to the “loaded” version. In addition to pickles and hots, this one also adds capicola and pepperoni (to the ham and salami), which doubles the variety of meats and notably improves the bread-to-meat ratio! Beware, the loaded version comes toasted, so if you’re not into that, just let them know.

Palma’s: “Calabrese Soppresatta”
We’ve had Palma’s “Italiano” sandwich before, which features capicola, ham, and salami. Since we sprang for the upgrade at Regatta, we decided to check out the upgraded Italian from Palma’s called the “Calabrese Soppresatta”. This sandwich features prosciutto crudo, capicola, mortadella, and soppresatta. The quality of the meats and freshness of the bread made this one our favorite of the three subs we tried!

Don’t forget to scroll ⬇️ to see the full rankings based on your votes. If you want to see a map 🗺 of all the top-spots or an even longer list of the runners-up, head back to our previous post!

Let us know which of these places are next on your list to check out!

The official results are in from our Central Mass Italian sub cookoff! 🥪 We announced yesterday that Belsito’s Deli was the most recommended, but now we want to share our handy guide we’ve put together based on all the voting results. 🗳

The guide starts with a ranked list of your top recommended spots. Congrats to all 17 delis, sub shops, bakeries, pizzerias, and markets that are making your favorite Italians!

In addition to your votes, we wanted to allow some guest experts to weigh in on the matter. These guys are local Italian sub connoisseurs and we’re so thankful they were each willing to share their top-3 spots. Thank you Mike Hsu (see ) and Gabriel Rollins! We’ve highlighted their expert picks in green in the chart and maps. Pay special attention to where their top picks align, also falling within your top-10…we’re looking at you Palma's Bakery & Café Sorrento and Tom's Deli!

Make sure to scroll past the first chart for:
⬇️ Maps of the top recommendations
⬇️ An additional 20 recommendations
⬇️ A compilation of your feedback

While we’re always curious to see who comes out on top, we’re most excited to discover new places we haven’t tried yet. We’ve been to 6 of the top recommendations, so still have some work to do! If you think you’ve already found the best, try a couple other spots on this list and see if your go-to still holds up. Remember, if it’s someone’s favorite, it could become your new favorite someday too!

Don’t forget to:

🔖 SAVE this post for future reference!

📨 SHARE this post with your friends and family!

💬 COMMENT below with your feedback!

➕ LIKE our page to keep up with other Central Mass cookoffs and see other handy food guides like this one!

We had a blast with this cookoff and can’t wait for the next one! Thanks so much for voting!

***VOTING IS CLOSED***

Three days left to vote for your favorite Italian subs in Central Mass! Drop your vote in the comments of any of our posts this week.

Two of the most important factors in determining the best Italian sub are the freshness of the bread and the quality of the meats. Palma's Bakery & Café Sorrento nails both of these factors! Bread is baked fresh daily and the Italian meats used are top-notch. Their standard “Italiano” sandwich, pictured here, features capicola, ham, and genoa salami. They also have what they refer to as an “upgraded Italian” called the “Calabrese Soppresatta” featuring prosciutto crudo, capicola, mortadella, and soppresatta.

If you’ve saved room after eating, do yourself a favor and grab some cannolis. If you didn’t save room, then bring a box of them home!

"You can find the best of something in an out of the way place."

Ep.11 - Having spent the better part of the last 3 decades at WAAF, Mike Hsu is a legend in Massachusetts radio. These days you can find him hosting the Morning Show on 100 FM The Pike + searching for the best Italian sandwiches around in his

Food & Convo met up w/Hsu Palma's Bakery & Café Sorrento for an education on Italian sandwiches + the difference between a sub, grinder + hero (join the debate in the comments) + a conversation about the state of terrestrial radio in the age of digital music.

Shout to Monika + the folks at Palma's for an amazing spread + incredible hospitality.

Thanks to Che Anderson mom for blessing us w/her presence (listen to find out why he looks like a judge).

Listen, share, subscribe: foodandconvo.com/post/food-convo-podcast-ep-11-mike-hsu-and-the-great-italiangrinderodyssey

Post Production by l

Went to Wholly Cannoli and left with so many questions...

🧨 Dynamite sticks?!?🧨 How have we never had these before? How does the caramel and cannoli filling get inside the chocolate crunch shell? Why didn’t we stop eating it to take a picture of the inside? Why didn’t we order more of them?

Side note: Palma's Bakery & Café Sorrento is a 2 minute walk from Wholly Cannoli. Is there such thing as a cannoli crawl?

Our April small business giveaway is with Palma's Bakery & Café Sorrento ❤

A wonderful, small family business located in Worcester!

Follow us on Instagram and keep an eye out for our giveaway post tomorrow! You don't want to miss this one.

Two $30 gift cards. One could have your name on it!!

The most delicious eggplant parm hot grinder I have had! Thank you!

Wow, it took awhile but we’ve finally finished our give away, $1000 in gift cards to 4 local restaurants, broken down into $250 gift cards each and broken down even further to 20 $50 gift cards to give away to those working SO hard during these difficult times. We gave gift cards to nurses, teachers, officers, small business owners and we wish we could’ve given more! ⠀
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Thank you all for sharing your stories with us! We are grateful to be a part of this community! ⠀
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The last round of winners are: ⠀
Buck's Whiskey & Burger Bar- Katie Simone, an ICU RN at UMASS⠀
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Palma's Bakery & Café Sorrento- Ashley Margossian, a Cath Lab NP who switched her role to a critical care nurse to work with covid patients. ⠀
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The Queen's Cups - Erinn, an ICU RN at UMASS, her husband is also a hardworking firefighter ⠀
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Flying Rhino - Michaela Hamilton an ICU RN at UMASS.

Gift Card Winners Round 4

We took some time off but we have had so many submissions for gift cards that we are continuing to pick names! ⠀
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Today’s winners are: ⠀
Buck's Whiskey & Burger Bar gift card: Sandra Sklarz - works on the front lines as a nurse⠀
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Palma's Bakery & Café Sorrento gift card: Danielle Friend - works at Dellovo’s and at the Worcester Police Department ⠀
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The Queen's Cups gift card: Bill and Donna Moore - they run New Hope Inc. Non-Profit Veterans Organization which is a nonprofit supporting Veterans in the area ⠀
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Flying Rhino gift card: Erica Dodge - works as a nurse at UMASS. ⠀
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Thank you so much for all that you do to support our community during these trying times. If you are interested in winning a gift card for someone who is working hard to give back - tag them below! Last round of winners announced Tuesday!

We had a very special guest pick the 3rd round of gift card winners! Thank you everyone for continuing to tag your hard working loved ones! Keep following along, one more round with the chance to win coming up!
Today’s winners:

Buck's Whiskey & Burger Bar- Brittney McDonald and Julie Yaskoski they own Great Adventure Preschool and are working hard to keep families connected during this time.

Palma's Bakery & Café Sorrento- Colleen Callahan Panday she works at WPI providing essential services to International Students

Flying Rhino- Luke Trudeau he is a hard-working CO at the Worcester County Shreiff’s office

The Queen's Cups - Brittany Paulhus - a hard-working nurse at UMASS (Brittany we apologize that my hand-writing is difficult to read 😂)