Castagnola Deli & Café — Restaurant in Capitola

The guy at the counter should not be working here. He should not even be around people. The person at that counter hates his job and he thought it would be okay to take it out on me. Not okay. I asked for an ice tea. Initially he poured me a cup out of an almost empty pitcher of ice tea. So, I asked him if he had a fresher brew, and if he could kindly pour me a new cup from that fresh brew. Then he began acting like a child, acting as if pouring tea over ice was some kind of inconvenience. At that point I stopped him and requested he give me a refund. The ice tea was 3 dollars plus a .48 cents tip. I told him to give me back 3 bucks, and keep the tip as an oject lesson in customer service. Customer service is a skill that has to be learned. Whomever assigned that particular person to deal directly with customers has made a terrible mistake that should be corrected at once. I should also add, after I told him to keep the tip, a tip which he clearly did not earn, his response should have been "no please take bak your money I can't possibly accept that." Instead, his reply was "go on get out of here." How crazy is that? Ironically, that is exactly what...

1st time I ate their pastrami sandwich I was already impressed. Recently spoke with owner's daughter who informed me that almost everything is home made by them except the prepackaged items like candy. But besides the sandwiches the salads are fresh and they put them in plastic trays which I thought the salads were store bought. Individual salads are definitely not store bought. The tomato basil soup was so good and I knew it was made that day and not from some can. Although Zeldas is a different kind of place I'd pass over Zeldas every time and choose Castagnola. May not have variety that Zeldas has but at Castagnola you feel welcome and treated respectfully. There's more to good tasting food when eating at places. They even make the pastries they sell at Castagnola. Though the food is very good I will go back because of how well they treated me. Lot of restaurants I'd been to have great food but I'd never return if staff acted as if you're doing...

Castagnola is the BEST. I have tried almost every clam chowder in the Santa Cruz area and they have the absolute #1 best, hands down. Like, so good that getting some clam chowder in a bread bowl from Castagnola will make my whole entire day. It's creamy but not too thick, has delicious flavor, perfect balance of potato and clam, they toast the bread bowl to make it all nice and crispy and buttery, the list goes on...and on top of that, Daniel and all the other people who work there are so incredibly warm and nice and I always leave with a smile on my face. I'm not kidding when I say it's the best chowder I've ever had, try it once and you'll never be able to try any other chowders again cause they simply can't even compare...you'll just have to go to Castagnola every couple weeks to get your chowder fix like I do! I love...