Shelter Island deli owner Ronald Miller half-jokingly said he faced a tough choice in changing careers from financial management: become an Uber driver or open a deli.
\nMiller\u2019s original notion was to lease a Bentley (which he couldn\u2019t afford) and use it for Uber driving. But an employee nixed his retirement plan, crunching the numbers and noting Uber driving wouldn\u2019t pay for the lease. “So I guess it\u2019s a deli,” decided Miller by default.
\nRetirement was never an option for the 74-year-old Miller, who recently opened Paragon Deli Cafe at 2724 Shelter Island Drive.
\n“This\u00a0is\u00a0my retirement,” he quipped. “I never want to quit.”
\nA CFO for numerous high-profile companies like Bumble Bee Tuna over the years, Miller felt the call to return to the restaurant business. It was something he did previously for six years back in the \u201960s working his way through SDSU.
\n“I worked full-time as a dishwasher\/busboy, helped wait tables, then worked up to the cooking side preparing food,” he said. “I just enjoy serving people. I\u2019ve had big parties at my house, like my Labor Day party with 110 people \u2013 and I cooked all that food myself.”
\nWhy a deli then? “Just because I had an interest in food and serving people,” answered Miller, adding, “I didn\u2019t want the full restaurant gig working evenings and Sundays.”
\nMiller chose Paragon for his business name noting it was a previous menu choice, Pacific Paragon, at a restaurant he worked at. “That\u2019s (also) our signature sandwich here,” he said. “I just duplicated the recipe.”
\nOf his menu, Miller noted it consists of soups, salads and sandwiches.
\n“Our menu has a little bit of a European flair,” he said. “We have French sandwiches, and a big, killer Portuguese sandwich.”
\nHe described building his blockbuster Portuguese special. It starts with bread grilled on both sides, with cheese on each piece, then a stack of beef, ham and sausage with more cheese over the top cooked in the oven. Then you pour sauce over that.\u00a0
\n“It\u2019s really a rich sandwich and filling,” Miller said. “The guys from the boatyards here come in and order it.”
\nParagon is open from 7 a.m. to 3 p.m. daily except Sundays, serving breakfast and lunch. For breakfast you can get eggs any style, plates and sandwiches, oatmeal and trendy avocado toast or French toast. There are a number of coffees available. “We buy our coffee from an Italian, a seven-bean blend, and I happen to think it\u2019s the best coffee here on The Point,” said Miller.\u00a0
\nThere\u2019s also an extensive list of salads for lunch. Sandwiches include Reubens, which are drier than most you\u2019ll find elsewhere. “We make all the soups, tuna and chicken salads here,” said Miller. “The carrot cake is made here. It\u2019s all homemade stuff.”
\nBeer and wine is served at Paragon, which is a family operation with Miller\u2019s children and in-laws participating.
\nThe decor inside Paragon is as artistic as it is eclectic, with items from all over the world collected by Miller.
\nMiller added he put cafe in his business name because he wanted to let people know that Paragon “is more than just a sandwich shop.”
\nWhy come to Paragon?
\n“The quality of the food, the cleanliness and the friendliness,” replied Miller. Paragon Deli Cafe
\n2724 Shelter Island Drive
\nHours: 7 a.m. to 3 p.m. Mondays through Saturdays.
\n619-888-4997<\/p>","protected":false},"excerpt":{"rendered":"
Shelter Island deli owner Ronald Miller half-jokingly said he faced a tough choice in changing careers from financial management: become an Uber driver or open a deli. Miller\u2019s original notion was to lease a Bentley (which he couldn\u2019t afford) and use it for Uber driving. But an employee nixed his retirement plan, crunching the numbers […]<\/p>","protected":false},"author":726,"featured_media":258613,"comment_status":"open","ping_status":"open","sticky":false,"template":"","format":"standard","meta":{"_seopress_robots_primary_cat":"11561","_seopress_titles_title":"Portuguese sandwiches and more at Paragon Deli Cafe","_seopress_titles_desc":"","_seopress_robots_index":"","jnews-multi-image_gallery":[],"jnews_single_post":[],"jnews_primary_category":[],"jnews_social_meta":[],"jnews_override_counter":[],"footnotes":""},"categories":[11551,11561],"tags":[],"class_list":["post-258612","post","type-post","status-publish","format-standard","has-post-thumbnail","hentry","category-news","category-peninsula-beacon"],"_links":{"self":[{"href":"https:\/\/test.sdnews.com\/es\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/posts\/258612","targetHints":{"allow":["GET"]}}],"collection":[{"href":"https:\/\/test.sdnews.com\/es\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/posts"}],"about":[{"href":"https:\/\/test.sdnews.com\/es\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/types\/post"}],"author":[{"embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/test.sdnews.com\/es\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/users\/726"}],"replies":[{"embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/test.sdnews.com\/es\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/comments?post=258612"}],"version-history":[{"count":0,"href":"https:\/\/test.sdnews.com\/es\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/posts\/258612\/revisions"}],"wp:featuredmedia":[{"embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/test.sdnews.com\/es\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/media\/258613"}],"wp:attachment":[{"href":"https:\/\/test.sdnews.com\/es\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/media?parent=258612"}],"wp:term":[{"taxonomy":"category","embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/test.sdnews.com\/es\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/categories?post=258612"},{"taxonomy":"post_tag","embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/test.sdnews.com\/es\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/tags?post=258612"}],"curies":[{"name":"wp","href":"https:\/\/api.w.org\/{rel}","templated":true}]}}