Paul Barker is the hero of heroes, the savant of sandwiches, the guru of grinders.
“Sandwiches are my passion. It’s what I do. I love my wife and my kids, but I love sandwiches.”
At Pauli’s in Boston’s North End, he has come up with some crazy concoctions.
“We’ll make anything into a sandwich. Whatever you want – we’ll sandwichcize that. I don’t know if that’s a word, but we’ll put that into a sandwich.”
This sandwich spot may be small, but Pauli’s pumps out dozens of mouthwatering grinders that you probably can’t find at your average sub shop.
“What we do with sandwiches, we just take it up a notch. We try to do things that are unique and different, and most of all tasty.”
Night and day, Paul obsesses over his sandwiches, trying to come up with the next big thing to put on a bun.
“I love to get up in the morning and say, ‘Let’s come up with something different. Let’s come up with a new idea. Let’s come up with something that’s just off the wall.’”
With so many sandwiches being invented on a daily basis, there’s almost too much to choose from.
“We have so many different varieties and so many great sandwiches that people get mesmerized. They don’t know what to pick,” Paul said. “But once they get a sandwich, they get hooked on that sandwich and they’ll have that sandwich over and over again.”
