Olivia Genthe has been opening restaurants in Dallas neighborhoods that did not know they needed one since 2020. Fount Board & Table in Uptown. Little Blue Bistro in a 980-square-foot house in Bishop Arts. And now Seegars Deli, which opened this spring at 1910 South Harwood Street in the Cedars, next door to Mike’s Gemini Twin, a few blocks from the Dallas Farmers Market. Three concepts, three neighborhoods, the same instinct every time.
The name comes from the street it sits on — Seegar Street, a short stretch of South Dallas that most people pass without knowing. The room looks exactly like a deli should: counter with rotating bar stools, a deli case, checkered paper in plastic baskets. It feels like it opened in 1987. It opened this year.
Genthe calls it nondenominational — not Jewish, not Italian, not New York. A Dallas deli that borrows from all of those traditions without pledging allegiance to any of them, plus a few from her own Midwestern upbringing that Dallas almost never sees, a proper fried pork tenderloin sandwich among them. The turkey and roast beef are made in house. The bread is baked fresh every morning to Seegars’ own spec. Focaccia comes from local market stall Crybaby. Bagels from Lenore’s.
The Seegars Grinder is turkey, ham, and salami with provolone, pepper juice, and Seegar’s sauce on a sesame hoagie roll, with house-made potato chips alongside. The turkey is house-made and it shows — properly seasoned, tender, nothing like the pre-sliced plastic-wrapped version that passes for deli meat everywhere else. The chips are gone before the sandwich is half finished.
The pastrami has arrived too, New York-style on marble rye, with a Reuben build for anyone who wants it hot with kraut and Swiss. There is fried bologna, a summer-ready tomato sandwich with cream cheese, capers, and lemon, house pimento cheese, and a proper martini if the afternoon calls for one, though Genthe is clear that this is a family place first — a third spot for the neighborhood, not a bar with sandwiches.
Seegars Deli is at 1910 South Harwood Street. Call (214) 233-6163 or find current hours and the full menu at seegarsdeli.com.
