53, Haig Road (Marine Drive), Colombo 3
Open 8.00 AM to 8.00 PM
Don's Deli is a little bakery on Marine Drive that doubles as a favourite spot for lamprais, and they also serve seafood at Fat Crab upstairs.
Don's Deli aka Don Stanley's is an establishment that's been around for a very long time and they're known for their catering business, mostly through their pavilion restaurant The Fat Crab. We dropped by the deli on Marine Drive and sampled their shorteats.
Don's Deli is a small, comfy, barely furnished space. The deli opens at 8AM but if you plan on having a meal, you can either ask for their famed lamprais, or head upstairs to The Fat Crab which opens at noon. The place is A/Ced with a nice glass view of the passing Marine Drive traffic and the ocean. Service is what it is, in a small mainstream bakery where you get your order over the counter.
Don's Deli serves a cheesecake that has come highly recommended from its start-up days. We tried it, and it's rather expensive at 500 bucks, but it's tasty - soft moussey cheesecake, sweet and slathered in real strawberry sloshed around with jam and sauce. By ordinary bakery standards, the cheesecake is good, despite the hefty price.
We also tried some other stuff - the brownie, the maalu paan, the eclairs, the mushroom & chicken pie. This stuff is more bakery priced at Rs. 80-125. The brownie is actually not bad (there aren't a load of easy stops that do takeaway brownie), it's very thick and chocolatey, although a little hard from being stored a while. These guys make a good maalu paan, it isn't amazeballs like the toppers of our maalu paan taste-off, but it's quite decent served warm, with plenty of fish and potato.
The eclair as with most bakeries was a hit and miss, the choux pastry was too hard - head further down Marine Drive to Yumi Cake for better eclairs. I loved the chicken and mushroom pie, it costs Rs. 80 and is big and buttery, and stuffed generously with fat chunks of chicken - it's a great choice if you're wandering around looking for good shorteats. They make a good strong iced coffee here too.
We didn't try the Don's Deli lamprais on this visit but we did for our great lamprais taste-off - and it won a spot at the top of our list. For Rs. 475, this is a pretty satisfying meal, especially if the meat in your lamprais is important to you. Just make sure you get here by about noon because as with all big lamprais contenders, the packets are quick to disappear.
Don's Deli does decent pastries, sandwiches and desserts, if you're in the neighborhood and want a quick bite. We'd say it's worth more the visit for their lamprais, and maybe some late night crab curry upstairs.
Don's Deli is a little bakery on Marine Drive that doubles as a favourite spot for lamprais, and they also serve seafood at Fat Crab upstairs.
The original Don's was an institution. The new establishment on Marine Drive, however, seems to be still finding its legs. Don's Deli has a great location and a range of stuff you can order in advance (crab, pasta). What they have on immediate offer, however, is rather limited, for now.
සිංහල ''රයිස් ඇන්ඩ් කරි නම් නෑ. ලම්ප්රයිස් තමයි තියෙන්නෙ''
සිංහල මුල් ඩොන්ස් ආයතනය ඉතා ප්රසිද්ධ එකක්. මැරීන් ඩ්රයිව්හි අලුතින් පිහිටුවන ලද ඩොන්ස් ඩිලිඑක තවම නැගිටිමින් ඉන්නවා. ඩොන්ස් ඩිලි පිහිටා තිබෙන්නේ අනගි තැනක. එහි ඔබ කැමති කකුළුවන්, පැස්ටා වැනි දේ කලින් ඇණවුම්කර ලබාගන්න පුළුවන්. ඒ මොහොතේ මිළට ගන්න තිබෙන දේ දැනටනම් අඩුයි.
Address
53, Haig Road (Marine Drive), Colombo 3
Directions
Haig Road off Galle Road is a skip away from Majestic City - head down the road to Marine Drive and you'll find the deli on your left.
Contacts
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Open 8.00 AM to 8.00 PM
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dissapointed
I went to this place few days ago. Do NOT waste time going here. It's useless. The hot dog was tasteless. The fish bun was horrible. The cream bun had a very "artificial" sort of flavor. Also, the place is very very small tucked in Marine Drive ( out of way). Not worth the drive also.
Mozerella
The lamprais are amazing and the cheese cake is to die for!
donny
the photos of cheese cake look very unappetizing
Adam
Rps.550 for that piece of cheesecake?
I though Coffee beans' price is the highest…
kannan
cheese cake image looks horrible !!
John
they have just expanded, and have a more extensive menu. I believe the refurbishment is complete and the other parts of the restaurant will be fully operational in mid october according to the website http://www.dstanleys.com… I cant wait, the good old don stanley's is back :)
Henryfernanado
one of the best cheese in Sri Lanka UM………….MAMA MEYA!!!!!!!!!!!
Mathumai
Wanted a chocolaty cake or something sweet , quickly checked yamu , for a good deal. The stopped in by don's deli(close by to my place). Unfortunately to my disspointment the road side patissere did not have a wide collection of sweets, only had big chunks of butter , chocolate , love cakes and brownies. Looked temptingand delicious. The aroma of chocoloate cake and presentation impressed me. Hence i am a die hard fan of love cakes, wanted to give a try for that too.
grabbed a piece of chocolate and love cake . The damage to my purse was 275.00(150 for choc.cake and 125 for love cake . Expensive dessert
I tried it , it tasted heavenly .
Chocolate cake , exceeded my expectation. it was not the usual choc cake , i've had upto now. The cream was little more like dark chocolote and spongy layers were sweet and creamy chocolate taste .
Love cake was a bit too sweet(may be because they used wine ), but was good. For me chocoloate cake was a jackpot indeed.
Very big piece , which can be shared with two people(if yr diet controlled).
it was the lady at the cashier counter, she was courteous and friendly. Both the pieces were packed in a regiform box and given
The lady kept the big junk of choc cake side ways , to avoid icing gettign smudged , which was a good though
More over a good deal , but a little too expensive
yosh
they seem to have been improved of there food well the cheese cake is more tempting and it taste better i think they have a price which is worth for?????
Araj
Do not order food to be picked up from here unless you don't mind them not fulfilling your order…Absolutely no coordination between the manager and the counter girl in taking down the time you want to pick up an order from here…we wanted to pick up an order at 7pm but they have managed to write it down as 1pm…the arragont counter girl does not have an iota of customer centric service quality in her body at all…blaming us for coming at the wrong time n being very flippant towards us…pathetic service levels…Do not count on them to deliver for a big occasion cos the way their processors are and the quality of the people working for them, you can only imagine how much quality goes into the preparation of the food…