{"id":4790,"date":"2011-11-11T11:13:16","date_gmt":"2011-11-11T11:13:16","guid":{"rendered":"http:\/\/www.jomec.co.uk\/altcardiff\/?p=4790"},"modified":"2011-11-11T11:13:16","modified_gmt":"2011-11-11T11:13:16","slug":"cardiff-character-harriett-davies","status":"publish","type":"post","link":"https:\/\/cardiffjournalism.co.uk\/altcardiff\/2011\/11\/11\/cardiff-character-harriett-davies\/","title":{"rendered":"Cardiff Character: Harriett Davies"},"content":{"rendered":"<h2>Harriett Davies came to Wales for love and stayed for life<\/h2>\n<div class=\"mceTemp mceIEcenter\">\n<div id=\"attachment_4881\" class=\"wp-caption aligncenter\" style=\"width: 480px\"><a href=\"https:\/\/cardiffjournalism.co.uk\/altcardiff\/wp-content\/uploads\/sites\/13\/2011\/11\/food_harriett_big.jpg\"><img decoding=\"async\" loading=\"lazy\" class=\"size-full wp-image-4881\" title=\"food_harriett_big\" src=\"https:\/\/cardiffjournalism.co.uk\/altcardiff\/wp-content\/uploads\/sites\/13\/2011\/11\/food_harriett_big.jpg\" alt=\"\" width=\"480\" height=\"220\" srcset=\"https:\/\/cardiffjournalism.co.uk\/altcardiff\/wp-content\/uploads\/sites\/13\/2011\/11\/food_harriett_big.jpg 480w, https:\/\/cardiffjournalism.co.uk\/altcardiff\/wp-content\/uploads\/sites\/13\/2011\/11\/food_harriett_big-300x138.jpg 300w\" sizes=\"auto, (max-width: 480px) 100vw, 480px\" \/><noscript><img decoding=\"async\" class=\"size-full wp-image-4881\" title=\"food_harriett_big\" src=\"https:\/\/cardiffjournalism.co.uk\/altcardiff\/wp-content\/uploads\/sites\/13\/2011\/11\/food_harriett_big.jpg\" alt=\"\" width=\"480\" height=\"220\" srcset=\"https:\/\/cardiffjournalism.co.uk\/altcardiff\/wp-content\/uploads\/sites\/13\/2011\/11\/food_harriett_big.jpg 480w, https:\/\/cardiffjournalism.co.uk\/altcardiff\/wp-content\/uploads\/sites\/13\/2011\/11\/food_harriett_big-300x138.jpg 300w\" sizes=\"(max-width: 480px) 100vw, 480px\" \/><\/noscript><\/a><p class=\"wp-caption-text\">Harriett Davies owner of the New York Deli<\/p><\/div><\/div>\n<p>Deli life is hectic, particularly when you\u2019re one of the most established and best loved lunch spots in town. The New York Deli has been a fixture of the High Street Arcade for the past 21 years and for each of those years owner Harriett Davies has been at the helm, guiding the business through the highs and lows.<\/p>\n<p>Harriett is not a Welsh native, it was the love of a Welshman that lured her from the East coast of America to Wales\u2019s chilly shores, and it was the love of Wales itself which has kept her here for nearly 30 years. Sadly, Harriett\u2019s husband passed away shortly after they and their young son Bryce moved to Wales, \u201cWe were here 18 months, he found a brain tumour in the February and died in the March, we had one month.\u201d Despite this tragic turn of events, Harriett decided Wales was home for her and Bryce so they stayed. Harriett said, \u201cI had no desire to go back at all because Bryce\u2019s whole family were in Bedwas. Why on earth would I want to leave that and take my son away from an entire group of family in one place? I\u2019ve always loved it here.\u201d<\/p>\n<p>Although Harriett arrived in Wales in 1985, it was 1990 before she set up the deli. Prior to starting her business, she worked with the Welsh Rugby Union through the Welsh Institute of Sport (WIS). Around the time of the 1987 World Cup, Harriett became involved in educating coaches on injury prevention and helped write up the level one coaching course. She continued to teach at WIS and it was during this time she and a friend started thinking of setting up a business together. Harriett remembers, \u201cWe thought and thought and I just said flippantly one day, \u2018you know they always say there\u2019s nothing like a New York deli\u2019 and we just looked at each other and it was like ping!\u201d<\/p>\n<p>It wasn\u2019t all plain sailing from that moment though, \u201cAfter one year in business we could have written a book the size of War and Peace on what we didn\u2019t know about the business, you learn as you go along.\u201d<\/p>\n<p>Harriett\u2019s business partner left after six years, so for the last 15 years she has been running the deli with the support of a close-knit staff, \u201cIf I wanted clones to work for me I\u2019d hire normal people, everybody that works for me is weird in their own way and that\u2019s what makes it fun.\u201d Her longest serving employee, Mike, did work experience for her when he was just 14, he\u2019s now 27, so aside from the occasional break and other job offer, he has been with her for 13 years. She speaks of her staff with the same motherly tones she uses to talk of her son and it\u2019s apparent they are more of a family than work colleagues.<\/p>\n<p>The New York Deli has managed to survive through tough times, battling not only the recession but also road works which limited access to the High Street Arcade and saw other businesses fail. Harriett owes this survival to her loyal customers and her commitment to quality food and service, \u201cIf prices go up on my supplies, I don\u2019t put less in my sandwiches I have to raise my prices because I will not sacrifice on the product.\u201d<\/p>\n<p>Running a deli for over 20 years Harriett has had all manner of strange sandwich requests, \u201cWe had quite an error in the menu once, it was supposed to be turkey and cranberry and my printer got it wrong and put tuna and cranberry, I was thinking \u2018why are all these people asking me for tuna and cranberry, has there been something on the news I don\u2019t know about?\u2019\u201d<\/p>\n<p>If anyone is ever stuck for what to order in the deli she points them towards the Harriett Special, \u201cMy favourite thing was always the cinnamon raisin bagel with cream cheese, ham, and sweet Thai chilli sauce.\u201d<\/p>\n<p>Harriett loves her time in the deli, but now, aged 60, she has become a grandmother which she describes as, \u201cthe most fun thing ever know to man,\u201d and is enjoying spending as much time as she can with her young grandson. \u201cAll the mistakes you made as a parent, all the time you didn\u2019t have with your children, with my grandson I just clear the schedule and spend every moment having a great time with him.\u201d<\/p>\n<p>Harriett has no regrets about staying in Wales, regarding it as home, having spent the last 30 years living and working here, \u201cIt\u2019s been a really good life; I look back on my life and think how lucky I am.\u201d<\/p>\n<p>&nbsp;<\/p>\n","protected":false},"excerpt":{"rendered":"<p>Harriett Davies came to Wales for love and stayed for life Deli life is hectic, particularly when you\u2019re one of the most established and best loved lunch spots in town. The New York Deli has been a fixture of the High Street Arcade for the past 21 years and for each of those years owner Harriett Davies has been at the helm, guiding the business through the highs and lows. Harriett is not a Welsh native, it was the love [&hellip;]<\/p>\n","protected":false},"author":252,"featured_media":4926,"comment_status":"open","ping_status":"open","sticky":false,"template":"","format":"standard","meta":{"_exactmetrics_skip_tracking":false,"_exactmetrics_sitenote_active":false,"_exactmetrics_sitenote_note":"","_exactmetrics_sitenote_category":0,"footnotes":""},"categories":[21],"tags":[22,1081,1082,1083],"coauthors":[],"class_list":["post-4790","post","type-post","status-publish","format-standard","has-post-thumbnail","hentry","category-food","tag-food-2","tag-harriett-davies","tag-new-york-deli","tag-sandwiches"],"yoast_head":"<!-- This site is optimized with the Yoast SEO plugin v25.2 - https:\/\/yoast.com\/wordpress\/plugins\/seo\/ -->\n<title>Cardiff Character: Harriett Davies - alt.cardiff<\/title>\n<meta name=\"robots\" content=\"index, follow, max-snippet:-1, max-image-preview:large, max-video-preview:-1\" \/>\n<link rel=\"canonical\" href=\"https:\/\/cardiffjournalism.co.uk\/altcardiff\/2011\/11\/11\/cardiff-character-harriett-davies\/\" \/>\n<meta property=\"og:locale\" content=\"en_GB\" \/>\n<meta property=\"og:type\" content=\"article\" \/>\n<meta property=\"og:title\" content=\"Cardiff Character: Harriett Davies - alt.cardiff\" \/>\n<meta property=\"og:description\" content=\"Harriett Davies came to Wales for love and stayed for life Deli life is hectic, particularly when you\u2019re one of the most established and best loved lunch spots in town. 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