Dino’s Subs & More, from grandson of Rascal House founder Wolfie Cohen, debuts in Fort Lauderdale
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Remember the mouthwatering stacked handhelds from Wolfie Cohen’s Rascal House, South Florida’s hallowed Jewish deli destination toasted on TV shows like “The Golden Girls” and “Miami Vice”?
The spirit of that pastrami-scented nostalgia may live on, perhaps, with Dino’s Subs & More, a Fort Lauderdale shop opened in late November by Scott “Dino” Cohen, Wolfie’s grandson. Here, at an unassuming strip mall west of Fort Lauderdale Executive Airport, Cohen turns out hot ribeye steak subs, meatball parmesans on garlic-brushed Italian rolls and, yes, even housemade corned beef and pastrami.
In a South Florida Sun Sentinel interview this week, Cohen is quick to assert that the new Dino’s Subs is strictly a takeout joint, not a Jewish deli, with zero connection to the Rascal House of yore (the Cohen family sold its stake in the landmark during the late 1990s). Likewise, the Dino’s website makes no reference to the Rascal House, and Cohen says his family has no relationship with the current Sarasota restaurant called The Original Wolfie’s and Wolfie Cohen’s Rascal House, which debuted in November from the team who bought the Cohens’ deli.
That’s hardly stopped customers from recognizing Cohen as the Rascal House’s former catering director, or pointing out the connection in online forums such as the Sun Sentinel-run “Let’s Eat, South Florida” Facebook group.
But Cohen, 66, wants no comparison to his family’s old business — the mighty palaces of kosher-style nosh with locations in Boca Raton, Sunny Isles Beach and South Beach. The past is past. Hoagies are the here and now.
“I’m a foodie, and I’m very passionate about this,” he says. “I’m not here to push any buttons. I’m here to make subs with really good products.”
Cohen’s 800-square-foot counter is a revival of his Dino’s sub-shop business, which operated stands in Tamarac (closed in 2010) and in Hallandale Beach (closed in 1999). Before that, Cohen had his first Dino’s shop in Boston in 1978, on the ground floor of an apartment walk-up owned by his father, Raymond. He also DJed in Boston and South Florida nightclubs and discotheques.
He says a post-pandemic epiphany inspired the new restaurant — and that was his belief that more customers want heat-and-serve meals instead of cooking at home. Dino’s was also inspired by one of Cohen’s favorite local shops, the late Fernanda’s International Market in Fort Lauderdale, which he says sourced its breads from another institution, Croissan’Time French Bakery on Federal Highway.
“The bread there, in my opinion, kills the competition,” Cohen says. “And it makes incredible garlic bread.”
Dino’s Subs uses Croissan’Time’s seeded and unseeded Italian breads and sources its roast beef and turkey from Smitty’s Old Fashioned Butcher Shop in Oakland Park and its chicken from Latinos Supermarket in Deerfield Beach.
The cold cuts and cheese are Italian-imported, he says, and served on antipasto trays and on the Italian Stallion, a specialty handheld with ham, genoa salami and capicola. A housemade garlic spread of pressed garlic, salt, pepper, oregano and parsley is added by default to Dino’s chicken, sausage and meatball parmesans.
And yes, the pastrami and corned beef are served on seeded rye made in-house. “I overseason that pastrami just like my grandfather did,” Cohen says. “I do it exactly the way my family taught me to do it.”
Cohen says he often spends hours on the line stirring cauldrons of meatballs and marinara, making sauces and deep-frying chicken cutlets.
“I sit here like a knucklehead and peel roasted peppers for four hours and marinate them, because you can’t get great roasted peppers from a jar,” he says.
The “& More” portion of the restaurant’s name refers to an off-menu blackboard of rotating specials — and an excuse for off-the-cuff experimentation, what he calls “the stuff out of left field.” Two weeks ago, his chef Kayte Warren prepared glistening trays of salted caramel bread pudding, followed by housemake cookies and chicken gumbo.
On the docket for next week: Muffalettas made with Sicilian sesame bread and Hawaiian burgers topped with pulled pork butt and pineapple slaw.
“(Scott) gives me the freedom to go wild and make whatever I want that day,” Warren says. “Every week, I’m introducing something new. What sub shop ever does that?”
Dino’s Subs & More is located at 6057 NW 31st Ave., Fort Lauderdale. Visit dinosubs.com or call 954-876-1233.
