Stanlieo's Sub Villa

A Huntsville original dating to 1971, Stanlieo’s Sub Villa has spent more than five decades feeding the city from its two longtime locations on Governors Drive and Jordan Lane. The old-school sub shop is best known for the Kitchen Sink, a gloriously overstuffed combination of deli meats, cheeses and toppings, but the menu runs through hot and cold subs, steak sandwiches, meatball and sausage sandwiches, salads and other no-frills sandwich-shop staples. It’s the kind of locally specific institution that predates Huntsville’s current restaurant boom by decades and has survived long enough for multiple generations to have a Stanlieo’s order of their own.The Kitchen Sink was the first sandwich I ever loved, which was a pretty major achievement for a kid who considered pepperoni, cheese and crackers a perfectly reasonable food group. Stanlieo’s also lives in a much deeper corner of my Huntsville food memory. During my mama’s final days at Huntsville Hospital, chemo had wrecked her taste buds, and I spent those days running around town trying to find anything she might still be able to taste or enjoy. Stanlieo’s was one of those stops. Some restaurants hold more than your order. They remember people with you. ORDER RADAR: Kitchen Sink, obviously. Come hungry