Animal Boy Owner Shares the Vision Behind His Punk Rock Sandwich Shop in Lauraville

Chris Tsonos was bitten by the cooking bug at the age of 14, while working in a deli in his home state of Virginia.

“It just clicked,” says Tsonos, who has worked in various Baltimore kitchens, including Golden West, Parts & Labor, and The Royal Blue. “There was something about the rhythm of the kitchen that made sense to me.”

That sense of rhythm never left him, in the kitchen—or out of it. A lifelong musician, he once played at the famed CBGB, the birthplace of punk rock. So it stood to reason that when he opened his own cafe, music became his guiding inspiration.

“Animal Boy is a Ramones album,” says Tsonos. “It’s not my favorite Ramones album, but I think it’s one of the coolest names you could have for a sandwich shop—it doesn’t make any sense, but it’s fun.”

Why did you want to own a sandwich shop?
It’s the best way to eat anything. I’ve always liked sandwiches. It’s the perfect vessel to present something in and you can get all kinds of flavors and combinations in a single assembly to enjoy. Who doesn’t love a sandwich?

Is there a connection between being a musician and a cook?
Cooks are more into the wild side of things because working in a kitchen is chaos. It’s organized chaos. That’s like a band. You know where you’re going and what you need but you never know what’s going to happen in between it all. There’s always a wrench to be thrown.

What did you want to do with the décor?
A lot of the vibe of the cafe is based off the album cover, with black, orange, yellow, and blue, and all sorts of random punk stuff.

I know you also use the cafe as a gallery space for artists to hang their work.
We have one piece by an artist by the name of Brian Costello. He did a logo of The Grateful Dead of the skull with the lightning bolt. To make the image, he overlayed the words to their songs to create an image. We rotate our art every first Friday of the month.

Tell me about the menu.
You have to be as classic as you can but I like to do my own twist on things. Of course, there needs to be an Italian hoagie. That’s one of the best sandwiches in the world. Layers of cured meat and vegetables come together for this great mouthfeel. And then there’s SPP. We call it South Philly Pork—I lived in South Philly down the road from John’s Roast Pork, which served roast pork with broccoli rabe. I always thought that was one of the best sandwiches.

How did working in so many kitchens help you open Animal Boy?
After learning from different chefs, I’ve always known I’d open my own place. I kept progressing until slowly, but surely, it turned into Animal Boy.