Russ Zimmer

@RussZimmer

UNION BEACH - Pluggy's Too, one of the most popular purveyors of pork roll on the Jersey Shore, has closed.

The sandwich shop and grocery closed on Jan. 4 to take a week off, according to a sign on the front window, but that temporary break apparently turned permanent.

A post on the shop's Facebook page announced that Pluggy's Too would not be reopening but that the owners cherished their time as “a part of the community, and meeting all the people that make Union Beach the ‘BEST LITTLE TOWN.’ ”

No explanation for the closure was given, the shop's telephone line has been disconnected, and multiple attempts to reach the owners were not immediately successful.

The Facebook post was overwhelmed by fans of the shop, some saying they were "heartbroken" and mourning the loss of "the best P.E.C. in the biz."

Indeed, Pluggy's Too had built a strong reputation behind its $4 pork roll, egg and cheese and the honestly named Belly Buster, which layers egg, bacon, pork roll, sausage, cheese and potatoes.

In a poll last summer, Asbury Park Press readers voted Pluggy's Too as No. 2 in a top 10 of Shore pork roll spots.

The restaurant opened about a month before superstorm Sandy ravaged the borough in October 2012. It was named after Pluggy's Place, a deli that Union Beach restaurateur Gigi Liaguno-Dorr opened on Union Avenue in 1989.

Liaguno-Dorr had named the deli after her father's nickname. She employed Scott Apel, owner of Pluggy's Too, when he was a teenager.

Years later, Liaguno-Dorr said, Apel would ask for her blessing to open his own deli with the name Pluggy's Too and to bring back the original's menu, a gesture she called "heartwarming."

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Slater's Deli in Middletown finished at the top of the Press poll on pork roll. Here's how they make their Slater's Slider:

10 of the Shore's top spots for pork roll

Russ Zimmer: 732-557-5748; razimmer@app.com