Deep in the heart of every New Yorker lies a strongly held belief that is difficult to express: There is a distinction between a bodega and a deli.

NY1 traffic reporter Jamie Stelter opened a Goya-size can of worms on Wednesday when she asked her followers about the two types of corner stores.

“Serious NYC question: what is the difference between a deli and a bodega?” she wrote on Twitter, alongside a photo of herself at Strawberry Deli on 14th and Ninth. “Is it what they sell? Is it just a feeling you get when you’re inside? Is there even a difference?”

Her followers — who mostly agreed that she was in a deli — responded swiftly, name-checking certain hallmarks of the different shops.

Only bodegas, some argued, sell loosies — single cigarettes, pried from a pack — while a hot/cold salad bar is a sure sign of a deli. Some thought it was a cultural thing: If the owners are from a Spanish-speaking country, it’s more likely a bodega (the word is Spanish for “cellar”) than a deli. Others thought it was more about neighborhood slang: Both types of stores can sell bacon, egg and cheeses, but if you spot a cat? Then you’re definitely in a bodega, consensus ruled.

But what do bodega and deli owners think? Well, for one, that the terms are most certainly not interchangeable.

Cashier Ahmed at Harlem’s Omega Deli and Grill, at 125th Street and St. Nicholas, bristles at the thought of his store being confused for a bodega.

“You can tell the difference right away,” says Ahmed, who declined to give his last name. He bases his argument on the store’s robust deli counter and organic packaged food, which includes Tory’s roasted Korean seaweed snacks and gluten-free rice rolls.

“A bodega is more of a store that has groceries than actual prepared food,” he says. “This is cleaner, brighter . . . and we don’t have a cat.”

“Usually delis are a little bit more upscale,” agrees Alla Saleh, a cashier at Healthy Market Foods in Hell’s Kitchen, a deli that sells, among other things, a $6.95 “daily detox” smoothie. “In a bodega, the ceilings are low, and it smells like cheap mop liquids.”

But bodega workers dismiss those claims as deli snobbery.

“A bodega is more old-school,” says Oscar Paulus, of Harlem’s Assary Grocery. “We’re a bodega!”

His loyal customer, local Gabriella Marte, agrees — and says that’s a good thing. “Even in a tiny bodega, you can still find everything you need at home — even if you run out of shaving cream or Scotch tape,” says Marte.

Bodega owners also take issue with the claim that they don’t serve real food. Brenda Cruz, who owns a bodega called Lazaro in Hell’s Kitchen, says that her from-scratch dishes are a point of pride.

“We have rice and beans, cassava and plantains,” says Cruz, who is originally from the Dominican Republic and also sells groceries such as laundry detergent, Spam and batteries at her store. “I’m proud to own this, because it’s hard to find real Spanish food.”

Stelter, whose social-media accounts have been blowing up all day with locals’ opinions, isn’t surprised to hear that even deli and bodega owners disagree on this important topic.

“It’s just one of those New York City things you can’t quite articulate, but you know it when you see it, and you will fight tooth and nail for it,” Stelter tells The Post.

Even the most universally agreed-upon point — that only bodegas have cats — isn’t ironclad.

“We’re the real-deal [deli],” insists Healthy Market’s Saleh. “But we do have a cat.”