Thursday, May 13, 2010

Subs, Grinders, Hoagies...

I'm sure this is the subject of many a food blog, but what do YOU call a giant sandwich from a deli?  Where I grew up in Connecticut, in what was considered part of the NY Metro suburbs, with Italian family roots, we called them grinders. And they ruled. Real crusty bread from a good bakery, and good deli meats. When I lived in the Town Plot section of Waterbury, we would get the most amazing grinders at D'Amelio's (back when it was only a deli and not a restaurant!).  Any place that makes a good Eggplant Parm grinder rates in my book.

When we moved to Vermont, nobody called them grinders. Not enough paisan here. Here they are called subs, and it's hard to find a good one.  It was even more interesting to me when we used to visit my sister in Portland, Maine, where they called them "Italians".  Of course we all know they're hoagies in Philly. Torpedos, po'boys, etc. There's a whole wikipedia entry here.

So my husband was intrigued when he started grad school in Rutland, VT, to hear of a famous deli called Gill's.  They don't compare to a good old NY deli hero, but they are pretty good for Vermont. Great bread, good veggies, good size!  Today Will was back up in Rutland, and anticipating the disruption to the dinner hour during lacrosse season, he sent me a txt asking if I wanted him to pick up subs for dinner---of course!


Fast forward to dinner time and I've eaten way too much big sandwich. 1/2 chedder and veggie, and 1/2 of a crabmeat sub (real crab too, not all that fake stuff). Does the walk with the dogs cancel out any of it?

For picky Kira, who won't eat from places she's never been, even if it's ingredients she likes, it was Amy's to the rescue. The best canned soup on the market, Lentil is her favorite.


Now I'm thinking about other good delis. I really miss them here. No one knew what an egg and cheese on a hard roll was here either.  They don't have hard rolls. Don't get me started on bagels.

Once I got to take my students on a weekend trip to Philadelphia, where a local businessman whose son lived in Vermont showed us around the city, and took us to the famous 4th Street Deli.  Some day I'd like to go  to Katz's in New York City, where the famous scene in When Harry Met Sally took place.





2 comments:

  1. After traveling quite a bit to various cities around the country - there really aren't delis the way that we have in the NY metro area. There's a ton here in New Haven that we should try out.

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  2. You know I'm always game for exploring food!

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