Jreck Subs

Jreck Subs is an old standby, especially for me at the location we are writing up for the Julie/MomProject at 61 Market St., Potsdam NY. It was here over twenty years ago when I was attending college and its still here, though most other business offices adjacent to it have switched hands or are unoccupied now.

This popular chain has locations listed in the North Country This Week's Spring Restaurant Guide for Canton, Massena, Ogdensburg, Gouverneur and Malone. As I see these other towns listed, I note that the Guide's listings are all in St Lawrence County (New York State's largest) but certainly is not inclusive of all restaurants in the county. This is a good thing for the Project, because we really can't go tooling off to Gouverneur all the time to eat out. Thankfully, most of the places are in reasonable distance to, or in Potsdam, where we live.

It was early in August and I had taken my girls out shopping for dresses for them to wear for the upsoming season of weddings and bridal showers. We walked the two blocks to downtown from our house to the used clothing stores, Kidz Closet and the CORC, then hit the Isle of You's summer sale. Though we passed Jreck Subs along the way, we still had to drive to Walmart as we had only found one dress, no shoes and there are no other options for clothes in town. After successfully completing our shopping, we were hungry and Jreck's was calling. It was about 7:30 PM and the long summer daylight was still with us for the pleasant stroll back downtown.

Its a pretty good place for fast food. The rolls, cold cuts, cheeses and toppings are fresh while there is still the selection for greasy fried hot food as well. MJ and Julie both got the "meal deal" that gets you a drink and side with your submarine sandwhich. Both got the curly fries side, a personal favorite of mine which they shared with me, thus reducing the overall fat and salt content of their meals.

And Julie could use some reducing... she ordered the fried chicken on a white roll with nothing else on it, no lettuce or tomato or cheese, nothing. I guess it could've been worse since she didn't have mayo either, but wow. White bread around batter fried chicken just seems like a bland, fiber-free, carbohydrate/fat calories, bludgeon of doom. She got a lemonade. MJ always gets the same thing here, ham and swiss on a white roll with lettuce and diced pickle. She got a root beer, always her beverage of choice when allowed to have a soda pop eating out. I usually force the girls to at least get their subs on a wheat roll, but I didn't think in time before they ordered.

I went with the sandwich du jour - Turkey Bacon Ranch. Oh yes. All ya gotta say is BACON to me! I had it put on the roll du mois, garlic and dill... WITH some extra Thousand Island dressing to go with the Ranch dressing. It turns out they will actually put on ALL of the dressings if you really want and I was tempted to just slap some mayo on there too, but thought better of it. My waistline has paid the worst price of a year away from the physical work I am accustomed to doing, though at this point the extra mayo could hardly make that much of a difference. Especially since I was helping to reduce Julie's fat calorie load by eating most of her curly fries. I chose provolone cheese to go with the usual suspects, lettuce, onion, tomato, and hot pepper.

I was thinking there should be more toppings, like bell pepper and black olives, but I guess it is one of the those smaller versions of Jreck's. They still have the grill for all the hot sub variteies. I usually get the "Philly" steak and cheese with grilled onions and peppers... dripping greasy goodness! Julie has done the hot meatball sub, too. (MJ always gets the plain ham and cheese.) But, it was a hot August night and cold subs were the way to go. The hot bacon I got on mine quickly cooled off in the bath of cold fat dressings.

We all ordered whole subs and I wondered "what the heck was I thinking?" as we went to sit down with this massive tray of food. As it turns out, MJ and Julie ate their whole subs and I took most of one half of mine home. It was delicious the next day, Homer Simpson's voice in my head saying, "mmmmmm... saaandwiiich".

The Bagelry

Oh, The Bagelry! In the heart of downtown Potsdam, NY at 9 Market Street, this choice little specialty sandwich shop is near and dear to my heart. Back in my youth, eh hem, of college in the mid to late 80's, The Bagelry was a shining beacon of gastronomic desire. Alas, it still is. It is worthy of a food pilgrimage across a continent to indulge in a type of food that is simply not available in the USA properly west of the Mississippi River. At least not in my experience, and I have lived and traveled across the continental United States to Hawaii. You simply CANNOT get a properly made bagel outside of the northeast except in a few very rare places, which I did not live in and have only heard about from possibly suspect sources.

When I lived in Wyoming for years, I once had my visiting mother-in-law from the Potsdam area bring me garlic bagels from The Bagelry on the airplane. Though quadruple bagged, the garlic fumes of her carry-on baggage turned heads on the plane. I was sooo grateful for her sacrifice. Even three day old bagels from the Bagelry are a Godsend in the wasteland of Wyoming, where we bought bready "bagels"at the grocery store to serve as hamburger buns.

A perfect, delicate crispness to the exterior coupled with a softly dense interior is just pure culinary artistic mastery. Though I now miss many types of regional cuisine from my travels, there was nothing I missed more than being away from a proper bagel for the last twenty plus years. And now, I am back! And The Bagelry is more than just dear to my heart, it is NEAR again.

As readers of this blog know, I lost my camera. I had planned to take a picture of the lovely bins of seasoned and other variety bagels to post with this. (Edit: my friend took a picture recently and I have now added it, YAY!) There are plain, wheat, sesame, onion, garlic, cinnamon raisin, italian, salt, poppy seed, everything, oh... Then, of course, you have the toppings or sandwich selections to be made. All sorts of tuna melt, breakfast egg, Gobble (deli turkey), Nova Lox (with cream cheese, onion and capers), Fresser (piles of different deli meats with cheese), Reuben, ham-n-cheese, etc. That list is huge and I can't possibly remember them all.

Back in town, we come here often now, almost always just to get a half or baker's dozen to bring home to make up ourselves. This day in early June, Julie and I decided to have breakfast here before school as a treat. Julie had never tried the lox spread (lox mixed with cream cheese) and I had a feeling she would like it, fond as she is of cream cheese and also has a taste for fishy stuff, as do I. We were picking up a half dozen to go (wheat, cin-raisin, garlic) and then got a prepared toasted garlic bagel with lox spread to eat in, split between us. I got onion and tomato on my half and we each got a pickle slice. Nice breakfast... I sent her to school with garlic, salmon and pickle on her breath!

We sat at the outdoor tables on the sidewalk of old downtown. It was a beautiful morning, still cool at the street corner by the Raquette River. There was a light breeze and long shadows of the morning to escape into, but you could tell it was going to get hot this day. When we were finished, I sent Julie to school on her bicycle from there. It is nice to be back in Potsdam!

Foxy Roxy

Foxy Roxy is a little diner open for breakfast and lunch at 124 Market St, Potsdam, NY. It was early June, school was still in session winding down Julie's last year in elementary (4th grade) and she had a science exam to take. Her teacher had told the students to eat a good, high protein breakfast to prepare their brains best for the test. So, we decided to knock this place off the list and make test preparation a little more fun at the same time.

Its a cozy, clean, little place with small booths in addition to the tables. The decor is hunting and fishing theme with outdoor scene pictures on the walls. The menu is typical breakfast and lunch diner fare. I noted something called "stuffed french toast" that didn't describe what it was, and also blueberry bagels that sounded good. I'm very particular about my bagels and we have a bagel restaurant in town (coming up next blog), so I am wary of the quality of this particular item since The Bagelry doesn't make blueberry bagels. I would be sadly disappointed if it was of the "Lender's" style mass produced drudgery. I will ask first before I decide to try this in the future. Should ask about the stuffed french toast, too. I also noted grilled cheese and bacon as well as the Foxy Roxy Sandwich: a grilled swiss, bacon and turkey. Mmmmmm... bacon.

We both got the special, 3 eggs, home fries, choice of meat, toast and coffee. I ordered my meal with bacon, eggs poached hard, and hold the toast. I always order my eggs cooked hard to be sure that the white is thoroughly cooked and not because I don't like soft yolks. I just hate it when the white is still runny. These eggs had a slightly soft yolk, which was just fine. The home fries are large size potato chunks. Julie ordered hers with sausage patties, scrambled, and hold the coffee! She got a glass of orange juice to go with her meal and I got a glass of water for thirst quenching purposes.

It was a big breakfast and Julie couldn't finish hers, so we put the remains in a box and I brought it back home to her Dad, who doesn't eat meat (I finished her sausage) but has an insatiable desire for fried potatoes.

We did our ongoing lessons of percentages to figure out the tip. I make Julie do it, having showed her how easy it is to calculate ten percent then add another half of that to get fifteen or double it to get twenty. We usually always leave twenty and never leave only ten percent. Part of the tip lesson is the reality of waiting tables as a very low-paying job premised on the expectation of tips. Food is life and so is making a living serving it. The gratuity is all about the gratitude we have for our blessings.