In the interest of finding places I haven't been to before, you know, a little bit of housecleaning before we turn off the lights here at Sandwich Bully HQ one last time and move on to our next big adventure (whatever the fuck "adventure" means), I finally went to the Loon Deli at 25th & Lyndale, a one mile straight shot from the apartment. No directions necessary, I don't even have to turn onto another street, I just *boop* this one out.
Why I hadn't been here before is part of the hard discussion: The exterior looks sketchy. But then I have to admit that it looks no different on the outside than say, Hark's, the corner store where I get my paper towels and two Diet Cokes.
People who live outside of NYC and don't have bodegas: where do you go to buy two Diet Cokes, a roll of paper towels, and oh also lemme get some peanut butter m&ms since I'm here, why not
— Alison Leiby (@AlisonLeiby) November 30, 2020
Except I'm in Minneapolis.
Places like Hark's and Tobacco Y Mas, in my neighborhood, look no different from the Loon. The people hanging around outside are no different from the Loon. There's always somebody out front waiting to get a dollar so they can catch a bus out to [insert outer-ring suburb here] or hoping for a cigarette. It's part of the social expectation of living in the city: You have to interact with people who are looking for a little boost. Sometimes it's annoying - you're just not in the mood today for the hassle - and other times you're receptive - "OK, here's a dollar, I don't need your life story."
Yesterday, a lady outside the Cub was looking for a dollar so I gave her one. She tried to bless me in Jesus's name and I was like, "Yep, OK, thanks, gotta go!" Easy enough transaction. You wanted a dollar, I gave you a dollar, I don't need the receipt of blessing.
So it was as I pulled up to the Loon. I found no bike rack so I locked up to a bus stop sign and walked up to the door, donning my mask, and a guy in a Twins hat chilling by a shopping cart said, "You were riding a bike but you may be a rich man."
I said, "Huh?"
He said, "I said you're riding a bike but you might be a rich man."
I shook my head as I didn't follow.
He waved me off, "Eh, forget it."
What was I missing? Were these Cat Stevens lyrics or something? What the fuck was this dude talking about? I mean it. I was lost.
By the way, here's the best Cat Stevens song:
Don't shun it, fun it.
ANYhoo, I go in and - OK, flashback time.
So I'm looking for new (to me) things on line and I find Loon Deli and I look at their menu and I see they have a veggie burger and gluten free options (we'll talk about those in a few mintues) and then? There they were: The cheesesteaks. The gyros. Oh, mama mia! Porco dio! Va fa un culo! Orecchiette salsiccia kielbasa marinara gordita nandayo do svidanya!
UGH!!!
You don't know how bad I wanted them. But I cheated my diet for the last entry with a really good cheesesteak. This cheesesteak, however bad I wanted it, I had to admit, didn't look that good. It had sandwich slaw on it, and for those of you reading Sandwich Bully for the first time, "sandwich slaw" is the classic (and around here, dreaded) lettuce-mayo-tomato combo.
But I could get them to hold that nonsense, right? Right?
So I made up my mind four fucking days ago that I was going to get this goddamned cheesesteak. It made sense to get this goddamned cheesesteak. I feel like a cheesesteak is a decent measuring stick for how well a deli / lunch counter / sandwich joint does. And yeah, I thought about the gyro. You know I love tzatziki. It's like my number one condiment.
Have we been over that before? I feel like we've been over that before. Well, anyway, for the new comers, my two favorite condiments are, number one, tzatiki and, number two, tartar sauce.
I used to really slack off at work.
But, you know, I'm just looking at that cheesesteak, baffled by it but wanting it. A gyro? Yeah yeah, I can get that almost anywhere but a cheesesteak...
A good cheesesteak...
A cheesesteak that doesn't look like what's in this photo.
This photo is warning me.
Maybe I should get the gyro.
But then I see the veggie burger.
[sigh]
"I'm probably going to get the veggie burger."
Fast forward to today:
I decide to go out on a ride before the rain hits and I get on the Greenway and the wind is bucking and I feel a sprinkle and I say nuts to that and get off on the Hennepin exit and bike over to Lyndale and head up to the Loon.
I found no bike rack so I locked up to a bus stop sign and walked up to the door, donning my mask, and a guy in a Twins hat chilling by a shopping cart said, "You were riding a bike but you may be a rich man?"
I said, "Huh?"
He said, "I said you're riding a bike but you might be a rich man."
I shook my head as I didn't follow.
He waved me off, "Eh, forget it."
What was I missing? Were these Cat Stevens lyrics or something? What the fuck was this dude talking about? I mean it. I was lost.
I go inside and I see a dude behind the counter putting together a couple hoagies. He asks me how I'm doing and I ask him how he's doing and he tells me he'll be with me in just a minute. He does his thing, wraps up the sandwiches, comes over, asks me what I'm having and I say, "I'll have the -" here we go, "veggie burger."
He rings me up. "Veggie burger?"
"Yeah."
"Fries?"
"No, I'm good."
Total comes to eight something before tip and here's another thing about the Loon: Their prices are in line with what I paid for a burger when I moved to Minneapolis seventeen years ago. For real, in this time of inflation, that's a really good price on a non-fast food burger. I think only the Cardinal beats that price by a dollar and that was three years ago. Homie got started on the burger and told me it would be a ten minute wait.
So, because the space in there is small, I got outside and listen to the last five minutes of the Dollop episode about Oofty Goofty and listen to the next one about ghosts or mediums or some shit for about three minutes, figuring eight minutes is long enough to cook a burger. I go back inside and homie is wrapping up. He gives me a nod and asks if I want cheese on it. I say sure.
His dude comes from in back just as this objectively attractive petite young woman in sweat shorts and a sports bra opens the door and looks in. Young homie from in back says, "Hey, come on in, we have food!" as she closes the door and goes in the other door.
Young homie looks at me and asks, "We have food, what? She doesn't want food?"
This was the point when I knew I'd be back. This is the neighborhood spot. This is where the young guns clown around and have fun doing what they're doing, interact with the customers and all that. It's the drum I've been beating over and over on this blog: You have two places: One place mixes an herb or a pepper into some Hellmann's and tells you it's rosemary aioli and puts an expensive sounding cheese on your sandwich which is really just cheddar at the end of the day and they hand it to you, anonymous and sanitary, for fifteen bucks. Then you have the other place. No frills, no upcharge, just the people from the neighborhood slapping together turkey, cheddar, and mayo between two slices of rye and asking for five bucks while they carry on a conversation with a lady with a four-post walker with tennis balls on the feet and they tell her to tell her son to come on by to say hi. And every. single. time, the second place wins with me. It will probably always win with me because food, more specifically feeding people, is a communal act. You go back to our cro-mag times, our Neanderthal times, feeding somebody was the first and ultimate method of communicating "I love you" because it was "I see you are hungry and I don't want you to be hungry so, here, eat some of what I have". I've believed that for years and I probably won't ever see it any different.
So when it comes to a neighborhood spot where people with a counter between them know each other's names and stories and all that? That's my place. That's where I gravitate. I've done fine dining and I've never felt more alien and unwelcome in my life than when I've done that. Hell, I get a plate of something fancy in front of me and I stare at it for a second, not in wonderment but in hesitation because I ponder whether I need an instruction book on the right way to eat this meal.
But I go to a mom & pop? I'm at home. I've got a patty melt in front of me. Maybe a tuna melt. Maybe a steak sandwich. The counter help talks to me. Maybe the grill cook talks to me. And I'm into that, I'm into places that function as hubs of their community.
Does that personal connection make the food taste any different? No. Of course not. But does a thirty-year-aged single-cow gruyere taste that much different from a factory farmed - OK, I already know that analogy is bunk because you know I complained for years about Sys- No, no, no...
Ugh, fine. Sysco provolone. It's not good. It doesn't taste like anything. But we've had that discussion. There's Sysco provolone and then there's genuine provolone. They do taste different.
Look, a neighborhood place that has a dude behind the counter with a young homie that wants to joke with you about hot girls - and he was respectful, he didn't say anything filthy, he was just a young player who started speak-singing about how they "have food over here" in the hopes that she would come back, maybe order a little something and he could get her number, that's young players. That's what they do. I used to have that game. If she would have come back, he would have asked her her name, told her it was pretty, asked her, "So, hey, what do I have to do to get to know you?" And she would have turned him down flat and he still would have put an extra dipping sauce in her order and made it a point to tell her because that's what young players do.
But a neighborhood place is valuable and you should drop your money on them to keep them in your community. They feed you, they know your kids' names, they know your siblings' names, they know your partners' names and, after a time, you know their names. You know their shifts.
Food is communal.
OK CHARLIE BUT HOW WAS THE GODDAMNED SANDWICH!?!?!?
So I get my veggie burger, tell homie behind the counter I don't need a bag, and go outside and find a concrete retainer wall against the neighboring building's wall to sit on. I bit into the burger and... Huh.
Nothing fascinating was going on but I liked it. It was a veggie patty that thankfully didn't taste like Boca and topped with catsup, mustard, lettuce, onion, and tomato. No frills. And while it wasn't lose-your-mind good, it was satisfying. I got halfway into it and I had that feeling again. That feeling that life is good. Look at me: I'm sitting outside, eating a veggie burger on a day with a nice breeze in my neighborhood. How can there be anything better than that?
But the real...
Oh, no.
Oh, no.
I haven't done this in a minute.
You know, where I say "but the real _____ was the _____"?
I mean this is the last season, I have to do it at least once.
[clears throat]
OK.
I think I know where I'm going with this.
[clears throat again]
BUT THE REAL disillusioned adult film actress who has gone down to the Caribbean to shoot a string of real estate commercials only to find out that the government of the country she's been working in won't allow her to take her earnings back to her home country so she has the option of spending it all before she goes or losing it entirely so she embarks on a project that will ultimately facilitate her exit from the porn industry and into the disco music industry and this shit is based on a true story WAS THE bun!
The bun was toasted on the inside and outside adding a sturdy rigidity to the sandwich. You could grip the burger easily and there was a semi-flake-away property to it as your bit into it. It didn't fall apart, it didn't shatter, it held together but there was a little breakage; tiny fissures in the crust. And the crust experienced a flavor boost because of that toasting. I was impressed. It could have been over-toasted but homie behind the counter nailed the toasting to where it was done just right.
The flavor and texture alone was enough for me to say I'll go back. My community rant has me compelled to go back with other people with me. I want Kath to try their food. I want to take Kafe Nasty. Sofia, who I haven't mentioned here before but she's cool, trust me, I want her to try this food. And I want you to try this food, too.
Clearly, this post was about a veggie burger. I think you may have to specifically ask for a gluten free option if you're intolerant. But the important part is they have those. Again: This place is a member of its community rather than just a place that hands out food. They're there to serve community members. And maybe get young players in front of young hotties, too. That's kind of how it goes.
Go give the Loon your money.
Eat a gyro for me and tell me how it was.
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