Spicy Feta, 9 May 2025

    Where to begin with this one?

    See, back in the day, Kafe Nasty would get this mischievous little smirk on his face when he'd bring up The Naughty Greek, a Saint Paul gyro shop. He fucking lurved The Naughty Greek because they put French fries on their gyros. Not the biggest whoop to regular folks like you and me but to Kafe Nasty, that would be enough for him to smile like John Lithgow did on 3rd Rock From The Sun whenever his character, Dick Solomon, brought up the fact that he had had sex. I never understood it and I wasn't about to bike over to Saint Pual to find out about it.

    And then one day, Kath and I are in Saint Paul and we're passing The Naughty Greek and we're both hungry, so why the fuck not go in there? I think it was during COVID because I remember we had to eat it in her car. And while we're in her car, I decided to text Kafe Nasty that I finally got The Naughty Greek. Not even two minutes later, this grown ass man is texting me back to tell me they put fries on their gyros.

    You know, like the gyro I was eating right in that moment.

    But OK. Cool.

    I didn't really think much of it. Not the part where they put fries on the gyro but the food. I didn't think much of the food. Like it was OK but I wasn't howling at the moon for it. I didn't even write about it in Sandwich Bully.

AND THEN WE FAST FORWARD FIVE YEARS

    Which brings us to Spicy Feta.

    This is what we know, just try to calm down as I tell this story.

    The Naughty Greek expanded to another location, right across the street from where I work now, and I never went there. I'm not sure if they ever had a third location.

    Then - and I don't know when this was - a couple of MMA fighters - I'm not making that up; that's them beating each other's asses in the photo at the top - a couple MMA fighters bought The Naughty Greek and renamed it Spicy Feta. They have a sandwich on the menu called The Naughty Greek. I don't know why. Please don't ask me why things happen. I rarely ever have an answer.

    Given that today is payday, I figured I would go across the street and check them out after perusing the menu which looked alright but I guess that was just the Saint Paul menu because the Minneapolis menu had only three of the eight sandwiches.

    And you know what? I support that.

    If you're not from here, Minneapolis and Saint Paul share a quiet animosity toward each other stemming from a nineteenth century slight. The gyst is that Minneapolis, whose chief industries were in lumber and flour and cotton and shipping, used to be pretty podunk and Saint Paul, whose chief industries were in the banking and financial sectors, was high class. Minneapolis asked Saint Paul if they could be incorporated in and Saint Paul was like, "Nah."

    But then came an economic crash and Saint Paul lost its economy but Minneapolis was just fine. So Saint Paul came to Minneapolis all, "Hey, were you guys still looking to incorporate?"

    And Minneapolis said, "Nah."

    Fast forward what? A hundred fifty years? And Minneapolis' (very reliable but also overrated) Pizza Lucé decided to leave Saint Paul standing by the punch bowl at the sock hop and go dance with Duluth.

    If that analogy went over your head, a Minneapolis pizza shop decided to open a location in Duluth five or so years before they opened one in Saint Paul.

    So when a Saint Paul gyro shop opens a location in Minneapolis, it makes sense that there's less than half the menu. Like three eighths.

    Anyway, I get over there and a very surprised, one might say bewildered or overwhelmed, man who looked like a Mediterranean Uncle Fester saw me and asked me for my order and I asked for The Naughty Greek. OK, cool, he'll get right on that.

    The guy whips it together - though I could have used more tzatziki but we've been over my feelings on tzatziki - and he's about to wrap it up when he asks me if it looks good and I say, "Oh, I thought it -"

    OK, everybody take a deep breath.

    I say, "Oh, I thought it was supposed to have fries on it."

    He asks, "Fries?"

    I say, "Yeah, fries... on it."

    He asks, "You want fries?"

    I say, "Yeah, the menu said it had fries on it."

    He says, "It will be a few minutes."

    I say OK and I grab the last lime Jarritos in the cooler.

    I wait by the register and Uncle Fester tells me, "I'm just going to put the fries on the side, OK?"

    I say, "I thought they were on the sandwich."

    He nods. He has been defeated.

    While I'm waiting, this big fucking dorky looking serial-killer-who-lives-next-door-to-you-but-you-never-knew-it looking motherfucker, looking like Keith from the Try Guys aka The Guy Who Sings That Stupid White People Taco Night Song, this motherfucker comes in and gets a bowl from our bewildered friend behind the counter, asking for everything under god's blue sky with his finger on his chin like these are serious decisions that have to be made, we're talking like this motherfucker backtracked - "Actually, yeah, I think I will have the slaw." - and then our friend behind the counter, he can't hardly get the lid on this fucking bowl, he rings the dude up, the dude pays on the little touchscreen, and while Uncle Fester is walking back to get my fries out of the deep fryer, this cowardly son of a bitch tapped the button for No Tip.

    No tip!? No tip!?

    I think I'm even angrier at myself for not accosting this piece of shit.

    Anyway, my fries come out of the deep fryer and Uncle Fester puts them in the sandwich and wraps it up and I pay for my gyro and my drink - almost eighteen bucks but that's expected downtown - and I pick up my sandwich and a fry comes rocketing out of a little gap in the foil and I catch it and I feel smooth and then I remember that Keith Habersberger looking motherfucker and I got mad again. I ate my gyro on the way back to the office -

    Oh! I forgot to mention the totally weird hours, listed as ten to eleven thirty and one to two thirty, closed when the majority of people are at lunch. (I was there at ten thirty.) So, an even bigger fuck you to Minneapolitans: "Here's our limited menu and our insane downtown hours. Good luck, bitches!"

    How did the gyro taste?

    Fine. I could have done without the kalamata olives, though. In theory, those work on a gyro. In practice, though, no. No.

    I can't tell you to drop seventeen eighteen bucks on a gyro and a sody pop, escpecially when the gyro doesn't wow me. There wasn't anything wrong with it, I just - I don't know. There are no pre-cum stains on my pants for this place. I won't talk you out of going there but I'm not in a hurry to recommend it, either. It's just OK.