Twenty Five Ounces

Yes, last night I had the vegan Reuben at Berben & Wolff’s. But lunch was a brie, bacon, and pear sandwich at Sweet Sue’s. And today, it’s likely I’ll get some kind of grilled cheese sandwich at The Cheese Traveler.

Even though I was given permission to loosen up the constraints of my diet, I’m afraid the floodgates have opened, and the only way to get back on the right path is to shut them down completely.

That will happen sometime in January. In the meantime, there’s too much eating to do. Like what happened on Monday. Because on Monday, I found myself in Schenectady, a mere stone’s throw from Capri Imports.

I suppose I could have gone to La Gioia and have one of their magnificent Italian mix subs. It was the sandwich that won the last Fussy Little Tour of Italian Delis. However, I already knew what sandwich was great at that spot.

The question was, could I finally find the sandwich of my dreams at Capri.

Those years writing for All Over Albany changed me. I went from simply eating food at a restaurant and evaluating the establishment based on my experience, to actively searching for the best thing at every single place.

And that’s no small thing. Because sure, there may be some food-based businesses that are just bad all around. Dunkin’ Donuts is a great example of that. But most people who go into this line of work do so for a reason. They love food. So I’ve become convinced that almost every single place has something delicious you can order, it’s just a matter of finding it.

Capri Imports filled me with hope. That Italian mix was delicious, if a bit flawed. The sandwich needed a bit more balance. There was just too much damn meat, and too much of that meat was ham.

My hope on a follow up visit was that hot peppers might help cut through the mounds of meat, but that didn’t quite work out. Instead of chopped cherry peppers, the shop relies upon sliced pepperoncini, which I find vastly inferior.

On that trip, however, I noticed Capri made its own muffaletta spread.

Now to be clear, you can’t have an actual muffaletta without the large, dense round of sesame seed encrusted bread. But you can still lean heavily on the flavors of the sandwich by using a similar mix of meats.

The only downside was that I couldn’t convince the woman behind the counter to add sharp provolone to my sandwich. At the end of the day, it wasn’t a big deal. I was going to bring home my prize, and I had some sharp provolone in the fridge. Slicing off a few shards and tucking them into the sandwich was a simple task.

I was able to order a sandwich with the house made muffaletta spread, ham, fennel salami, mortadella, and mozzarella.

When I brought this monster home and weighed it, the whole thing came in at twenty five ounces. And that was before I added my sharp provolone.

Oh dear god, was this delicious. This. This is the sandwich to get at Capri. I think all said and done, it was about nine bucks. And I ate the whole thing. Then I felt sick for the rest of the day. Not because the sandwich was bad. It wasn’t. It was marvelous. But somehow I found myself consuming multiple days worth of fat, calories, and sodium, one delicious bite after the next.

And you know what? Should I ever get another break from this diet, I’m going to do it again. This time, however, I might even be tempted to heat up the sandwich in the oven at home and melt the mozzarella a bit.

Now, the pressure is on to see if I can top the grilled cheese I had at The Cheese Traveler last week with comte, mustard, red onions, and Flying Pigs Farm liverwurst.

I think I really want something with ‘Nduja. But first, I’ve got to make it through yoga. Wish me luck.