The thread on “grinders” got me thinking, or maybe just hungry. What do you guys do for lunch? We are often out on a site and don’t always pack a lunch from home. I’m often in a rural area. Small towns won’t let McDonalds and other fast food chains come in. We don’t like neon lights and golden arches. This leaves the mom and pop corner store, there is at least one in most villages, might not be a gas station or anything else but there is always a small store.
A traditional Maine sandwich is called an Italian, pronounced eye-talian, with an accent on the eye. Most corner stores make them. A long roll, like a frankfurter roll, chopped onions, American cheese, ham or salami, fresh sliced tomatoes, long slices of pickle, sliced green pepper, black olives, salt and pepper, drizzled with olive oil, not toasted.
Most of the stores also have a hot dog steamer with our famous red hot dogs. Pizzas, burgers and all kinds of other sandwiches are often available but the Italian is the quintessential Maine lunch, add a whoopie pie for desert and wash it down with a Moxie.
What do you have have that is unique to your area. Something you miss when out of state, a place where the parking lot is full of pickups with ladder racks?
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Replies
Arizona, the usual 7 course lunch, a 6 pack and a taco.
Do you guys have a cowboy breakfast, too? Black coffee and a cigarette.Beat it to fit / Paint it to match
Cowboy breakfast?! That's a Brooklyn breakfast! Black coffee and a Lucky Strike was my gig.
That would be me... a medium, light, w/ 3 sugars and a smoke.
I usually eat off the taco wagon, they are pretty good.every once in a while we hit the buffet at the casino
Edited 11/9/2007 8:24 pm by brownbagg
Around here that's known as a stick lunch. I used to work with a guy that was 60 years old and consumed only black coffee and cigarettes all day, regardless of season or weather. 95 degrees with 90% humidity and he'd still be drinking coffee all day. He said he'd been doing it that way for over 35 years.Every now and then when I'm working in the neighborhood, which is most of the time, I head to Tavern on Grand for the Walleye basket.
Edited 11/9/2007 9:38 pm by ptp
Walleye is a fish we don't see around here. Our fish and chips are haddock with fresh cut Maine potatoes, of course. Fresh sea food is abundant, can't help but feel sorry for a lot of folks that have to eat what we consider bait.Beat it to fit / Paint it to match
obviously you don't know what you are missing...Walleye Sandwiches will make your eyes roll back into your head and dream about visiting MN. That is good eats. You can keep your haddock fish sticks.
That's why I feel so bad for you folks from away, you think haddock is fish sticks, you have so much to learn, grasshopper.Beat it to fit / Paint it to match
I think that the people that don't like Walleye have only eaten it when frozen and shipped great distances. They'd change their minds eating it right out of the pan on an island in the BWCAW when it was swimming 30 minutes ago. Living within a few hours of a ready supply, you can find places that have it delivered fresh on a regular basis and that's almost as good.
I concur. Straight outta the Boundary Waters is a great way to eat Walleye.
thats like Mullet, its great when caught but once the sun goes down, its not that good.
I thought a Mullet was a haircut that looked better in the dark.
They can't get your Goat if you don't tell them where it is hidden.
Man, I had to cut myself off from the taco wagons. Between them and the tamale girl, I was turning into Rolly Polly. Good stuff but swimming in grease. Mike
Trust in God, but row away from the rocks.
We were usually so far out in the sticks that we had to bring our own.
Ten hour day, thirty minute break for lunch...
Been there, Tom. At least in the winter we could toast our sandwiches on the kerosine heater.Beat it to fit / Paint it to match
On the days (maybe one a week) that I'm in the field, I usually head for a corner store or general store (Vermont, we got 'em everywhere). The I-talian there, is a sub sandwich here. Or whatever that they have on special. If I'm in town I'll stop by Wendy's for a heart attak on a bun, which is better than the MickeyD's version, I guess. I never pack a lunch, although I should.
My business partner, who's a land surveyor, always has a lunch bag with him, full of leftovers.
>>My business partner, who's a land surveyor, always has a lunch bag with him, full of leftovers.<<
Having been a surveyor for 30+ years, I know where he's at.
Either frugality, or broke....
Do the general stores still have a big wheel of cheddar on the counter? That's something you don't see everywhere.Beat it to fit / Paint it to match
Well, one time, I had a 12 inch piece of railroad track in mine ! !
I worked with some guys years ago that picked at me a lot about my lunch. I'd bring a couple of BIG sandwiches and all the trimmings. I mean big old onion rolls, stacked high with meat and cheese and stuff.
I used to tell them, "you heard of a Big Mac ? Well, that's a Big Greg !" I'm 6' 7", so the Big Greg was for real.
Anyway, we had a metal cutting bandsaw and we had a rail siding. One day, there was a gondola car full of short pieces of scrap RR track. I had an idea to make some bookends, so I cut four pieces of track about 4" long. Painted them black, they're the best - won't blow away, either. So I had another thought, cut a section just the right length for my lunchbox.
Sat down, said hey, hand me my lunchbox! It was a hoot ! The guy couldn't get it off the floor.
Greg
When I worked in a shipyard, they checked your lunch boxes at the gate when you left. Just in case you were taking home a souvenir. I always wanted a 12" hunk of rail for a shop anvil. I was offered a long piece once but I only have a 3/4 ton truck!Beat it to fit / Paint it to match
could be worst, a cup of brown rice, eaten without drinking for fiftheen minutes
a container of dry oatmeal, two 10 oz bottles for drinking water, extra set of truck keys a 30 day supply of Vicodin and Daypro, a calculator for payday, a handful of Sharpies© BandAids©, a couple of bandanas, extra earplugs a knife, fork, and spoon
a tea mug, tea bags and some fresh yogurt.
my wife makes me a breakfast sandwich with egg, sausage or bacon and cheese with jam and a lunch sandwich both on her homemade breads with lettuce and tomato on the side.
sometimes if there is a hotbox in the gang trailer I have a stainless container that I I can heat up ( usually yesterdays supper )
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, wer ist jetzt der Idiot ?
After 30 years Im just sick of coldcut sandwiches.Sometimes designer breads can make them better or jazzing things up with toppings.If im anywhere for any amount of time I bringa cheap microwave which totally opens up the options. Now at dinner im like..should i pig out or hmm thatd make a good lunch tommorrow!
Do real glass thermos bottles keep soup hotter than these plastic insulated themos'?
Wish my cooler had a side section for all the non-food items like my wallet/keys/phone and ither junk that ends up there.And i wish they made cooler that were watertite.
Edited 11/9/2007 7:21 pm ET by treetalk
treetalk,
I had cold sandwiches for 6 or 7 years, it get's old. Now, if I am close to home, that's where I eat. If I am on a job that last for a week or so, coffee maker and microwave are in the truck, or left on the job sight.. If there are other people on the job, and know you have a microwave, the cold sandwiches are left at home and leftover's are the main staple. What used to get me is when the weekend hit, the DW would say "I made you a sandwich for lunch..". Thank you , but I think I will start the grill, and cook a burger or something.;)
northeastvt
PS- spellcheck suggested I change your name to "streetwalker" lol
I've been considering suggesting trading lunches with a couple of the people who show up on the job. You'd both get something new and I bet it would very quickly sharpen up the amount of effort that goes into lunch making.
Lately I have revived an old practice of mine which is to carry single cup coffee filters, a thermos filled in the morning with boiling water and coffee ground fresh the same morning. Coffee left in a thermos is no treat. Fresh made filtered coffee on the job - I no longer have to dread breaktime.
Ron
Fresh, freetrade, filtered jobsite coffee is an excellent idea, thanks Ron.
Swapping lunches doesn`t work for me, I work alone 90% of the time.
For the past 6 months or so I`ve gone low fat. Lunch is whole roasted chicken or turkey or ham, mixed salad greens, tomato, and vinegrette or hummus in a whole wheat wrap. Fruit on the side, orange, apple, I loooove grapes, and a muffin or date square, or cookie. Juice.
If occasionally, I forget my lunch in the mudroom, or its friday, Tim`s chicken salad wrap, or superstore> sobeys roast chicken dinner with veggies and mashed. Mmmmm good!
Gord
Gord,
I buy the filters from Sobey's. Java Blend also has them. They are usually hanging from their own rack, not a store shelf, near the coffee. The brand is MiniMinit or some such thing.
Ron
Thanks, I'll try them.
Maybe next time we have a fresh brewed beer, you can finish that Ont story...
Gord
Gord,
There's time. We just started an ICF house in Halliburton. Have time for a beer at the pub at Exit 5 Friday?
Ron
I feel your pain with the cold cuts day in day out. I live and die by my lunch box it is just as much a tool box for all my personal stuff than it is just to carry lunch. I learned quickly on one of my first jobs working road construction that you never get seperated from your lunch box as it makes for a very long day if the foreman grabs you and takes you to another project and your lunch is left on a piece of equipment or job site. I only let that happen once.
Now I mix it up a bit, I love cold pizza anytime it is my favorite breakfast food or lunch. Otherwise I will do leftovers, I have conditioned myself that food temp is not essential and will eat most any food not warmed up.
Back on the road crew the best was dinty moore beef stew.....punch holes in the top and place it on the manifold or in the hotmix for awhile and presto hot lunch on a cold day....still work today with sandwiches or what ever.....just need plenty of foil. Summer time was the best when sweet corn was ripe sneek into the farmers patch and get a dozen or so through em in the hotmix still wrapped in the husk....while it is cooking we would bribe a truck driver to stop and get butter and salt......at that point life was very good. Some of the best days of my life.
I sometimes take soup too. cold cuts don't bother me, I'm not having lunch for the experience anyway, but she makes them so I don't complainI just want to take a break and relax more than eat most of the time anyway !got a glass thermos a few months ago just haven't used it.. Stanley can shove their Chinese made metal ones where the sun don't shine.
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"Wish my cooler had a side section for all the non-food items like my wallet/keys/phone and ither junk that ends up there.And i wish they made cooler that were watertite."
You should check out http://www.duluthtrading.com
and this is one of theirs, too:http://www.duluthtrading.com/search/searchresults/35629.aspx?feature=Product_1
They have lots of choices,good service,great quality stuff from my own experience.bum
...The unspoken word is capital. We can invest it or we can squander it. -Mark Twain...
Be kind to your children....they will choose your nursing home.
...aim low boys, they're ridin' shetland ponies !!
What, no Rolaids or tweezers? There was a time my wife baked fresh bread. I don't get it, I was skinny back then.Beat it to fit / Paint it to match
a razor knife to gouge out anything,I wear some kind of glove all day, leather drivers, welders, or kevlar type.....cuts down on splinters and who knows what else.
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Two peanut butter and jelly sandwiches.
Bread is whole wheat with no corn syrup in the ingredient list.
Peanut butter is usually Trader Joe's Organic creamy peanut butter. Nothing but peanuts and salt.
Jelly is almost always a preserve. I look for preserves in shops when we travel. Guidelines are 10 grams or less of sugar per tablespoon and no corn syrup. I prefer raspberry or blueberry, but others are acceptable.
Currently I'm using Marionberry Seedless Preserves made by Columbia Empire Farms in Dundee, OR. This was purchased in Wheeling, West Virginia. It is very good. It came in a three pack, the other two being Strawberry Preserves and Marionberry Fruit Spread, both of which sucked.
My favorite so far has been White Tea Key Lime Raspberry Preserve made by Cherchies in Malvern, PA. I'm not sure where exactly I picked it up, but it was on the way home from NorthFest. Really interesting, good flavor.
When I haven't found anything in awhile and the stock is low, I use the low sugar blueberry preserves from Trader Joe.
Some "homemade" preserves do not have the nutritional info. I often will buy those and if they are too sweet I use them to flavor some plain yogurt.
Rich Beckman
I was in Canada last month on the Ile d'Orleans, an island outside of Quebec which is all farms. Seemed like every other house had a roadside stand selling produce, homemade jams, jellies and in all kinds of flavors. If I had room on the motorcycle, I would have loaded up. At this time, the closest Trader Joes is in Boston. The Mrs. will stop when she's there, we have a few bottles of 3 buck chuck in the fridge right now.Beat it to fit / Paint it to match
I recently made pomegranate jelly with my mom. We put up 72 half-pints...yumm!
Isn't that interesting?I knew you would.I hope you're all taking notes, because there's going to be a short quiz next period... Tom Lehrer
I always bring my own and have been eating the same lunch for the last 5 years or so. I'm getting sick of it and I gotta change, but I've been eating it so long I don't think I know how.
I grill boneless chicken breasts very tender, tupper it up and store it in the Kelvinator for the week.
1 chicken sandwich served on very sprouty type brown grainy bread (feels like you're eating hemp rope), spread with ff cream cheese, thin slice of vidalia, topped with any of the lettuce that's in the bin, drizzled with Ev olive oil, S&P. Wrapped in tinfoil.
1 apple
1 orange
2 qts of spring water.
1 protein bar for my 10:30 snack with maybe a bottle of that new vitamin water they sell. I really like that stuff.
Sounds good right?! It is but...I gotta change.
Once in a while I get wild and have a ham & swiss on rye and with a sharp dijon.
I'm thinking of stuffed cabbage now.
Ain't life grand?!
"I always bring my own and have been eating the same lunch for the last 5 years or so. I'm getting sick of it..."I would imagine so. I mean, didn't it start to get moldy after the first week or so ?;o)
Get your head out of the box.
Luka,
Just imagine the size of the lunch box he needed five years ago...
northeastvt
It would appear that you know me better than I do myself. Think I should just throw out the whole lunch pail and all?I just wouldn't know where to start.Maybe a tray of Ho-Ho's. Do they still make Good 'N Plenty?
I need a life.
Ham and cheese (swiss, prov, mozz,american, velveeta, colby,cheddar..whatever is closet to the front of the fridge door) almost everyday for the last oh, 20 yrs.
Mustard in summer, mayo in winter. Bread is anything to hang on to the H&C with.
A jar of homecanned Hot peppers, some times some corn chips and two quarts of "Magic Juice" which is a package of E-Mergen-C, a can of Steven Segal's energy supplement drink, a scoop of powdered Gatorade and purified water.
If I know I am going to be in civilization, I try to find a decent eatery, rarely fast food, but on one job I have going, McD's is so on the way that I'll snag a few bagel/egg/bacon/cheese sammiches, or 3 or 4 cheesburgers.
Leftover pizza is a real treat.Spheramid Enterprises Architectural Woodworks
"If you want something you've never had, do something you've never done"
have you tried putting a spicy rub on the chicken b4 grilling? How about a marinade with soy sauce and/or cooked with onions and herbs. Or split the cuts up and cook 1 or 2 different. Also Dijon can greatly change the taste of chicken breast, pretend it's pork.Speaking of which. Why not try boneless pork tenderloin - there is little you cannot do to it. Or come to Maine and get a haddock sandwich. I'm gonna try Walleye one day.
Oh I do all that. Nobody can grill a more tender or tasty boneless chicken breast than me.But after (6?) years of chicken sandwiches it still ends up tasting like chicken.I just gotta learn more about taking myself with a grain of salt is all.
Just wandering in from CT for a visit and thought I had to jump in on this thread. When I had various trades working on the house I always made "the boys" something to keep them going. If I knew anyone on the crew, it was lunch (beef and cider stew with dumplings, piles of pasta and garlic bread, baked ham with fixin's) and if I didn't know them, at minimum it was water and lemonade on hot days or hot chocolate and coffee on cold ones, usually with something hot out of the oven like croissants, scones or cookies. Believe it or not, some of us really appreciate the jobs people like you do. We know you work hard and it just makes some of us feel good to make your day a bit better. I guess from my side it comes from having friends in the business and seeing first hand what goes on in a day. Have a good one!
Beebuzzled,
A little honey goes along way! " no pun intended;) " If I hire anything out , cold soda in the fridge, hot coffee available, and even bbq lunch once a week or so. If they see a tool I am using they like, the whole crew may end up with one at the end of the job. I have been(and still am) on both sides, it's nice to know your appreciated, and treated as such.
northeastvt
I've worked for a lot of people over the years but the ones that took the time to just bring you a cup of coffee were few and stood out. I have a baker for a customer and he always sits me down for a treat. I look forward to it. CT isn't that far away, need any work done?Beat it to fit / Paint it to match
Can anyone name the book that made Lindy-cakes famous? (It's a must read for almost anyone on this forum).
House Tracy kidder Wrote a recommendation of it in a letter to the editor at FHB way back when.
They can't get your Goat if you don't tell them where it is hidden.
I typically work within a few blocks of my house---so that's where I eat-If I eat lunch.
I eat a lot of red beans and rice, or homemade soups or chili, or stew.- Basically left-overs.
in the winter I basically don't work away from home-and I often bake bread during the day.
Stephen
I keep a hot pot that boils water in the truck, I have those soup, top roamine cups you add water to, I also keep cans of tuna fish and crackers in the truck, Sometimes i dont want to stop to drive anywhere, If i do i go to subway or the supermarket but no more corn dawgs or burrito things, I like to bring Elk sausage and cheese or a PPand J, Nobody wants a bite of my Elk heart sandwitch though
it gets so hot here and 99% of my work is outside, Boss tell us, you will go somewhere at lunch where you can get a/c and a glass of tea.