Duffy's Tavern Boalsburg, PA

 Duffy's tavern in Boalsburg is an historic restaurant dating back to the 1800s.  The building is decorated with period artifacts and paintings that represent the history of the town.  Next to our table there was a painting of women visiting a gravesite, an homage to the towns claim as being the home of memorial day.

I was there for a friends birthday and didn't take any food pictures as I felt it was inappropriate of the occasion.

I ordered the Reuben with sweet potato fries and my wife had the "soup of the moment".

The "soup of the moment" was a broccoli cheese soup that had large pieces of broccoli and had a pleasantly surprising Parmesan flavor.  The soup was good but a bit too salty.

The Reuben came out with a nicely crisped texture to the marble rye.  The sandwich was hot throughout and all of the ingredients were well represented.

The pastrami seemed to be deli cut and of an acceptable quality.  Likewise with the Swiss cheese, neither one was remarkable in any way.  The sauerkraut was a delight though.  It had a sweet almost caramelized taste and I would have happily sat down with a bowl of it.

4.5/5

DeFazio’s Pizzeria Troy, NY

A Reuben pizza?  Wait? What?!?  This is enough to bring me out of semi retirement and to upstate New York, or upstate adjacent at least. DeFazio’s  is a spectacular family run pizzeria with a long tradition. 

This is as close as you will get to a Reuben in a pizza. The results are utterly spectacular. I’ve had a few pseudo-reubens of late and this reminds me how much good, no make that great, rye bread makes the sandwich. 

This has a rye crust with a thin layer of sauerkraut and pieces of corned beef. There are splashes of thousand island dressing across the top.  It’s baked in a wood fired oven which makes the crust crispy.  The only places this falls short as a reuben is where it excels as a pizza.

Eveready Diner -- Brewster Hill, NY

Ida and I were trekking up to Boston to visit my brother and needed a bit of sustenance. I pulled off the highway when I saw a sign for the Eveready Diner. I was in the mood for a patty melt but fate handed me an excellent Reuben.

This  is a cute little diner playing 80's music. The menu said legendary coffee. The coffee was ok, better than what I get at work, not as good as Sheetz.

We were seated next to several tables of Verizon retirees who were having a regular lunch get together. They had loud discussions and one person was talking about eliminating a council seat to save $80,000.  I was rather amused by that since I sit on my  boro council gratis.

The Reuben had options of corned beef or pastrami. I chose the pastrami and it was wonderful. The sauerkraut was good. The dressing was on the side which is a nice touch. The bread could have stood to be grilled a bit more.

All in all well balanced, and put together with excellent ingredients and very good french fries. 4.5 out of 5. 

World of Beer - Reston, VA

I am down in Reston for training with Perfect Sense Digital makers and integrators of the Brightspot CMS. After a day of training, which was tantamount to drinking from the firehose, I decided to have dinner at a nearby restaurant World of Beer.  It has a nice group of outside tables and it was an incredibly lovely evening.

The menu had a Reuben and previous experience with pub food Ruebens has been almost universally positive.

I ordered the Reuben and a beer of the suggested style.  The recommended style was an imperial IPA.  IPA's tend to be big beers and extremely hoppy.  Imperial beers are typically big and hoppy.  Imperial IPA's are typically monster things that are insanely, almost unbearably bitter, and while not my favorite style I can see how it would pair well with the outsized flavors of my favorite sandwich.  The beer was a "Tin Cannon Twin Cannon" which was hoppy as promised but not overbearing.



When the sandwich came I was somewhat disappointed but the size and character.  My sense of food perhaps has become lowbrow of late.  I just want a chicken bucket or perhaps a cheeseburger with lettuce, tomatoes, Heinz 57 and a deep friend potatoes.

As they say though when in Reston, do as the Restonians do.  Looking at the sandwich from the side I didn't feel compelled to pull it apart and expose the innards for the world to see.  The top and bottom layers were pieces of fairly good pastrami pulled from an even stack and then griddled.  There was one piece of cheese and a little sauerkraut with a good bit of Russian dressing in there.

The pastrami was good quality but the rest of the sandwich was sadly lacking.  The other elements were in short supply and the pastrami was placed like a mother would send to school with a small child in a sandwich with the crusts cut off.  No layering or piling, just neatly stacked.  The ratios were similar to what I've seen in New York except there it is a matter of "behold this mountain of Pastrami", while here it is, "well we need to garnish the meat because that is how it's done, I think".

The bread, meh, marble rye.  It was grilled a little bit.  It could have gone a little more, with of course more butter.  At least it wasn't soggy.

The fries were another disappointment.  Somewhat low quality.  There were more bad spots than expected and while they came out hot there weren't fully cooked.  They weren't inedible by any stretch of the imagination but they failed the McDonald's test.  (i.e. If McDonalds does X better than you, then don't do it!)

The beer was good.  The service was incredibly friendly.  It looked like they were gearing up for a real party atmosphere and perhaps a live band later in the night.  Go for the drinks and the party.  Maybe grab Chick-Fil-A on the way home.

The sandwich gets 2.5 out of 5 stars.

Bellefonte Country Club -- Bellefonte KY

My cousin's passing brought me back to the center of the known universe Ashland, KY.  There are so many weird vortices that circle place.  After the funeral we all adjourned to the Bellefonte Country Club for lunch.  Siblings, first cousins, second cousins and even third cousins sat around and chatted and drew in coloring books and watched football.  The weirdness of the place extended to Penn State fans cheering on Ohio State and Kentucky (my cousin's team) upsetting Louisville.

In my experience upscale restaurants don't do great reubens.  It a basic primal thing that can fail from overthinking.  It benefits from a really great well seasoned grill.  They being said this we pretty good.  It was a little light on the dressing and the bread wasn't as grilled as I like it but the ingredients were high quality and well balanced.  The bread was great, a nice thickness, not at all soggy.  It wasn't as crispy as I like and the pastrami was a bit on the weak side.

The swiss was good, and I was quite happy with the bit that dripped onto my fries.  Likewise the sauerkraut was excellent.

All in all a good sandwich.  3.5 out of 5.

Subway - State College PA

I have read that there are four times as many Subway restaurants than McDonald's that means that when Subway announced the reuben sub that I had four times as many places to try it as I had to get a Big Mac.  That left me trying to figure out which of the ones nearby I should try.  I decided on the one in the Walmart.  Then I had to decide which Walmart...

The "Sandwich Artist" at the shop was kinda cool.  He asked me if I had had one before and I said not there but I regularly ate them elsewhere.  He said that until this came out had had never had rye bread or sauerkraut and now he was eating three or four times a day.

Part of the Subway mystique is being able to adjust the sandwich my liking but I decided to let it ride.  Take it as presented.  I will admit to having the person add a bit more sauerkraut, but that was only because I was asked.  I might consider adding hot peppers and bacon in the future.

Now the sandwich suffered a bit in the 15 minute ride to work while sitting in a plastic bag.  This might have led to some of sogginess and chewiness in the bread so that is being forgiven.

I knew going into this that the sandwich wouldn't be grilled but they did put it in their toaster which crisped and warming things a bit.  This wasn't really a hot sandwich, more lukewarm (even at it's hottest)

Now for the ingredients.  The bread was okay, not spectacular.  I guess part of that was the transportation and part of it was attempting a mass market appeal.  The corned beef was bland.  The sauerkraut was a bit on the sweet side and the dressing was dressing.  Honestly I don't think I have even had bad Russian dressing and perhaps only once had good.  One sandwich artist stopped the one who was applying the dressing from applying more and that was a good thing since it was a little over the top.

Overall the sandwich wasn't bad.  I'll assume a lot of the deficiencies were from transport and boost the score up to 3 out 5

The Hunt Club -- Hillsdale, MI

A proper Reuben with a proper score. This is from the hunt club considered one of the better restaurants in Hillsdale. We ate around 6 after some hiking around the campus. The sandwich came and I was intrigued to see a triple decker. Far to thick for a dainty mouth but fine for me. 

Notice the side of veggies. I was trying to be somewhat healthy. Each of the three layers seemed to be the same and I was pleasantly surprised to see chunks instead of slices and sauerkraut that appeared to be of higher quality. There was some crispness to it and a courser cut than in most commercial sauerkraut. The bread was a seeded marble rye and seemed to be well prepared. At first it looked like it might be burned but it tasted ok. 

As I have started previously the chunk corned beef has great potential in a sandwich but it makes getting the distribution tricky. This was the case here. The three layers did help to somewhat even out every bit but it just didn't quite muster up. Additionally while intriguing the ingredients themselves we're bland. For once in my life while eating a Reuben I wanted to reach for the salt shaker. 

2.5/5