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

Cavoni's Pizza and Grinders -- Hillsdale MI

Visiting a friend he suggested we eat here specifically so I could try the Reuben Grinders. Not a true Reuben so no rating but here it goes. 

Zachary asked what I look for in a Reuben, how I rate it. I said the first thing is the bread and how it is grilled nice and crispy. I also said that soggy is the cardinal sin. Like many pizza and sub shops the bread here was baked from their pizza dough which is traditionally aged in a cooler at least overnight. It's a little known (outside of pizza circles) trick that letting the dough rest gives a far superior product. If you want good pizza today, make the dough yesterday. Cavoni's obviously shares the philosophy. 

He asked what else I looked for. I then said balance. All of the ingredients in a Reuben are unsubtle. This is a sandwich where hot sauce could be lost in the flavors. I told him that balancing the intense ingredients is the next key thing. 

Finally I said the quality of the ingredients. I told him about sandwiches that I had had elsewhere where you would expect perfection but they turned out to be mountains of good pastrami hiding scraps of bread and cheese with dressing and sauerkraut hiding somewhere in there. 

What you saw in the pictures was a half sandwich and rather huge. The filling was light at the ends and the bread was excellent although just a white hoagie roll. The other ingredients were good, not great and it came with mozzarella instead of Swiss(admittedly I'm not sure how well Swiss deals with a trip under a salamander so...). As I said above while excellent ingredients impress me and can elevate something to a true masterpiece failure lies in the execution. This was very well done and extremely enjoyable.