That’s a fried green tomato slice in there. Lit so beautifully by Scott Suchman.
It’s the season. Around here there is a drought and my tomatoes have stalled at green. I can make stuff with those green tomatoes, unlike the thousands of tiny green rocks masquerading as figs hanging out back. Bring on the pimento cheese and pickles! The birds can have the figs.
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They may have scrubbed Black Lives Matter Plaza but they cannot whitewash DC’s soul.
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Three guys walk into the Milburn Deli, a recording engineer, an artist and an access specialist. The sandwich man says, “Is this a joke?”
No it is not!
The first man whips out a pad of paper and a pencil. “This is a head scratcher, fellas. So many choices, only three of us. It’s a deli-emma.” The venerable Joe requires a Venn. That is to come. I need a minute.
In the meantime, MMSMINY, Curtis and LRoy walked into the Milburn Deli. Preemptively I had implored them to guest post. The fellas obliged.
Curtis, James and LRoy outside the Milburn Deli
James (MMSMINYC) weighs in:
JOE REVISITED: A follow-up to my 2008 guest post …
My best friend L. Roy Goldberg and I grew up in Springfield NJ – the town next to Millburn. Since high school in the 70s, we both have been huge fans of the Milburn Deli Joe. Since it has been years since our parents passed away, it has been some time since either of us visited our old haunt. That changed today, as our good friend, “Fun and Pretty” artist Curtis Wallin, drove us out there from Manhattan.
Our initial Idea of a jaunt to the Deli turned into more of a pilgrimage, as we not only got our long sought after Joes, but also drove past the homes L. Roy and I grew up in, and visited the graves of L. Roy’s parents on the way back to the city. While taking pix in front of the house I grew up in, the current owner, who remembered my parents and me, came out and invited us in. I had always wondered how the house had changed on the inside and was quite surprised to find out that it had changed very little.
But, hey – this is a sandwich blog – right?
It felt so great to enter the Deli once again and get swept up in the rhythm of the crew behind the counter as they cranked out Joes and other popular sandwiches, including the Godfaddah (chicken cutlet, bacon, fresh mozzarella, Russian dressing on a sub roll, pressed).
As we left the deli with our weighty order – 2 Turkey Joes, 1 Ham Joe, and 3 homemade iced teas – we were salivating as we entered adjacent Taylor Park to find a shady picnic table at which to chow down most mightily.
I don’t need to describe the Joe here, since I did that back in 2008 on this blog. I am happy to report that the superior quality sandwich is nearly identical to the first one I ever had, with the one exception being that the rye bread is now a bit “spongier” than it used to be, which is in no way a deal killer. We devoured our Joes, washed them down with the iced teas and, with big smiles on our faces, vowed to return.
James Farber (unmasked: formerly JAF – Lisa’s Main Sandwich Man in NY
And from LRoy, the ham man:
It was an eagerly awaited challenge – get the three of us out to Jersey and get our hands and mouths around a Millburn Deli Joe. The planning took months, but we finally made it. Aside from some very garish signage and a hundred new sandwiches with Jersey mobster names, the place was pretty much the same. But would the sammys be the same since the last time I had one (6 years ago? 8 years ago?).
The structure was the same, the layers and layers of rye, ham (for me – the boys had turkey), Swiss, cole slaw, Russian. Cut into three pieces: left, right, wedge.
But wow, could they really have always been this big? So heavy? The bag must have weighed 20 pounds (with the homemade iced tea for each of us, natch). Would we really be able to consume such a monstrosity? The challenge was on and none of us was going to back down – eat or die. Eat and die. And maybe a few weeks sooner because of this Joe (ironic that we visited my parents grave sites after lunch, and James suggested I lie down next to them. Not dead yet).
So consume we did.
We were proud of ourselves (though we did need to hose ourselves down in a nearby bathroom). Has our capacity for gorging ourselves been diminished with age? Should we have split one or two? Would we order it again? Yes, for sure, definitely – but the consensus also was, maybe we should wait a few years, until we digest today’s mighty Joe. Curtis said that afterwards we were moving like we were all in our 3rd trimester. But happy as hell.
L.
From Curtis, is a Joe fun and pretty?
Is a sandwich as good as a memory ? Sloppy Joe, Milburn Deli
On Monday I drove out to Milburn NJ with James and L.Roy. They grew up together nearby and wanted to visit the homes they grew up in. No old home tour is complete – in my opinion – without food from your youth to complete the memory.
When my wife was taking care of my parents in Lansing, MI. I took her to many haunts old and new. When an old haunt is new, your memory starts there. When it is old you bring your senses (dimmed). At home in Michigan, Jersey Giant had to change their bread, once locally made and fresh daily, and it became a par-baked industrial loaf from Jersey. The bread brought the outside, the first thing that hit your tongue, down. But still, the best quick sandwich in town. The pizza I grew up with was Sir Pizza (my father engineered their early buildings and took pizza as a trade). My favorite pizza then was BROWN BERRIES, until one day a new waitress delivered my MUSHROOM pizza and my six year old brain melted down. (From the moderator: haha.) The Sir Pizza pie was snappy and crisp and our pie was BBQ sauce and sausage. Strangely divine. Until it was not. Time had done it in.
Back to Monday. After a fine tour of the home James grew up in off we went to the Milburn Deli with an impressive staff that kept the line moving. My guys insisted I go for the Sloppy Joe. I followed James with the Turkey Joe.
Fresh Roasted, three slices of un-seeded rye, cole slaw, Russian dressing, and a slice of cheese ~ TOPPED OFF with a square of folded wax paper with one pickle slice on top. You guessed it! That moment was my favorite thing about the sandwich.
I must say the sandwich was pretty swell. I have never had this type of JOE and it was juicy, and sloppy and tasty. It is what is an unpretentious taste of yesteryear.
The rye died on the vine and could have used more flavor to compete and complement the slaw and Russian. My guides informed me that it used to be seeded and more flavorful. Ahhhh yes, that memory.
But this Sloppy Joe was everything it was upsold as – a wet, chewy, triple-decker of joy left alone and not altered to compete with a TIC TOK-ready look that is made ready for seeing on your phone and not tasting.
No this was a memory I got to create, with dear friends through their eyes, and I cannot wait for our next trip, but I must include my wife, she needs to be part of the SLOPPY JOE CLUB.
Curtis Wallin, Monday July 21, 2025, Sandwich eaten
Addendum from LRoy: It’s been 5 days and I think I’m ready for another.
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Tagged Milburn Deli, New Jersey, New Jersey Sloppy Joe, Sandwich, Sloppy Joe
“What is a baGEL”, asked the woman in line in front of me. Okay, it was a long time ago, yet in my lifetime, and in a town of some size, a university town. Anyway, that’s ok. Regionality is disappearing in countless precious ways. It’s a good thing, although I grieve it. Global is the glowball of peace. And yet. So good to see something you have not seen before, foodwise especially. So, yeah, she had not seen a bagel, lucky woman. Her town had not been subsumed.
All photos by Scott Suchman for Bullfrog Bagels
Unabashedly self indulgent post here. The pictures following are work that I do. How I get paid. And also a major part of my identity. The accent needs to shift and the syllable on which to focus is life. One syllable. In the meantime, constructing a baGEL is what I do during work hours. I love the handling of it, the tactile, visceral mess of it all. The upcloseness.
Why I think any human enters a period of time when they have “earned” the right to not work is not beyond me. It is a social construct. We are built to work. Work is survival. Work for an older person looks different than work for a younger person. Still, it is work. Purpose, contribution, work, identity.
When I choose to no longer work as a food stylist – well aware that to have a choice is a privilege – my identity will morph, organically I hope. Ultimately organically, as I will become compost. Until then, carrying on with touching, constructing, handling, working.
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of the New Jersey Sloppy Joe I have wondered why it has not been exploited, franchised, appropriated. Such a superlative sandwich.
And finally I was given the opportunity to make one. The Washington Post did a story on it. I did my best to procure proper ingredients and build authentically. The bread is a mystery. It can be oval and then cut into the iconic thirds, including the superlative triangle, or it can be made with pullman slices, cut into cute squares and arranged on a pedestal. I am not sure and have no opinion about which – if either – is “correct.” Therein lies the sandwich fascination. Many opinions, no answers.
The recipe asked me to butter the bread on the inside. Someone, I do not remember whom, remarked that the butter was not de rigueur. Growing up in a Wisconsin household including, iconically, a dad in the dairying business, we buttered bread for sandwiches to protect from sogginess. How about you, New Jerseyites, children of the Garden State, what is correct? Do you want the slaw to soften the bread or not? Tell me.
Truth, I love yesterday’s sandwich today.
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SECRET: Sandwiches Eaten Collectively, Raptuously, Eagerly Together
It is in Fayetteville, West Virginia. My friend Harold loves this place, takes his mom there, and I hope he will take me there someday too. I want to bust into anyplace that has a secret. There is a second outpost in Richmond, that’s a closer destination. If I have my way we will travel on blue highways, they whisper secrets at every curve.
From Harold, who is in the know about exceptional West Virginia:
David Bailey and his wife started TSSS in Fayetteville. They also started a pizza place called Pies and Pints. I believe P&P came first. Both are favorites.
Eventually the Baileys sold the P&P concept to some investment group. Now, there are P&P’s in several states in the South and Midwest. The Baileys kept the locations in Fayetteville, Charleston, and Morgantown.
It seems this process is now occurring at TSSS. The current owner is Lewis Rhineharr but the Baileys still own the name and concept.
Fayetteville is a former mining community that sits on the rim of The New River Gorge. It’s also the gateway to the nation’s newest national park. Many smart, creative, and young people began moving there fifty years ago. It’s a center for whitewater rafting and rock climbing.
Three intriguing words. Secret. Sandwich. Society.
Intriguing words from Harold, talking about Fayetteville:
Also my first memory in life happened near there.
I do not know of what he speaks, nor do I know if it is a secret. Someday, over a sandwich, I hope to know.
Lives are secret-filled, from inconsequential stuff such as the hated peas I dropped through the porch floorboards, to the turtle I might have killed by playing with it too hard to more important stuff. You know the important stuff, whether you can face it or not. Let’s not talk about it.
And then there are sandwich preferences. Let’s talk about it. Do you have a secret sandwich preference? Beef tongue could be a bridge too far for some, but not for me. I keep that a secret – no need to be maligned for my sandwich preferences. Mayonnaise is polarizing, I am told. I love mayonnnaise and also keep that to myself. Canned tuna, aka “tuna fish”, might be something someone might shame you for liking. I like it. A lot. Not telling anyone.
We have our differences, our preferences, our secrets, our guilty secrets, our proud secrets. Between two slices of bread all is confidential.
What a beautiful statement. Let me make you a sandwich.
I just listened to an episode of the Wiser Than Me podcast, hosted by Julia Louis Dreyfuss, in conversation with Patti LaBelle.
Patti’s sister, who died at 44, asked Patti to make her a fried egg sandwich the day before she died. Patti, just home from a tour – just, asked for a day to recover and then the sandwich – you know it would have been delicious! – would be made. Opportunity lost. Not throwing any shade because – obviously – no one knew that time had run out.
Apparently Patti LaBelle is a comfortable, happy, generous, capable cook and she is called upon to feed and nurture all those who know her. Lucky them.
Patti went on to talk about – and this has been documented in many notable forums – her guilt, regret and sadness about not making the sandwich. She was haunted by a sandwich not made. Understood.
Dilemma. Powerful.
Need I mention that a sandwich is the conflux of all things human? Of course not. Bread, the “staff” of life , holding/cradling/securing the necessary stuff, the essentials. And Patti cooks. She has authored countless cookbooks. Book covers hold/cradle/secure the necessary stuff, the essentials. Staff? She must have staff. The staff of life. To do what she does would require STAFF.
Dilemma. For me, if I ask you for a fried egg sandwich, it is the asking that matters. If you agree to make it, that is more than enough. The actual making? Not so much. Should we run out of time, for whatever reason – on to other things, sudden thunder storm, overflowing bathtub – it’s the sandwich thought that matters. Always.
Tomorrow morning we leave for Korea – my son, a Korean adoptee and me, his adoptive mom. I lived in the rainbow and unicorn world for many years, through the adoption process and long into his childhood. We had fun, checked all the joyful boxes, all of them and more, with zest and love.
Life got more complicated as he got older – bigger kids, bigger problems, everyone knows about this – and I was neither prepared or equipped. Am I now? No, I am not, although I have scratched the surface and found a deep, rich vein of resource. Podcasts, books, people, vocabulary, awareness, kindness, recognition, people, stories and vast reserves of love.
For years and years I have wanted to go to Korea and he said no. Okay, not ready, maybe never. That is for him to decide. Now the stars have aligned for reasons unknown and, magically, the timing feels very right. Earlier would have been off. We were both untethered, off-kilter, possibly desparate (me), possibly too young (him). In Beth Syverson‘s words, I walk beside him on this journey although, to be frank, I hope to walk a few paces behind him in Korea. Quietly.
Korean Street Toast is on our agenda. It’s a sandwich, from what I understand, a sandwich you buy and eat on the street. Yes, I want to learn ALL about Korea, anxious over-achiever that I have been trained to be. YES, this is a long time dream. YES, rainbows and unicorns are lurking. Should we get there and eat that toast together, that’ll be gravy on my mashed potato heart. Score.
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Now for some gilgeori toast, Korean street toast, to wash it down. Gonna drown my sorrows in egg, cabbage, carrot and milk bread. And restore myself with the five flavors of omija – sweet, salty, sour, bitter and pungent.
In November I am going to Korea with my son, who is a Korean adoptee, a first time visit for us both, something I have wanted for a very long time. Twenty-five years ago, when our adoption process began, I was hope-filled, abundant with love, open-hearted and serenely euphoric.
They told us he is “your own”. They told us he was “placed for adoption”. They told us that October 17 would be his “coming home” day. I had questions then: is he healthy?, what do I say when people ask me if I want children “of my own”?, will he love me when I am old? will he love me at all? when will he notice that we do not look alike?, so many questions, so many questions. And so much love. Love harder, deeper, more ferocious than anything I have felt or will ever feel. Without question he was my own. Mama bear style. Fierce, committed, devoted.
I felt proud, not proud as in I had done something charitable. God no. Just proud. Proud to be a parent. Proud of how staggeringly cute he was. Proud to be all puffed up with love. Proud that he was happy, and clean, and adorable.
Adoption is fraught, and fraught in countless ways beyond my comprehension. But I drank the koolaid. I thought I had this down, I believed him being my own was enough, I drank the koolaid. It was indeed sweet, salty, sour, bitter and pungent.
Truth: maybe I did a bad thing, or participated in a bad thing. Took him from his own. Took him from his home. Truth: my heart was and is all in. Truth: a beautiful thing, adoption, is complicated and maybe not so beautiful and, without question, built on heartache. He has another mother and another father. I know this, I have always known this and they are weft and weave of my family. Their son is my family. Or is he? Am I expecting way too much? Where is home?
So, we are going to Korea. My heart is open, he will lead the way and I will watch, absorb, learn and detach. His number one desire while there is to “eat street food”, mine too, with him. I drank the koolaid on the “stay put and let them fly” message, too. I’ll be there, heart in hand, and here always, holding down the fort, this home, whether or not it is needed.
Posting this now although it is just a few crumbs of what I am feeling. This “reckoning” is, frankly, major.
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LEXINGTON CANDY SHOP – NYC
Hey there sandwich lovers. It’s James (formerly known as Lisa’s Main Sandwich Man in NY), unmasked and guest blogging today. Do you like eateries that have been around for over 100 years? Of course you do. I know a couple in NYC. One is Barney Greengrass on the Upper West Side:
but that’s an appetizing post for another time.
The other is the Lexington Candy Shop on the Upper East Side:
Surprise! … it’s not a candy shop, though you can pick up some old favorites like Choward’s Scented Gum [see photo] at the checkout counter, where you pay (cash tips preferred left on the table). So, if it’s not a candy shop, then what is it? I guess it’s a diner, but it’s called a Luncheonette, which is fun to say – right? This joint has the vintage look and vibe you’d expect from a 100-year-old institution. Start with that classic corner entrance and neon sign. Then add the soda fountain counter with the stainless-steel backdrop behind it, and finish up with those vinyl clad booths.
On the menu there are throwbacks such as Frosteds, Malteds, Egg Creams, Fresh Orangeaid, Lime Rickeys, and Cinnamon Toast. Plus, they serve the ever-rich Bassett’s Ice Cream from Philadelphia.
Except for the egg cream, I have not tried any of those things. That’s because I can’t resist the TUNA MELT.
The Lex Candy Shop Tuna Melt is not a gut bomb. Fries are not included though it does come with a pickle spear. Some may argue that the sandwich is a bit pricey, but the price includes the total old-world (time warp?) experience.
The sandwich comes closed face by default, though you can request an open face version on toasted English Muffin. You get a choice of cheeses and breads. I opt for cheddar cheese and rye bread.
Let’s begin with the tuna, which is always fresh tasting and never fishy (so the scented gum is not necessary). There is ample finely diced celery in the tuna, adding a nice crunchy texture and a refreshing taste. Mayo is present, but only just enough. And the nicely chewy rye has caraway seeds – not just on the crust, but throughout the bread – adding an additional flavor layer.
I’m not sure how they toast the sandwich, but it’s not drenched in butter so it’s not greasy, and the toasting is enough to melt the cheese without heating up the fish. The Lex Candy Shop Tuna Melt seems light enough that you could eat two … but you don’t … or maybe you do?
Where better to post about a Luncheonette but on The Lunch Encounter – you dig?
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The Lunch Encounter 