Coke is ok as long as you put the straw in your mouth and not in your nose.
That's my 2 cents....plain as it may be.

Yeah I'm with you Larry! That kind of thing went out in the 80's. (least for me anyhow)

Kids today. Of course it didn't help having the old NYC mayor explain how to make crack on public TV. Not that a kindergardener couldn't figure it out. One thing I can say with all honesty. Never smoked crack. Not even on a bad day. I kinda knew I'd grow up, and do something right. Now if I could just break all these other addictions....<img src="http://www.arlo.net/ubb/smilies/eek.gif" width=15 height=15>

<BLOCKQUOTE><font size="1" face="Verdana, Arial">quote:</font><HR>Originally posted by Larry:

That's my 2 cents....plain as it may be.<HR></BLOCKQUOTE>

BTW... anybody know why they call it an egg cream, when there's no egg and no cream in it? (but it's oooooh so good!)

Obviously, I'm on the soda side of this argument... and hero's and I fold my pizza when I eat it!

It's pop and usually subs or hoagies (seldom grinders). Had a friend from Boston once--called it tonic. First time I heard coke for anything was in Texas--a friend's son asked for a red-coke. (Red pop to me.)

No egg creams, no frappes, no cabinets. Sheez. Gonna have to hit the East Coast one of these days soon.

Do you have chili dogs or coney islands??

We have grinders here in CT. Where I went to college in western PA, we had subs. It's been a long time since I lived in Jersey, but I think we had heroes or hoagies there. And you could fold the pizza. You can't fold the pizza in New England--too thick. God, I miss NJ pizza!

...in pennsylvania (eastern-ish) they would call them hoagies (or at least my grandparents who lived there would refer to them that way, and at first i chalked it up to their general weirdness anyway, but to my bemusement noted that others (not just my grandparents) were referring to them as hoagies as well)...and i must say, it seemed a tradition that every time we went up to visit them we should stop at this one place in particular to get one of the world's greatest italian "hoagies" which included tomatoes (something our favorite local sub shop (you notice i called it sub) would flat out refuse to do for you...
"this is my place, and i'll make these subs any d*** way i please!"
..really! but it was part of the deal and half the reason we went there anyway...for the ambiance (and a fairly good sandwich)...but still some of the locals here referred to them as "heroes" which i had to figure out, but was suspicious after the "hoagie" incident that it might be a similar sandwich to that...so anyway...it's been my experience that if i order an italian "hoagie" it's larger than usual, prepared with various cold cuts (sliced thin), provolone (ditto), onion, oil & vinegar, herbs, peperocinos on request, and TOMATO (and i mean these were heavy, locally grown tomatoes). if it's an italian "sub" it's somewhat smaller with various cold cuts, provolone, oil vinegar & herbs, onion, and peperocinos whether you want them or not. if it's a "hero" it's the smallest of them, made with salami, bologna, cheese, lettuce, tomato, maybe a ringlet or two of onion and mayonnaise (for a while after that, i may have become a little neurotic about making sure they wouldn't put mayonnaise on a sub instead of vinegar and oil...i don't mind mayonnaise on some things, but not when i'm not expecting it)

Are we forgetting down south about the "poor boy" sandwich, aka "po' boy"??????? Yet another name for the hoagie, grinder, hero .
On another note, I believe that the term "hero" is derived form the Greek "Gyro", which is pronounced about the same.

mmmmmmmmmmmm
I like Gyros... good stuff... and I really don't want to know what's in the sauce! (I believe it's sour cream, cucumber & garlic - but you wouldn't want to know what my brother used to tell me it was...LOL)

And don't forget souvlaki, if we're talking Greek food!

But if you're from N'Orleans... I think you'd bypass the hero/gyro/hoagie/sub/grinder argument, and go for muffaletta... Gotta head down south one of these days and have one of them!

In Phila, we called them hoagies; the grinders were hot hoagies, as in a tuna grinder was a tuna hoagie which was placed in the oven. My mother loved them... I never acquired a taste for them. Some pizzas could be folded, depending on which restaurant we ordered from. Coke, I thought as a kid, was the generic term for soda... or was it the other way around? Oh, yes, I'd order a "soda" and then the waitress would ask "what kind" and I'd kinda stare at her blankly. Turns out, what I wanted was a Pepsi, but I didn't know that cos my mother always spoke in the generic anyway. It was real surprise when I found out that vaseline and kleenex weren't the "real" names for things.

I've had a Philly Hoagie in Philly before. Around here in VA folks call them subs tho...

Now that Subway is more popular than Mr. Hero, I guess we call them subs here in Ohio. We call folded pizza calzone, or is that something different?

There was a word I heard recntly,"generica", whick supposedly stands for all those things that look the same no matter what part of American you're in, like WalMart, McDonalds, etc. I guess local culture is getting harder to find these days.

<BLOCKQUOTE><font size="1" face="Verdana, Arial">quote:</font><HR>Originally posted by Pat Rainey:
I guess local culture is getting harder to find these days.<HR></BLOCKQUOTE>

When Corey and I went off in "search of America" this past summer, we did note some local culture, especially in the form of The Waffle House found mostly in the south (I found out online that there is one near Harrisburg).

Even in the Indian Country of Gallup, NM... the place is littered with "national culture" such as Denny's and WalMart. In some respects it was good to have that familiarity all around us, at least we knew we wouldn't starve, as Corey preferred to eat at such places at Taco Bell (in Albuquerque) and Olive Garden in Flagstaff, along with Red Lobster in Farmington.

Only three times did we eat "culturally" and all those were in the motels where we stayed in the Navajo Nation. But, we ordered "standard" American food.

In one respect it was good that the various Indian cultures have become "Americanized" because we were both worried about eating "strange" foods, but it bothered me even more that they've become so "Americanized" that they'd have Taco Bells all over the place!

I'm not sure that I've managed to stay on subject here, but I've been doing a lot of thinking lately about this and just wanted to share my thoughts on "generica" as it pertains to other nations within our own.

Then there's lollipop v. taffy v. sucker.
When we first moved to NJ I asked for a sucker at the bank for my toddler -- the teller looked at me like I was a complete pervert. Turns out that a sucker is a taffy here. Now I just call them lollipops. Everyone's happy and I no longer scare bank tellers.

<BLOCKQUOTE><font size="1" face="Verdana, Arial">quote:</font><HR>Originally posted by Pat Rainey:

We call folded pizza calzone, or is that something different?
<HR></BLOCKQUOTE>

Yep... calzone is something different... at least around here... that would be a pizza-type dough, wrapped around a filling of ricotta and mozzarella cheese, sometimes with meat inside too, and sealed up like a turnover and baked... then add a side order of marinara sauce for dipping... (Kinda like a pasty italian style - pasties are a north-country regionalism, usually dough around potatoes and meat.)

As for folded pizza... I take my wedge-shaped slice of pizza (thin crust, thank you!) and crease it down the middle to pick it up and eat... I've seen some places where they eat pizza with fork and knife... where's the fun in that?

I like the idea of different regions having their specialties, and I try to taste new things as I travel... though I haven't traveled much, so my palate is primarily tuned to New York area foods (which can include everything under the sun - but I mean typical foods... like New York Cheesecake from Lindy's.)

you folks are weird...


but a knish by any other name is still a knish!

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