I'll Always be a Jersey Girl

Jersey Comfort Food - taylor ham, egg, and cheese on a hard roll.

Last week my niece posted this article on Facebook. If you don’t live in New Jersey, heed what it says. New Jersey folks love their taylor ham, egg, and cheese sandwiches. Folks who move away from the Garden State (and make no mistake, it is the Garden State), dream of these sandwiches as well as the idea of running into a deli and grabbing a hard roll for breakfast. For those not in the know, a hard roll is a soft Kaiser roll sliced in half, slathered with butter, popped back together again, and wrapped in plastic to sit in a bowl by the register for folks to grab with their morning coffee on the way to work. I was a vegetarian who didn’t eat dairy, and yet I still dreamed of these two quintessentially New Jersey breakfasts.

Mmmmm, I need my morning coffee!

Some states, like Arizona, don't put a high priority on Dunkin Donuts (poor dearies), but I do. When I moved to Arizona, I really really missed my morning stop, but they had crappy coffee in Arizona Dunkin Donuts. How bizarre.

Note that I called it Dunkin. The wonderful institution that began in Massachusetts, Dunkin Donuts, is abbreviated as Dunkin down in Jersey, from whence I hail. This weird “Dunks” term they use up here in the Boston area is just strange. It’s like Boston natives are too damned lazy to finish the word!

New Jersey’s delicious and quick breakfasts are not the only thing unique to New Jersey that expats miss. I miss having someone else pump my gas for me on a cold winter day. Nobody in New Jersey is allowed to pump their own gas, so my first trip over the border involved a lesson on what to do when your car needs to be filled with gas. I was so proud when I filled my first tank! Not only does someone else pump your gas for you in Jersey, but they generally clean your windshield, too. If you ask, they’ll even check your oil so you don’t have to get your hands dirty. You get all that service while paying less for gas than anywhere else I’ve ever lived.

All turns from right lane only.

When you’ve got your coffee in hand and had someone else pump your gas so you can unwrap the plastic from around your hard buttered roll, you can get on the road to work. If your job is to the left, you hop onto the road, turn right, and zip around until you have turned around the other way and are facing the direction you need to be. Folks from Jersey do this automatically because we're from the land of jughandles. If you’re from anywhere else, you’re wondering what turning right to go left has to do with holding onto a cheap gallon of wine. Another unique Jersey item, the jughandle is a bizarre version of a traffic circle whose sole purpose is to confuse out of towners. If you can’t figure out the jug handle then we know you’re a transplant. I've heard there are a few towns in Vermont or New Hampshire that have some jug handles, but I'll believe it when I see it.

Please note that I keep saying I’m from Jersey. That is JERSEY, pronounced "jur-ee." I did not say “joy-zee.” Nobody in New Jersey is from this bizarre, mythical land you call joy-zee. When you say we’re from Joyzee, or Joisie as some people prefer to spell it, we know you’re insane. The only people who talk like that are out of towners and some folks from Long Island. Sure, there are a few people in Newark, but Newark sure doesn’t represent the state. We’ll let you think so, though, so that you turn around and leave as soon as your plane lands.

New Jersey is a great state, and when I was a kid I thought that very few people ever escape. There’s a joke that you have can get into New Jersey for free, but you have to pay to get out. That’s based on the fact that some of the bridges over the Delaware River have tolls going in only one direction. Some bridges, like the Dingmans Ferry bridge, are privately owned, so New Jersey has no control over them, others are free, and still others will cost cash. Honestly, I don’t generally pay to get in or out of New Jersey because I usually cross over land going to and from New Jersey. I’m from northern Jersey, southern New York state is right there, no water crossing!

Driving all over the state is hungry work. Not problem! You can easily find a good deli or a good diner. Where else but a diner or Dunkin Donuts would you go when the bars close at 1:00 a.m.? Jersey diners have been memorialized in songs, including Billy Joel’s Scene from an Italian Restaurant where he mentions the Parkway Diner. The Parkway Diner's ok, but my favorite diner is Yetters in Sussex County. While not a 24 hour diner, it was "the" diner near us when I was growing up. The only place open 24/7 was Dunkin Donuts in our small town.

Agood New Jersey diner you should be able to get a Monte Cristo, a sandwich made of joy like a party in your mouth. No boring bread for a Monte Cristo – oh no, it’s made with French toast. The sandwich filling is turkey, cheese (swiss, please!), and ham, and your sandwich is topped with powder sugar. I hate ham, so I always get mine without ham.

I’ve tried to get Monte Christos in so many restaurants in so many states, and almost everybody failed. I have to give credit where it’s due, though. Sharon, the proprietor of Mom’s Schoolhouse Diner (it’s not a diner, but it was sweet of her to think it was) in Potsdam, New York, succeeded in making me a Monte Christo. I almost cried while I ate it! Unlike Jersey where you get pancake syrup, I was offered my choice of New York or Vermont maple syrup. Her Grade B syrup was Vermont, so that's what I always chose. Maybe one day I’ll write about what I learned during my visit at the American Maple Museum. Sharon retired and closed Mom's Schoolhouse,but she'll be opening up a B&B soon. If you're in the North Country, stay there - I guarantee you'll get the best waffles you've ever had in your life.

Even with all the great food, I was glad to leave New Jersey. It wasn’t that New Jersey sucks; it’s just that my family lived there so long that I attended my great grandmother's school. My high school teachers were my parents' high school teachers. I couldn't do anything secretly because my dad knew everybody, and they'd always report my behavior to him. Leaving was the right decision for me, but Bon Jovi has assured me that New Jersey will always be there for me. That man knew how to rock!

I haven't lived in New Jersey for over fifteen years, but if you're raised in Jersey, but I'll never stop being a Jersey girl.