August 3, 2017

"Though of course bread and butter are eaten all over, the buttered roll (or roll with butter, as it is known in parts of New Jersey) is a distinctly local phenomenon."

"Mention its name outside the New York metropolitan area and you would very likely be met with blank incomprehension."

From "Ode to the Buttered Roll, That New York Lifeline," by Sadie Stein (in the NYT).

I know this article is getting mocked — as if it's typical New York cluelessness about the people who don't live in New York, but I think the mockers are not really getting the way New Yorkers experience the buttered roll. My understanding is premised mostly on my experience working in midtown Manhattan offices in the 1970s, where a bell from the coffee wagon broke up the morning's work. Something about the small array of items got me tracked into eating the completely nondescript buttered Kaiser roll that came in a waxed paper sandwich bag. (Stein calls it "wax paper." I'm not that much of New Yorker. I say "waxed paper," since it's real paper with wax on it, not paper somehow composed of wax, but I'm not going to fight about it, because I'm not a native New Yorker. I don't like to fight for the sake of fighting. I'm just saying it's not "wax paper." I also don't say "piece fruit," for "piece of fruit," but I've lived around New Yorkers who did.) Anyway, in my experience, the buttered roll in New York is a specific thing and a weird thing, precisely because it is too ordinary to be considered a specific rather than a generic thing, but it really is. I think elsewhere people would look at this as an empty sandwich, a failure to add baloney or cheese or something. What is this?

And why is a Kaiser roll called a Kaiser roll?
Kaiser rolls have existed in a recognizable form at least since 1760. They are thought to have been named to honor Emperor (Kaiser) Franz Joseph I of Austria (1830–1916). In 18th century a law fixed retail prices of Semmeln breadrolls in the Habsburg Monarchy. Allegedly, the name Kaisersemmel came into general use after the bakers' guild had sent a delegation in 1789 to Emperor Joseph II (1741–1790) and convinced him of deregulating the selling price.
Here's the highest-rated comment at the NYT, beautifully written by Fred Plotkin:
Lovely article and great memories from commenters. I grew up in the West 70s in the late 1960s and early 1970s. There was still a large Viennese community, mostly Jewish, who had escaped Hitler, the Anschluss and the Holocaust. All of them loved classical music and spoke about it to anyone who would listen...and I was one of those. West 72nd Street was a sort of Wienerstrasse, with bakeries and cafes that somewhat replicated those from Vienna. One drank Meinl brand coffee (Vienna's most popular) and always had a brotchen, which was close to a Kaiser roll but always had poppy seeds unless you did not want one--but we did! The roll was crisp, fragrant, baked just hours earlier and would be easily cut horizontally. Fresh room temperature sweet butter was spread on both sides and this was served with a tiny dish of apricot preserve, just enough to slightly sweeten the butter. I would sit at tables as a 12 year old, carefully eating my roll so it did not go too quickly and sipping that wonderful coffee. Why did I tarry? Because it allowed me to listen to people tell stories of hearing Mahler, Strauss or Bruno Walter conduct or to hear readings by Hugo von Hofmannsthal. Or to hear about Klimt, Freud, Loos, Wittgenstein and others who made Vienna so vibrant before what was often referred to as "the catastrophe." These people were guardians of a civilization, one they felt it was essential to transmit to the likes of me, one bite of roll and butter at a time."


81 comments:

Meade said...

Funny, I always heard it as peace fruit. But then the country I come from is not called New York.

Michael K said...

Austria also has wine bars and gardens outside which have a green branch of a tree mounted on the wall above the door. They were granted special tax rates by the Emperor.

They are called "Heuriger's" and are all around Vienna.

If you go at the right time, around September, the wine is still fermenting and is called "Sturm."

The heuriger tradition was born in the 18th century when Emperor Joseph II allowed the country’s vintners to sell newly fermented wine tax-free. Soon after, winemakers were setting up tables in their gardens and vineyards, inviting Viennese to partake in the new tradition.

They must sell it only in their own location.

Another Viennese tradition.

HoodlumDoodlum said...

Ann Althouse said...I know this article is getting mocked — as if it's typical New York cluelessness about the people who don't live in New York, but I think the mockers are not really getting the way New Yorkers experience the buttered roll.

Ok, but if we're doing the "lived experience" thing--as in: you wouldn't really understand since you didn't live it--then what portion of the NYT's observations and criticisms on the rest of the nation and world have to be thrown out? 80, 90%?
It's such an arrogant thing to reserve that privilege just for yourself if you're the NYTimes; "we can understand what things are like for the rest of the nation and condemn then for their wrongthink, their backwardness, and their ugly expressions, but those of you who find our opinions and behavior odd are missing the subtle nuances that you can only truly understand by living here yourself."
Is that a "cosmopolitan" attitude, or just the worldview of a jackass?
If you and the NYTimes want to say we (people who find the NY view of a special relationship w/a buttered roll to be mockable) are insufficiently close to the culture in question to pass judgement then in fairness you'll all have to shut the fuck up about all cultures that aren't your own. Which, you know, means about the rest of us.

rehajm said...

It's wax paper. That's what it says on the box and it deserves to be called whatever it wants.

'TreHammer said...

In Iowa we say, "go with" instead of "go with you" or "go with them", etc. In Iowa, we also say "the clothes need washed" as opposed to "the clothes need to be washed". Economy of words.

tcrosse said...

The German/Yiddish word for Piece doesn't need an 'Of' between it and whatever it's a piece of, i.e. ein Stück Käse.

madAsHell said...

MichaelK, dein link ist kaputt.

Ann Althouse said...

I guess it's like ice tea and iced tea. I say iced tea. Never drink the stuff.

Ann Althouse said...

Ringed binder or ring binder?

Fried bread or fry bread?

Teen-age kids or teen-aged kids?

2-wheel bike or 2-wheeled bike?

Anonymous said...

"piece fruit" is, I believe, a linguistic remnant of German immigration to the US. My wife, native German, speaks English fluently after 30 years here but she still uses the preposition-free "piece ________" construction. "I'll have a piece bread and a bit cheese" would be a sentence she would and does say.

Funny how long language can hold on: my Pennsylvania Dutch (read German) ancestors landed in 1712. My grandmother in the 1960s would tell me to "make the light out" or "go the stairs up". She had never been to Germany and did not speak German other than a few passed down phrases e.g. "Du kleene Deibel!" Interestingly enough, that phrase (you little devil) was still in the Franken dialect of our ancestors.

Interesting to me at least

exiledonmainstreet, green-eyed devil said...

Hot ham and rolls on Sundays seems to be a Wisconsin or maybe - I don't know - a Milwaukee thing, perhaps of German origin. Local bakeries and small grocery stores have had weekend hot ham and roll specials since I was a kid. I ate my hot ham and rolls with butter when I was a kid. Then we went to church. Nowadays, I have mustard with it instead.

Just a roll and butter seems boring to me.

Michael K said...

"MichaelK, dein link ist kaputt."

Thanks. No preview function.

Try this one.

Quayle said...

You don’t eat it like a sandwich. Common practice is to fold over each half of the roll and eat it that way, as two half rolls.

Also in junior high school in Maplewood, New Jersey, we used to buy a buttered roll and potato chips, and make a potato chip sandwich.

HoodlumDoodlum said...

These people were guardians of a civilization, one they felt it was essential to transmit to the likes of me, one bite of roll and butter at a time."

Yeah, a WHITE MALE EUROPEAN IMPERIALIST civilization.
Or is that ok in this case??
Damn but the rules are slippery!
Memories of Vienna and its culture are beautiful...but they're memories of a white patriarchal culture (all the composers and authors mentioned are male, no?) and we all know those cultures can't be celebrated without also condemning their pernicious effects on oppressed People of Color and Women.
Celebrating Viennese culture is celebrating whiteness.
Shameful.

Unknown said...

You're only about 100 miles from a real roll-based local phenomenon -- the Sheboygan hard roll.

HoodlumDoodlum said...

Ann Althouse said...I guess it's like ice tea and iced tea. I say iced tea. Never drink the stuff.

That's too bad. I bet you'd like sweet tea, though.
Totally different.

dustbunny said...

I lived in Des Moines for a few years when I was in what was then called junior high and I was baffled by friends who pronounced chimney as chimley. Also there were creeks and cricks but that might have been in Wisconsin.

D 2 said...

Tourists eat bread and butter. Travellers eat buttered rolls. The locals: roll with butter.

Tomorrow: egg boiling in Brooklyn.

~

Years ago, i would go to a diner with a coworker for lunch. Maybe 10/15 times over the years. Each time he would order: "i would like a chicken salad sandwich on plain brown bread, - i mean untoasted". The waitress must have known what he meant, but he was always fearful over it.

I told him to drop the word plain, and just say untoasted. I must have had 5 eyes.

Ralph L said...

Can anything with butter or bacon possibly be wrong?

Tea-lemonade mix is better than sweet tea, which can sometimes taste like dishwater.

Left Bank of the Charles said...

My sister in Beaverton, Oregon makes buttered rolls at Thanksgiving. They are buttered before they go in the oven and they are wonderful.

Can we have a picture of one of these NYC buttered rolls? Because its too early in the month to waste one of my free trips through the NYT paywall to see if there is a picture.

Rick.T. said...

We called an "incomplete" stop at a stop sign a Jersey Roll.

Meade said...

Ringed binder or ring binder? 3-ring binder

Fried bread or fry bread? Frybread (one word).

Teen-age kids or teen-aged kids? Teens.

2-wheel bike or 2-wheeled bike? Bike. Or, maybe, 2-wheeler.

jacksonjay said...

You tawkin about a yeast roll?

Meade said...

We called an "incomplete" stop at a stop sign a Jersey Roll.

A dead stop or a roll.

tcrosse said...

We called an "incomplete" stop at a stop sign a Jersey Roll.

We used to call changing into an already occupied lane on the Garden State the "Jersey Merge".

Meade said...

"Also there were creeks and cricks but that might have been in Wisconsin."

You're warm. Michigan.

SukieTawdry said...

I sometimes dream about the hard-crusted rolls, buttered or not, we eat in the east. Our bread choices out here on the west coast basically suck. One of the reasons I love cruising is that they always have hard rolls on the buffet table.

Fried bread for some people is French toast for others. Fry bread (or frybread) is something entirely different. It's a Native American specialty invented by imprisoned Navajos. And it's yummy.

tcrosse said...

How widespread is the term 'bubbler' for a drinking fountain ?

The Cracker Emcee Refulgent said...

'We called an "incomplete" stop at a stop sign a Jersey Roll."

A "California slide" in my east Bay Area teens.

Gilbert Pinfold said...

I grew up in New Jersey, and these were always called "Hard Rolls". At any commuter stop, train or bus, you would see these buttered and in wax paper. Perched on a lidded coffee cup decorated with a blue-and-white Greek motif, these were central NJ staples in the morning. I may have gone to Princeton, but everyone ate these.

Meade said...

Do you mean water fountain?

raf said...

Ralph L said...
Can anything with butter or bacon possibly be wrong?

Tea-lemonade mix is better than sweet tea, which can sometimes taste like dishwater.


Well yes. Tea-lemonade mix, for example, is not improved by either butter or bacon.

TestTube said...

This -- and a subset of other NYT articles, mostly in the lifestyle section -- cause me to suspect that living in New York City is not unlike being a member of a strange and somewhat abusive cult.

"Ah! How wonderful to live in New York, and indulge in bread slathered with margarine, while waxing nostalgic about an even happier time, when it was butter instead of margarine! Wonder what the poor country folk are having for breakfast!?!"

They live in cramped little cubicles, then travel in dirty, unreliable little communal vehicles, to a job where they are lucky to have a cubicle. Pitying the rest of us.

Kept in line by being force-fed a steady stream of (Admittedly well-written) propaganda about how fortunate they are, they smugly pity the rest of us. They toil long hours for high salaries that allow them to pay exorbitant rates for their tiny apartments, uncomfortable travel, margarine rolls, and, curiously enough, the very propaganda that justifies it all.

Robert Cook, where are you? Enlightened us, for, truly, we ponder and do not comprehend.

Larvell said...

Some people call it a kaiser roll, I call it a swing roll.

Meade said...

"Tea-lemonade mix, for example, is not improved by either butter or bacon."

Actually, it makes a great endurance sports drink.

Larvell said...

Some people call it a kaiser roll, I call it a swing roll.

Ugh, stepped on my own joke with a stupid typo. Sling roll.

tcrosse said...

Do you mean water fountain?

No, I mean a bubbler. Do the street-corner (or street corner) bubblers in Madison still run continuously ?

Meade said...

"Some people call it a kaiser roll, I call it a swing roll."

haha.

Sling Blade.

Earnest Prole said...

Let's talk about the American dining tradition of eating a preliminary meal of butter and dinner rolls before the actual meal is served or indeed even ordered.

Gospace said...

2-wheel bike or 2-wheeled bike?

Neither. Bike, short for bicycle, by definition, 2 wheels. Bicycle without modifiers such as electric bicycle refers to human powered vehicle. Bike can refer to motorcycle or human powered. 3 wheels is a trike.

mezzrow said...

Kaiser rolls for breakfast with wild cherry jam. Vienna. (sighs)

You break them into five pieces, each of which opens up like a clamshell for whatever you want to stuff inside. Like butter and jam. With a Meinl coffee. (sighs again)

Meade said...

" Do the street-corner (or street corner) bubblers in Madison still run continuously ?"

Those were the days my friend.

Water fountain — East, South, Midwest
Drinking fountain — West
Bubbler — the west coast of Lake Michigan

Ambrose said...

@meade. Bubbler (pronounced bubbla) is also a common Rhode Island name for the water fountain

traditionalguy said...

Around here a stop sign slow down and go is called a Rolling Stop. We are good energy conservationists.

Scott said...

Around my town in Jersey (referring to the state of New Jersey and not one of the Channel Islands) the 7-Elevens and Quick Cheks and Wawas sell wrapped buttered Portuguese rolls (which are sort of like Kaiser rolls but a little different) to morning commuters. I always thought it was a Puerto Rican thing. Sort of like a "regular coffee" containing two tablespoons of sugar and topped with whole milk.

vanderleun said...

Sometimes I have to think that without the New York Times, Althouse would be stuck with posting pictures of her pedicures.

tcrosse said...

A hot roll with fresh butter every morning was the heavenly reward of Bontche Schweig.

'TreHammer said...

In MN...
"I did not do it"
morphs into...
"I didn't do it"
which further morphs into...
"I did it do it"

:-D

Meade said...

"Around here a stop sign slow down and go is called a Rolling Stop. We are good energy conservationists."

To live outside the law you must be conservationist.

Meade said...

@meade. Bubbler (pronounced bubbla) is also a common Rhode Island name for the water fountain

Crazy R-droppers.

Smilin' Jack said...

Duck tape or ducked tape?

My name goes here. said...

I had an African American roommate once. I asked him if he needed anything from the store since I was going out. He told me he wanted some Ask Deodorant. I looked all over the store and never could find it.

Anonymous said...

Why would buttered bread make you expect some sort of sandwich filling? If it'a a peanut butter sandwich, it's the peanut butter itself that's spread over the bread (possibly with preserves, honey, or banana slices). If it's any other sort of sandwich, it comes with mayo, and maybe mustard if the filling's robust enough. The point of putting butter on bread is to enjoy the butter!

HoodlumDoodlum said...

Earnest Prole said...
Let's talk about the American dining tradition of eating a preliminary meal of butter and dinner rolls before the actual meal is served or indeed even ordered.


South Park Episode 109: Starvin' Marvin
...
Marvin just sits there. A waiter walks in and sets down a
large plate of shrimp.

CARTMAN
You see, Starvin Marvin, these are
what we call APPETIZERS.

STARVIN' MARVIN
Apee-tiser.

CARTMAN
This is what you eat before you eat...
to make you more hungry.

Marvin can't believe it.

The waiter reappears with several plates of food.

CARTMAN
Oop! Food's here! That's it for the
appetizers!

Cartman grabs the plate of shrimp and tosses it into a trash
can. Marvin's eyes absolutely pop.

The boys start to gorge themselves.

John Nowak said...

I grew up north of New York City and worked on Manhattan for a number of years.

I can't recall ever having a buttered roll, seeing someone or hearing them talk about eating one, or seeing someone sell one.

SukieTawdry said...

This -- and a subset of other NYT articles, mostly in the lifestyle section -- cause me to suspect that living in New York City is not unlike being a member of a strange and somewhat abusive cult.

Perhaps, but the food is superb.

HoodlumDoodlum said...

D said...Years ago, i would go to a diner with a coworker for lunch. Maybe 10/15 times over the years. Each time he would order: "i would like a chicken salad sandwich on plain brown bread, - i mean untoasted". The waitress must have known what he meant, but he was always fearful over it.

I told him to drop the word plain, and just say untoasted. I must have had 5 eyes.


4 Fried Chickens and a Coke; Dry White Toast

mikeski said...

I guess it's like ice tea and iced tea. I say iced tea. Never drink the stuff.

How about ice(d) cream for dessert?

That's one where the "grammatically wrong way" is so common that searching the Internet for "iced cream" corrects you and searches for "ice cream" instead.

David Baker said...

"too early in the month to waste one of my free trips through the NYT paywall to see if there is a picture."

For unlimited "free trips," clear your browser's browsing data/history as necessary. (Note: if you maintain any keep-me-logged-ins, you'll have to reenter your user/password after clearing your browser's data/history)

David Baker said...

Here's a great picture of a NY-style Kaiser Roll.

The shelf-life of a Kaiser roll was about 4-6 hours. Beyond that, they became something else - typically a "hard roll."

Kaiser's were also economical as compared to a standard breakfast. And aside from the taste and fresh-baked texture, Kaiser's were fast, and filling. Until the advent of Burger King and McDonald's ca. 1962 in NYC, at coffee shops (mini-diners) all around NYC you could walk in and walk out with a buttered Kaiser roll and a container of coffee in under one minute. And if you were a regular, 15/20 seconds. This was especially true in the garment district and Wall Street area - where time waited for no man. Also,the Kaiser roll was almost an entirely Jewish phenomena - not unlike a bagel with a "smear" (cream cheese) - or a "two-cents plain" (glass of seltzer) - or an egg-cream (shot of milk or cream, shot of chocolate syrup, seltzer).

I wrote a book (unpublished) about this NYC-era, and if you're interested, here's the short-story version: WARREN STREET

Ron said...

I used to go to a place called Ham Heaven. It was decorated with kitschy pig related ephemera, but most of it was pretty funny. They had only 3 menu items; pea soup, bean soup and ham sandwiches. Today we would call them "sliders"; they were pretty small, just a carved hunk of ham, two pickle slices and mustard on these very shiny rolls...for some reason they were 68 cents. You'd a bag of 10-20 of them and share with friends. I had a friend who worked for the Detroit symphony, and I would be quite popular when I would bring a few bags when they were rehearsing....even more so if I brought soup as well. Much music chatting during lunch, and some kind of clear hooch got passed around...awful stuff, tasted like kerosene....

Good times in the D

tcrosse said...

My Dad worked for many years in Lower Manhattan. After 9/11 he said they should put everything back the way it was before they tore the neighborhood down for the WTC.

william moore said...

Smilin jack duct tape for furnace ducts

David Baker said...

@tcrosse,

Your dad was right. Here's a brief excerpt from WARREN STREET:



"Moe stood a bit longer than usual though, realizing the days of his thirty year ritual were numbered. From under his Yankee cap he knew 60 Warren Street would be falling into the shadows of the soon to be erected World Trade Center. If they didn't tear down Harry's building, Harry would certainly be cleaning the windows to justify the new view-rated rents. The agency men would surely scatter around the city, planting their rotary phones on their bargain-basement desks wherever the rents offered the least resistance..."

The WTC marked the end of the neighborhood, even as rundown as it was. Still, it had been a beehive of activity, even cobble-stone streets, and "Radio Row." Hard to calculate how many lives changed as the WTC went ever higher and higher. And it turned out to be a boondoggle for many years, and then - 9/11.

David said...

"my Pennsylvania Dutch (read German) ancestors landed in 1712."

Palatines probably, part of the Palatine Migration or its offshoots. My Palatine ancestors arrived in New York in 1710, or at least my grandmother and her three children age 7 and less did. My grandfather died during the voyage at the age of 30. They were part of a surge of about 10,000 people who left the Palatinate in 1709 and floated down the Rhine to Rotterdam and then London on the supposed promise that Queen Anne of England would send them to the new world.

If your ancestors arrived near Philadelphia in 1712, they might have been part of a different group from east of the Rhine, near Frankfurt, that arrived that year. There were also a number of Palatine Germans who were originally sent to New York but later reassigned to near Philadelphia.

However they came, it was a dangerous and difficult experience. All honor to them for getting our family to the New World under such trying conditions.

David said...

"Duck tape or ducked tape?"

D-U-C-T tape.

dustbunny said...

Gaffers tape

Morsie said...

Separate but related, why do Americans say "off of " as in " he jumped off of the bridge" and not simply "off".?

urbane legend said...

Ann Althouse said...
Ringed binder or ring binder?

Notebook. Never heard anyone call it a 3 ring binder until I worked for an office supply company.

WA-mom said...

Growing up near Buffalo, I have never found one similarity between New Yorkers and New York Staters like myself — until this post. I do say "wax paper." Thank you, Ann.

Robert Cook said...

"Can we have a picture of one of these NYC buttered rolls?"

NYC buttered rolls.

I like them.

Robert Cook said...

"Tea-lemonade mix is better than sweet tea, which can sometimes taste like dishwater."

Only if it's made badly.

Robert Cook said...

"Robert Cook, where are you? Enlightened (sic) us, for, truly, we ponder and do not comprehend."

If you have to ask (about the appeal of NYC), you'll never understand it. One either gets it and loves it or one does not. I've lived here 36 years and still cannot believe how lucky I am to live here, (though I do miss much about the city that has changed or disappeared in my time here). I love that I can step out of my apartment building and walk to a pharmacy or supermarket or hardware store or barber or restaurant, etc., in minutes, that I am not a mile or miles from the closest such business establishments, that I don't require a car to get to one of these places. I love the beauty of a cityscape, the motley of buildings old and new and of people exotic and ordinary, city-born and transplanted from all parts of the country and points of the globe.

It's very likely that I will have to leave NYC at some point, and I will be sad to do so.

TestTube said...

I thank you for your response, and for your other contributions to this thread, Robert Cook.

I'm not sure its possible to NOT understand the appeal of NYC. It is an amazing city on so many levels. It speaks to the soul on a visceral level. I love visiting.

Anyone who sneers at NYC in toto, I suspect of a certain petty jealousy. NYC is NYC. It is a crown jewel, as, confident in the knowledge that it may have peers -- London, Paris, Rome, Hong Kong -- but no equals.

But understanding the appeal of LIVING in NYC -- that is something a bit more elusive. Even with the benefit of your kind explanation.

In truth, I do not begrudge New Yorkers their fanatical devotion to living there. Someone has to. It seems a sort of complex Disneyland, only one that really craps on its cast members. That the residents actually seem to enjoy all this is a plus -- it alleviates my guilt at their exploitation, the last obstacle to fully enjoying its wonders.

May the day of your departure be prolonged as long as possible, Robert Cook! May you continue to revel in that which I cannot appreciate, but only recognize! May God bless you with a long and happy life in New York City!

Krumhorn said...

Maybe I'm channeling Laslo here, but when I read her post, I thought for sure our hostess was leaning into the sexual frisson some guys are known to have when they seek to have sex with a woman who has just had sex with another guy. That's the buttered bun I thought this post was about, particularly in New Jersey.

- Krumhorn

Robert Cook said...

"May the day of your departure be prolonged as long as possible, Robert Cook! May you continue to revel in that which I cannot appreciate, but only recognize! May God bless you with a long and happy life in New York City!"

Thank you, TestTube, for your kind words and well wishes!

RonF said...

I was born and raised in New England and we always called it "wax paper" not "waxed paper". It's not just a New York locution.

Bad Lieutenant said...

It's very likely that I will have to leave NYC at some point, and I will be sad to do so.

8/4/17, 8:46 AM

Robert, have you seen these ads in the subway about the rent freeze program? Old/poor/disabled people can get some kind of special deal. I think you can call 311 or...lmgtfy...

Freeze Your Rent - NYC.gov

nyc.gov/rentfreeze

What is the NYC Rent Freeze Program? The NYC Rent Freeze Program, which includes the Senior Citizen Rent Increase Exemption (SCRIE) Program and the ...

On topic,

Isn't it true testimony to the limitation of words how we can't explain the "roll with butter" to people? What's the word? Ineffable?

(One thing these folks don't understand is that New York, due to peculiarities of its water supply, reigns supreme in baked goods, excelling even the water of Paris. A hard roll here, or bagel or pizza, is not like a hard roll, etc., in DC or Florida. And, of course, people should understand this is not Wonder bread, these rolls are baked fresh each day.)

Hey - Do you think they know about coffee rolls? How about ham and egg on a roll? (I eschew cheese.) Or the "pork roll" or "Taylor ham" in the protein space that the NJ types get excited about.

I guess maybe it's the difference between clams and a clambake?

I Use Computers to Write Words said...
This comment has been removed by the author.
I Use Computers to Write Words said...

Althouse:"Ringed binder or ring binder?"

Binder full of rings?

Bad Lieutenant said...

Loose-leaf notebook. The End.