random thoughts – Day 1,588 – (Tuesday) – pockets

Today’s defining feature was clouds. It was gray and slightly gloomy, but not too much. It rained, but not for too long. Today’s lunch was salad in a pita pocket. It had slices of cucumber, onion, and tomato, black olives, and mixed salad greens with shredded carrots, feta cheese and a schmear of mayo.

As I added the feta cheese to the pocket, there was a sudden memory of a pocket sandwich of decades ago from D’Angelo’s, a New England sandwich shop chain. In the last century, their specialty was pocket sandwiches, often called “Syrian sandwiches.” 

Back in the olden days, I had a great aunt who hilariously messed up words. She said she wouldn’t eat at D’Angelo’s because all they had were “cesarean sandwiches.” Ewwww. Really, ewwww. Now their focus is grilled sandwiches, as evidenced by their rebranded name of “D’Angelo’s Grilled Sandwiches.” Maybe too many people were ordering cesareans.

Pita pockets.

Anyway, my two favorite sandwiches from D’Angelo were a grilled veggie and cheese pocket, which was grilled pepper, onion, mushrooms, and melty cheese, and the Greek pocket, which was salad, black olives, a generous amount of feta cheese, and Greek dressing. Once, my Greek pocket order went totally, comically sideways. The clerk asked if I wanted feta. It seemed like an odd question, because feta was kind of the defining ingredient of the sandwich.

That long ago evening, I picked up the order, drove across town to home, and unwrapped my extra heavy sandwich at the kitchen counter. Imagine my surprise at finding a pita pocket stuffed to bursting with nothing but feta cheese. There had to be a pound of crumbled feta jammed into that thing. It looked like a comedy prop. 

Luckily, I had some salad basics at the house that particular night and was able to rebuild my sandwich. That was the random memory that struck today. A pita pocket crammed with feta. If I used every speck of the block of feta in the fridge, it still wouldn't have been as full as that one pocket that one crazy time.

Today’s homemade pocket sandwich was tasty, and like every pita sandwich I’ve had in ages, it was messy. I ended up wearing it all over my hands and was glad to be at the home desk and not the office-office desk. Maybe later this week I’ll try to recreate the once beloved grilled veggie pocket. Or if I’m extra lazy, maybe it will be the quickie pocket that sustained me in college – American cheese in a pocket and toasted in the toaster oven.