Reid’s Fine Foods, Charlotte, NC USA

Ordered at the counter within Reid's Fine Foods in downtown Charlotte.

Charlotte for Zarticon – the one hour and forty five minute trip from Boston was the shortest flight I’ve taken in a very long time. It was also the first American Airlines flight I had taken in a very long time… and wow has that airline gone full budget. At one point in my life I was proudly Platinum Pro on American, taking full advantage of my status, and nowadays I try to avoid the airline.

Those absolutely garbage pretzels definitely did not fill me up on the flight over. At least JetBlue provides vegan butter pretzels – talk about American skimping!!

I arrived at the hotel just before 1pm, fairly hungry and eager to dive right into the event… which didn’t start until 3pm.

My colleague, Lindsay, gave me the heads up that the Marriott Charlotte City Center did not have a club sandwich on their in room dining menu, so I perused and reviewed restaurants in the central business district in my taxi to the hotel, narrowing down the list and deciding on what felt like a classic Charlotte institution with decent reviews only a few minute walk from my hotel.

Reid’s specialized in Fine Foods and was just 4 years shy of its 100th year in existence – I just loved the ambiance walking in, and one could feel the years of memories this deli meets knickknack store exuded, nostalgia a side item for every dish on their menu. Lindsay and I placed our orders and sat down minutes later, diving into our sandwiches over conversation about the upcoming conference.

I first have to admit that the photo on their website looked shockingly better than the club sitting before. The bread looked like an imposter – are you sure that was a multigrain French roll??

Heavy and dense, the sandwiching of the ingredients didn’t really great a pleasant bite down, and I felt myself chewing, and chewing, and chewing this club sandwich. There were only a few layers of sliced ham, even less of the turkey, but because they were so flat against each other and coupled with the dense “imposter” multi-grain and the double-combo cheddar and Swiss cheeses,  my jaw was getting tired while consuming this club. In the future, I recommend the thinly sliced layers should be wrinkled on each other, introducing air pockets, texture, and more tongue to turkey ratio for increased flavor and ease of eating. The chewiness of the bacon also didn’t really help.

I did find the addition of the tomato jam to be pleasantly surprising, but I was even more surprised that the herb mayo and tomato jam were only schmeared on the top slice of bread, leaving the bottom naked. That felt like a mistake?

Alas, while I was slightly disappointed, I enjoyed the conversation and the calm before the conference storm. I was very excited for my presentation at Zarticon, and even more eager to see the content presented throughout the event, that this moment did, at the least, provide the pause I needed to regroup before what lay ahead.

And for proof – sandwich on their website looked far superior to what I was served!

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