I don’t often talk about other people’s goals on my blog, only my own. Maybe others’ goals if they are on a similar journey, like a reading challenge or working out. But even then, it’s almost always about my own experience; I try not to tell other people’s stories, leaving them to do so if they wish. Maybe to the extent they inspire me, often I have my own take, but it’s rare I see a goal and want to do the exact same thing.

But I caught an article on CBC two weeks ago about a man who is rating club sandwiches in Ottawa to try and find the best one. Of course, it’s on the news, so there has to be a hook, which is that he has stage four cancer (colon, liver, lungs). The prognosis is dark, no doubt, but as he describes it, he’s “living with cancer”, and part of his mental therapy is to distract himself by finding the best club sandwich.

ARTICLE: https://www.cbc.ca/news/canada/ottawa/sandwich-clubbing-cancer-blog-jay-macpherson-1.7055505

RADIOCAST: https://www.cbc.ca/listen/live-radio/1-100-ottawa-morning/clip/16028993-clubbing-cancer

The goal resonated with me. Not because I do reviews, although perhaps that is part of it. Not because I like curating things, although that is part of it, too. I eat out a fair amount, well above average, and I, too, have thought of reviewing “something”. Curating a specific meal, perhaps, or a specific dish. Maybe in Nepean. Maybe in Ottawa. Maybe in the world. Hah!

Pizza has long been an obvious choice for many people. Yet, IMHO, pizza is almost impossible to be definitive about, well, almost anything. Suppose I choose a chicken pizza from Colonnade Pizza, a worthy choice no doubt. But too many variables are subjective…thick, stuffed or thin crust? Are they all the same ingredients or different? Is it a chef’s unique favourite or something common to all pizza shops? I like anchovies, but I likely wouldn’t order it often nor with other people who likely wouldn’t. I am amused by the advertising where people tout that they were chosen the best pizza in a competition but then don’t explain WHICH pizza variety / combination they had as their entry. Was it a Mediterranean with a thick crust or a simple pepperoni with thin? Obviously, not EVERY pizza combo they sell “won”.

Wings would be a popular choice, but like pizza, there are a lot of variables. You might not think so initially but there are, and no, I don’t mean the seasonings. You can do boneless or bone-in, for example. Very different flavours with the bone removed, often more like a cutlet or chicken strip than a wing. Others make them almost like popcorn chicken. Or they offer split or still-connected or drumstick-style, large or small, frozen or not. I prefer non-frozen, oven-baked, bone-in, but that’s just me. The REAL test most people think of for wings is the sauce. Which is a worthy viable consideration, but to me, I don’t really care that much. If I was rating sauces, sure. But if I’m rating wings, comparing a salt-and-vinegar dry rub split frozen wing to a suicide wet sauce fresh boneless wing makes almost no sense. Most people rating wings ignore that, they’re really just rating the coatings. Which as I said, is viable but doesn’t excite me. Perhaps if I was rating them all at one place, say all four wings in a pub for the best ones in that pub or the best combos at a wing place with 50 different toppings. It should be relatively comparing apples to apples, oranges to oranges, and across those two restaurants makes no sense but I could see it within one restaurant. If I were to do wings, I think I’d have to make it the same wing everywhere, likely mild or no sauce at all. I would want to rate the wing, not the sauce. As you can see, I’ve thought about this before. A little too much, but I digress.

I have also thought about doing wonton soups, maybe limited to Nepean. Or places designed for take-out, not dine-in. We used to frequent a Vietnamese place with awesome wonton soup, but alas, it was a victim of COVID’s decreased business. We were trying to order somewhat frequently, yet some nights, ours was the only order they had had by about 7:00 p.m. Not good. And so I no longer have a “go to” option for wonton soup. I’ve been tempted to find every place in Nepean that offers the soup for takeout and give it a taste test. I could deal with chicken or shrimp wontons, or pork, for that matter. I am not sure about those that leave out the bok choy as a “necessary” element, though. I suspect that shrimp wontons, with bok choy and green onions, along with a decent broth, would win hands down over just about any other combo for me. I don’t even know if I could rate one without bok choy above a 6 or 7 out of 10. Ah-hah! A standard!

So, since I have thought of something “similar”, I love both the premise of Jay’s goal and his approach. It is concrete, limited variables, and a relatively standardized menu option. I wish I’d come up with it.

Building off his two lists of clubs so far

Jay has a FaceBook group called “Clubbing with Cancer”, which is an awesome name too. A touch of whimsy in a bit of darkness. I only recently joined the group, and there are currently over 2000 members, with a lot joining as I did after the CBC article and podcast. Under his featured posts, he has his current running total / rankings of club sandwiches with 15 listed; there are six turkey clubs and nine chicken clubs on his “best of” so far. I managed to knock off two of them in the last two weeks (I’ll blog about them separately), and so far, both were solid options.

I don’t know if I’ll make it to Arnprior or all the south Ottawa ones. But maybe. I also don’t know if I’ll start a rumble ordering a club at a restaurant that specializes in smoked meat (#2 on the chicken list). Again, maybe. 🙂

As I said, I really like the goal, and I’m happy to benefit from someone else’s curation. And, gasp, there might even be some controversy in the rankings. Some of the members were discussing if the turkey should be WARM in a turkey club (most say no), but there was general agreement that there should be warm chicken in the chicken clubs. We also can’t all agree on whether the sides affect the rating of the club itself or not. I think it’s an “also ran” item to talk about i.e., that the sandwich should live or die on its own.

Two down, thirteen to go from the best list. Despite the dark underpinnings of the group, the sandwich metrics are fun. Heck, Jay even had members uploading images of their club sandwiches, with ratings too, from Whitehorse and Cambodia. They seem a little far to me. 🙂 Fortunately, I don’t have to wrangle this group. I just have to watch and munch.