Robert's Market Report

Of Pork, Rabe and Spinach

Once upon a time, the roast pork sandwich at DiNic's at the Reading Terminal Market could be had with only one green: spinach. Tom and Joe Nicolosi, the father-son team which operates the Center Court stall, tried adding broccoli rabe, but no one wanted it.

That changed a couple years ago when DiNic's reintroduced the bitter green. Tastes change and now it's a hit. This Saturday Joe was tending to five trays of rabe for cooking with oil and garlic, vs. two of spinach; considering that the spinach weighs less than the rabe per volume of measurement and has a lower yield, the rabe probably outsells spinach by a ratio of nearly 10-to-1. Although you could hardly go wrong my ordering a sandwich with aged provolone and spinach, I go for the rabe, which offers a clear balance between the sweetness of the pork and bitterness of the green.

Lately I've been indulging in breakfast sandwiches from The Grill at Smucker's. Moses Smucker and his crew offer a meaty start to the morning, piling on plenty of ham, bacon, sausage of pork roll atop a roll also filled with egg and/or cheese. The pork roll comes from John F. Martin in the Lancaster/Berks area; it's good, though lacks the spicy punch of the original Jersey variety from either Taylor or Case. The sausage breakfast sandwich comes with two patties which are both the size of a hamburger; the sausage seems to be flavored with a bit of onion rather than sage, but that's no sacrifice to my taste.