The Media Noche at Court Street Grocers

Court Street Grocers (485 Court Street, 718-722-7229) isn’t scheduled to open its main dining room until mid-December, but this Carroll Gardens shop, which opened two weeks ago, is already doing a brisk business selling sandwiches. I popped in on Friday and got my hands on the Media Noche.

Medianoche means “midnight” in Spanish and is a variation of a traditional Cuban sandwich, usually eaten in the wee hours after a long night of mojitos at the nightclub. The bread used, though, is sweeter and eggier than what’s used to make a classic Cuban.

The Media Noche sandwich ($8) at Court Street Grocers is, appropriately so, a bougie Brooklyn rendition of the traditional: shredded pork butt and country ham are piled high inside a brioche roll and slathered with gooey Comté cheese, crunchy pickle spears, and grainy mustard. It is a great contrast of textures and flavors and hearty enough that you wouldn’t actually want to eat it at midnight. Perhaps they should rename it the Medio Dia (“noon”) instead.

And to wash down the sandwich, Court Street Grocers’ well-chosen selection of foodstuffs includes a shelf devoted to hard-to-find regional sodas ($2) like NuGrape, Double Cola, and Cheerwine. Now that’s something to cheer about, indeed.

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