Clubhouse With No Mayo And No Bones.

It was early on a dark winter morning when I walked into the Bloor and Jane Restaurant for the very first time. Like a junkie searching for his next fix I trolled the Bloor West Village. Although I was not looking to buy illegal drugs, my fix was what I craved every single morning. My fix was bacon and eggs for breakfast after I had just recently begun working in the ice cream business. I always ate my breakfast before making my first delivery.

I would not be able to function for the rest of the day unless I succumbed to my daily unhealthy breakfast habit.

I had already driven east for blocks and there were not any greasy spoon diners along Bloor Street. As I approached Jane Street I saw a dimly lit restaurant sign with a few burnt out light bulbs. I slowed down and peered through the front window and saw there were people inside. Perfect, it was open, I was starving and from what I could see it looked like a fine establishment for me to get my next breakfast fix.

I parked my truck, bought a Toronto Sun paper from the box outside and I went inside for the very first time. My memories are as vivid today while writing this story as they were on that morning back in late 1981.

On my first visit, I sat at the lunch counter; there were a couple of older guys sitting at the far end of the counter. The man behind the counter was wearing a stained white apron and a Toronto Maple Leafs baseball hat. He was tossing slices of bacon on the grill and I remember he had a little weight he put on the bacon to keep it from curling up. He was talking with the other two guys; I assumed he was the owner.

I established right away from their conversation his name was Johnny.

“What can I get for you?” Johnny asked me.

“I’ll have bacon and eggs, eggs over with a double order of toast and a coffee,” I replied.

I opened up my freshly bought newspaper to glance at the Sunshine Girl on page three.

“I have free papers for customers to read next time you come,” Johnny told me while pointing over to an ancient radiator at the end of the counter. I noticed there was a stack of Sun newspapers sitting on top. Johnny seemed pretty confident that there would be a next time judging by his comment.

“Can I please get a glass of water?” I asked him.

I remember watching Johnny grab a large fountain glass, he then reached down into the chest freezer right in front of me. After grabbing a couple of ice cubes with his bare hand he filled the glass with tap water and put it in front of me.

“Thank you,” I said.

I sure hope his hands are clean, I remember thinking to myself. Within a few minutes my breakfast was also put in front of me exactly as I had ordered it.

Johnny continued on with his conversation at the other end of the counter as I listened intently. They were talking about the Toronto Maple Leafs and what players needed to be traded. It was a conversation I would have loved to have added my two cents, but on this morning I just listened. I slowly ate my breakfast while looking all around the restaurant that I had never been inside before.

Hmmm.

Maybe there would be a next time, then again maybe not. To put it bluntly, the Bloor and Jane Restaurant was a dump. I doubt it would even rate a single star on any restaurant critic’s review. The place was a relic of nostalgia from an era gone by. There were little handmade cardboard price signs written with magic markers everywhere. I noticed that the dimly lit and grease stained menu board above the grill was missing letters as well most of the fluorescent light bulbs in behind were not working.

As I pondered my decision about returning that morning from the lunch counter, I could see numerous stains, drips and splatters that looked like they had been there for years. There were so many raw egg drippings crusted on the front of the now far from stainless stainless steel fridge doors. All of them were now beyond the simple wipe off stage for removal as they would most certainly need to be scraped off.

The walls along with the many vintage hockey pictures had a greasy yellowish hue, most likely from years of improper ventilation and a lack of regular cleaning. The old linoleum tiled floor was dingy and was also in need of replacing. I noticed that there were many quick fix duct tape repairs to some of the tiles that had come loose over the years. The floor looked like it hadn’t seen a mop in months.

From what I could see on that morning, the Bloor and Jane Restaurant could use a thorough industrial cleaning from top to bottom. The old wooden staircase leading down to the washrooms was narrow with a very low ceiling. It was all I could do to get my six foot four frame down into the dingy basement and take a piss in the tiny cramped bathroom.

Nothing looked like it had ever been replaced in the restaurant. All the booths along with the lunch counter and red stools were from the old original Loop Lunch Restaurant that had opened back in the early fifties. Back then the Bloor Street streetcar ended at Jane Street and there was a streetcar loop on the south side of Bloor just across the street from where I was sitting on that morning. After a couple of decades, the streetcar loop was demolished and the brand new subway would begin running under the Bloor and Jane in 1968.

After eating my breakfast and having my second free refill of coffee, I was content and happy. I thanked Johnny and paid him the five bucks for my five star breakfast before I left to make my first delivery.

“We’ll see you again.” Johnny said.

I got the impression he wasn’t asking me, but more like he was telling me he would be seeing me again. He knew I would be back

“Yes you will.” I told him.

I walked out the front door and into the early morning sunrise now bathing the north side of Bloor Street. Little did I know on that morning just how much eating at the Bloor and Jane Restaurant would become such a big part of my life.

I was in a different area of the city daily and I was already making regular visits to a couple of other diners within the city. Each one like the Bloor and Jane was owned by a Greek guy. Johnny would now be joining the ranks with Steve and Nick in the preparation of my daily culinary morning habit. In the beginning what I liked best about the Bloor and Jane was the free newspapers and the bottomless refills on the coffee. The breakfasts were all pretty much the same and they were all around the same price.

However, I always needed to have a Toronto Sun paper to look at while eating my breakfast. Part of my daily ritual was to buy the Sun paper, but it was like throwing money away because it always ended up getting thrown in the garbage. By eating at the Bloor and Jane I would no longer be throwing my money away. I liked the Sun not just for the Sunshine Girl on page three but for the in depth sports coverage. The Sun was also a smaller paper and a lot less cumbersome than the Toronto Star, so it was much easier to read while eating. Although to be truthful the Toronto Sun was nothing more than an ad infested tabloid rag of a paper. For the most part it was written in such a way as to attract readers with not much in the way of literary skills.

Over the years I walked through the front doors of the Bloor and Jane Restaurant a couple thousand times. Johnny was there every single time watching his business thrive and I can only remember once Johnny not being there. It was the week when he went back to Greece for his mother’s funeral. There was very little staff turnover throughout the years mostly because there was very little staff. All the staff was Greek and they were all friends of Johnny. Christina worked the early mornings waiting on tables. Maria who always looked twenty years younger than her actual age worked the lunch crowd up until closing at 3 pm. Tommy who always looked twenty years older than his age was Maria’s husband and cook. He helped Johnny in preparing the lunch orders when it got busy.

It would always amaze me to watch Maria, Tommy and Johnny all working in unison at the busy restaurant. Maria would take orders then relay them to Tommy and Johnny. Nothing was ever written down and they never seemed to screw up the orders. Whenever there were disputes they would argue between themselves in Greek and sometimes quite loudly. I could always tell when Maria was pissed off with Tommy and sometimes Johnny would get involved in their Greek speaking verbal tangos. When it came time to pay your bill Johnny would ring it through the ancient cash register based on his memory of what you had eaten. If he forgot something Maria would be sure to remind him.

The Bloor and Jane never opened past 3 pm and was strictly a breakfast and lunch diner. Johnny would be there opening up every morning before 6 am seven days a week. It was a cash only business and there was no credit or debit ever. Johnny had even put a sign in the front window warning customers that they only accepted cash. It never seemed to hurt his business as the restaurant was always crowded and on most weekends there would be a lineup for most of the day.

The Bloor and Jane Restaurant which I also affectionately christened the Dumpy Diner had its fair share of celebrities who had eaten there. Many athletes, actors, musicians and politicians all experienced the ambiance of the Dumpy Diner. I remember one morning blind Juno award musician Jeff Healy was eating his breakfast with a couple of friends in the booth right behind me.

The walls of the restaurant are adorned with many autographed photos from some of Johnny’s more famous customers. Long before the Rogers network introduced Hockey Central the Bloor and Jane Restaurant was known as hockey central. There were a few times when one of the 680 News radio reporters would do a live feed from the diner. He would be gauging some of the diehard Leaf fans' reaction to the previous night’s game.

I myself had been interviewed a couple times over the years while eating my breakfast and I was never shy about giving my opinion. The reporter would always sign off with 'I'm Carl Hanstke for 680 News from hockey central at the Bloor and Jane Restaurant in the Bloor West Village'. It was always fun to hear myself on the radio for the rest of that day as the station would replay the clip every couple of hours.

Johnny, like me loved the Toronto Maple Leafs and for the most part all of our conversations revolved around hockey and the Leafs. I am pretty sure during the hockey season all Johnny ever did was work, watch hockey and sleep seven days a week. Ever since I started going to the Bloor and Jane, Johnny promised that when the Leafs eventually win the Stanley Cup, all his regular customers would get a free breakfast. It was sure to be a very costly day for Johnny because he had hundreds of regular customers, myself included.

For almost forty years I have eagerly looked forward each and every season to my free breakfast.

Although I loved eating breakfast at the Bloor and Jane, by far my favorite item on the menu was the clubhouse sandwich. Come to think of it, the only items I ever ate over the close to forty years at the diner were breakfast and the clubhouse sandwich. I never once tried the burgers, fish and chips or any of the other sandwiches on the menu. For me it was always the clubhouse with fries and coleslaw. It was easily the best clubhouse I have ever eaten and every single one of the hundreds I ate tasted exactly the same. Johnny’s clubhouse sandwiches were legendary and by far the best in the city.

Why?

Because Johnny always used real chicken and not the processed meat like other restaurants used.

Due to the logistics of my route the only day of the week I was able to have a clubhouse was on Fridays at lunch. Almost every Friday during the twenty plus years I worked in the ice cream business, I had a clubhouse sandwich at the Dumpy Diner. On one Friday I was eating my sandwich and unbeknownst to me there was a bone hiding inside the chicken. Tommy had missed it and I thought I had broken my tooth. It was a very painful experience to say the least. From that Friday afternoon on and every Friday thereafter I always ordered my clubhouse with no mayo and no bones. It was kind of a running joke between all of us. I often wondered if I had broken my tooth on that day what Johnny would have done. My guess is probably nothing, but maybe he'd have given me a free lunch.

Once I semi-retired and moved up to Muskoka back in 2004, I was only able to visit the diner about twenty or so times a year. For the most part, it would be after my Saturday morning hockey games with the Shanahan Group. As much as I loved playing hockey, I just as much loved having lunch at the Bloor and Jane and my clubhouse sandwich.

It was part of my Saturday hockey ritual.

After all the years the Dumpy Diner hasn’t changed a bit. Everything is still the same as it was on my first visit back in 1981. The prices are much higher now and there are many more pictures on the walls, some of which were once mine. Many more celebrities as well as the actual Stanley Cup have paid a visit to Johnny’s fine eating establishment.

Johnny’s ancient cash register was eventually replaced with a new modern one that actually can give a receipt if you need one. There is still no credit or debit accepted, just cash. Johnny still makes his milkshakes the old fashioned way served with the retro stainless steel sidecar holding a bit extra to top up your glass.

Maria still looks twenty years younger, but the now ponytailed Tommy hasn’t aged well at all. Johnny is well into his seventies, he walks hunched over and still wears his Leaf hat over his now visibly grey receding hair. When I arrive at the restaurant on Saturday after hockey the place is always packed. I am pretty sure the Dumpy Diner has made Johnny a very wealthy man. He could easily retire, but what would he do?

He has owned and run the Bloor and Jane Restaurant since 1972.

Who knows, but eventually that day will come and the Bloor and Jane Restaurant will be closed for good. Every Saturday afternoon before I walk out, I always take a good look around while paying my bill. You never know, it just might be the last time I will have eaten my favorite lunch, a clubhouse with no mayo and no bones.

I will always love my Dumpy Diner also known as the Bloor and Jane Restaurant.

*Update: I last ate at the Bloor and Jane back in March 2020. Johnny was not there after suffering a heart attack and then going through quadruple bypass surgery. Maria told me he was resting at home and the future of the restaurant was in doubt.

Within a few weeks, the COVID pandemic struck the world and restaurants in Toronto would be closed for indoor dining. Johnny closed his doors and fully anticipated reopening when the lockdown orders were lifted. I was happy to hear that Johnny was not going out of business.

The lockdown dragged on for well over a year and in June 2021 the Bloor and Jane Restaurant never reopened and was permanently closed.

Amazingly Johnny had run the Bloor and Jane Restaurant for almost a half-century in the same location.

Although the Dumpy Diner was not the most pristine of establishments, it did have its own unique ambiance. It was a great place for breakfast and lunches. The food was always good and the place was always busy with Johnny's loyal customers.

However, I do have two regrets now that the restaurant has closed for good. One, it would have been nice to say goodbye in person and thank Johnny once again for all the great breakfasts and clubhouse sandwiches. Two, I never got my free breakfast because the Leafs still have not won the Stanley Cup.

Johnny, you sure got out of that one nicely.