On the Menu
How One Couple is Exploring the State and Finding Joy in Everyday Adventure, One Diner at a Time
(Photo: Karsten Moran)
By Kenna Caprio
Each stop has a familiar rhythm. They prefer a booth to the counter. She orders a salad or maybe grilled chicken. He opts for a panini, a gyro or a burger, maybe even a special of the day. They snap the same photo.
And they love every minute.
The adventure of a lifetime kind of started as a lark for Jon Ricklin and Karri Kass-Ricklin, BSN’85 (Ruth).
About a decade ago, after an emotional day visiting Karri’s sister in the hospital, the couple stopped for a quick bite at a diner. On a whim, she asked her husband to pick up the menu and she snapped a photo. “How cool would it be to take this exact photo at every diner in New Jersey?” Jon asked. At the time, he was just thinking out loud, asking a rhetorical question. But pretty soon, after noticing all the “cool, little old-school diners around,” they decided to go for it.
The Ricklins have eaten at 325 diners and counting with about 125 still to go.
“Most of the ones we have left to visit are in the southern half of the state,” says Jon. “Sometimes it’s a little hard to justify a four-hour roundtrip for a hamburger, but we’ll get there!”
(Photos: Karsten Moran)
The couple, who live in Bergen County, met at FDU. “Jon’s sister was my roommate,” says Karri. The story goes that Jon’s sister, Leslie Ricklin Cantillo, BSN’82 (Ruth), called him up and asked him to come be Karri’s date for the night, and to bring one of his friends for her to meet. “This was February 1981. Our date went a lot better than the other one did,” Jon quips.
“We got married in 1984, and I graduated from nursing school in 1985,” Karri adds. She’s worked in just about every nursing setting and just retired as a charge nurse at a medical group offering primary and walk-in care. Jon previously worked in hospital administration before becoming a small business owner of a dry-cleaning delivery and pick-up service. They have two grown daughters, one of whom walked Jon through setting up an Instagram account to document their diner journey. Follow along @njdinerjourney.
“We’re just doing our part to support these diners, these small businesses in the state, as we bond and travel,” says Jon.
“I call it a vacation without a suitcase,” adds Karri.
Over the years, they’ve crisscrossed the Garden State, visiting both famous and hidden spots near whichever diner was next on their list.
“We took a day trip to Clinton. Another time, we stopped at the Mount Mitchill Scenic Overlook. You can see Sandy Hook and the New York skyline from there! We drove through the Pine Barrens from Ocean City up into Camden County,” says Jon. “We took a ride down to Cumberland County and went along the old oyster and fishing towns on the Delaware Bay there. It’s one of the quietest parts of New Jersey and includes the Edwin B. Forsythe National Wildlife Refuge.”
(Photo: Karstan Moran)
The Ricklins aren’t food critics and don’t review the diners. “We’re not comparing, we’re just enjoying,” Jon says. “People ask us to name our favorites. That’s impossible to answer and really beside the point for us.”
Still, they do have their preferences — Jon says he likes diners to be “classically furnished,” especially with neon colors, while Karri delights in seeing retro barstools. “I love the old-school diners,” she says. Both say friendly staff is a must.
Their quest has been an exciting and fulfilling experience. “It’s a relatable thing to see a middle-aged couple doing this fun project. People enjoy engaging with it,” says Karri.
The Ricklins have appeared on “The Today Show,” the “Tamron Hall Show,” News12 New Jersey, and in a variety of print outlets across the state, talking about their ambitious and delicious journey. They threw out the first pitch at a minor league Somerset Patriots game and filmed a scene in an upcoming gangster movie — they’re background extras in a diner scene, naturally.
Diners have long been a staple of New Jersey culture, attracting families, blue collar workers, college students — anyone and everyone really. “They are meeting places,” says Karri. “People go after church or youth sports or to have a work meeting.”
“Diners started as lunch carts to serve the working man and evolved from there,” says Jon. “Patrons could get a quick meal at a reasonable price. They’ve always been a middle- and working-class destination, which strikes me as very emblematic of the grit of New Jersey.”
(Photo: Karsten Moran)
But the real heart and soul of a diner is its warmth. “There’s such a nostalgia to diners, and they’re still near and dear to many, many people,” says Jon, including both him and Karri, who cherish their early childhood memories of going to the diner with their families, and the new ones they’re making together, now.
Through this project, they want more people to discover the charm of a homestyle meal, an order of fries or a slice of pie in one of New Jersey’s cultural touchstones: the diner.