The Sandwich Times - Volume 1

In addition to reviews, I have promised by faithful Sandwich-ites all the latest sandwich gossip that is fit to print and here it goes:





1. For those of us who like to combine their sandwiches with 80's kitsch toys I present this monstrosity (shout out to Nat for the link)

2. New Grilled Cheese only restaurant poppin off at the old Good Eten location in Kensington Market. YESSSS!

3. Neo-Sandwich Patrimonalism or How I performed a good Samaritan act, got rewarded with a free sandwich and was subsequently fired for receiving said sandwich

I bet the sandwich was pretty tasty though.

4. British Airways has killed the short-haul sandwich

5. This is an old one but a classic nonetheless. The genesis of this blog came about when classmates noted my excessive googling of GIANT sandwiches during classtime. In rebuttal, I offer this ESSENTIAL how-to-guide on how to create your own non-edible bromdignagian sized sandwich

Take that snooty law schoolers and all those who question the value of internet sandwich googling.

Volcanoed at Slice of New York

Every time I go to visit NYC, I am struck by many of the delicious offerings that cannot be acquired in Toronto the Good. Whether it be Korean-Fried Chicken, a readily available breakfast sandwich, Brian Schwartz, Baked Ziti, or Gourmet Doughnuts . Suffice it say, NYC has things TO lacks (many of which will be featured in future entries)

Many Toronto chains try to claim some sort of connection, whether it be mere rhetorical flourish or an earnest attempt at authenticity: (i.e. New York Subway, New York Fries, New Yorker Deli, Harlem Restaurant, New York Fried Chicken etc etc etc).

One such joint claiming linkages is “A Slice of New York”: A Pakistani Run fast food joint that has all delicious N.Y. staples such as Good looking slices, Chicken Rolls, Hoagies, and the centrepiece of this review, the Stromboli.

The Stromboli is the Calzone and Panzerroti’s “special” but loveable cousin. According to my personal sandwich mecca W. I. Pedia, the Stromboli, appears to have been birthed in Philly by Nazzareno Romano who named it after the contemporaneous Ingrid Bergman flick.

The shape of a Stromboli can be best described as an Oblong loaf, halfway between a Burrito and a wrap.

The Stromboli I ordered was the Manhattan, which was stuffed with Gyro Meat, Pepperoni, Green Peppers, Mushrooms and Mozzarella Cheese. The Stromboli was perfectly cooked: crusty on the outside, gooey on the inside with perfectly distributed goodies inside. The meats inside were well cooked and not stringy or overdone.

The Stromboli cost 4.99 and came with a container of Marinara sauce

Based on the ability of the guys running counter @ Slice of N.Y, I will very rapidly be back to taste one of their hoagies.

8.5/10 OPA’s

Pros:
- Once again delciously greasy
- Good distribution of meat, veg and cheese
- Fast service

- Halal, a bonus for TGCSB's Islamic readership
- Wide menu of sandwich variation goodies (hoagies, schwarma, hoagies with schwarma, etc)

Cons:
- Marinara sauce lacked the Zip I was looking for
- Was left a bit hungry but that is pretty reasonable for the price.

I shall exuent once again, pursued by bear and with one of my favorite Mitch Hedburg sandwich related jokes:

“I order the club sandwich all the time, but I'm not even a member, man. I don't know how I get away with it”

A Pittsburghian Experience @ Sandwiched

I have oft been told that Pittsburgh, more than any other American City, embraces artery clogging like true Steelheads.

(While I feel weird writing about a city's culinary chops without ever having been there, I feel that my parent's degrees at UPITT as well as a lifetime of Steeler's supporting gives me at least partial street-cred)

While Pittsburgh has no one genre-defining sandwich like its' Pennyslvania brother Philly (pun count #1... think about it) , Steeltown has produced several important innovations to the sandwich game:


The Big Mac was invented in Pittsburgh by an early enterprising McDonald's franchisee by the name of Jim Delligatti.




More relevant to this actual blog entry , was the great innovation started at Primanti Brothers. A quick google search of "Pittsburgh Sandwiches" turns up a number of hits for this storied restaurant, whose defining feature is having fries INSIDE the sandwich.

Watching a Food network special on must-eat sandwiches, I got curious about this bust-gusting addition to the sandwich, and decided to scour the streets of Toronto to find a fries-inclusive sandwich of my own.

Luckily, my search took me only a few blocks away from work - to Sandwiched at Church and Gerrard (377 Church St).

The joint offers essentially two items: crepes and fry-stuffed sandwiches.

After much sandwich consternation, i decided on the roast beef. In front of the Panini press, deep fryer and crepe maker, there was an impressive array of condiments, sauces (I counted 5 variations of hot sauce) with a Subway-like assembly line.



I fabu-sized my roast beef with lettuce, pickles , banana peppers, mozzarella cheese, pickles, hot sauce and mayo


Despite the calorically-dubious innovation of adding fries to the sandwich, I must say that it is a spot-on taste-wise. The fries added a delightfuly salty and crispy texture to each bite which was intensified by the crispy baguette after it had been pressed. In terms of aesthetics, the fries gave the sandwich a Dagwood-esuqe, towering appreance.

The biggest problem with the meal was that when I showed up with 5 work chums, it seems to have over-stripped their sandwich capacity. They only have one person one in the line, and over the course of our order, the man behind the counter had to: assemble sandwiches, put fries into fryer, carefully watch two crepes, and take our payements. So if you are planning on having a Sandwich themed Box-Social at ye olde local sandwich shoppe, i'd probably recommend taking it elsewhere (perhaps to the relatively nearby Mutual Street deli which will be reviewed shortly, though based on theme name alone the Sandwich Box seems more apropo).

Sandwiched features daily specials for something like 5.99 with a pop (Tuesday is Roast beef day), and they offered many other seemingly delicious offerings like the Super BLT (back bacon AND side bacon) as well as some veggie options.

All in all, I truly felt that Fries-in-Sandwich, invented by those wacky Pittsburgher's, is alive, well, artery-clogging AND delicious in Toronto.

9/10 OPA's

Pros:

• Fries in Sammich!
• Reviewing of Sandwich allowed me to use appropriatly use the term Gestalt Effect (defn: fries in sandwich = better than fries + sandwich)
• Great condiment choice
• Attractive price point

Cons:

• Can be very slow if there is a crowd.
• A little bit grimey inside.

Fusion food and Storefront Con-fusion @ New York Subway

Fusion, whether it be a theoretical concept of energy creation, a women's football team http://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Cleveland_Fusion, or a process of accultaration and bilateral cultural exchange, is usually seen as a positive (but don't get me started on the Cleveland Fusions' weak secondary and non-existent d-line).

For my first real, authentic, no-filler sammich blog, I decided to rate the Indian inspired Burritos at New York Subway.

The Restaurant name is fitting for a Linda Richmond-esque rant: New York Subway, neither located in New York nor an underground mass transit system... discuss. Despite the somewhat confusion name, New York Subway have long been an O.G. in the Toronto Burrito game (The Ice-T of stuffed tortillas).

It is, pleasentries aside, a bit of a dump, located in the heart of Queen West.

NOW TO THE MAIN EVENT: THE SAMMICH

The burrito they serve are more oblong shaped then the goliath-shaped offerings of ball'o'torilla'and'stuffing that Burrito Bandidos and Big Fat are known to serve .

I decided on the regular Lamb Satay burrito, which was about 4.99 plus tax. I wholeheartedly endorse this burrito. The lamb was equal parts crunchy, sweet and greasy, the tomatoes were fresh and I left feeling only partial meat comatosed.

Fusing interesting flavors with sammich templates is something I have been interested in since my former roomate Oscar's mother described her attempts for the the elusive Kazakh-Salvadorian (can you say pupusa with yak milk cheese and horse meat!?!?!?)

On the modified J Karantonis Opa scale, I would give this fused burrito a 7.5/10

Pros:

- Delicous lamb meat

- good balance of sweet and spicy

- inexplicable name had me starring off to the stars

- No horses or yaks were harmed in the making of said burrito

Cons:

- Some of the meat was over cooked

- slightly too much satay sauce

Next up, a cheezboiger cheezboiger-esque experience with the wacky Greek line-cooks at the Mutual Street Deli, me continuing to 'celebrate my Jewiness' at the Corned Beef House AND our very installment of the don't knock it till you've tried it section @ Annex Submarine.

Sandwich History

Sandwiches, as Roland Barthes once said, are a "delicious treat yearning for latent mythologization".

Many people tend to attribute the creation of sandwiches to that feisty English Noble "lil'' John Montagu, the Earl of Sandwich, who was too damn busy ballin/opressing serfs to actually cut his meat and bread separately . I challenge one of my readers to dispute his claim that "getting my greasy mutton hands on my playing cards is elephant-pooping on my cribbage game" (note photo evidence is required)

I however feel that sandwich invention vis-a-vis bread must be seen as a Chicken and Egg scenario (Chicken, Egg and Vis-a-Vis Sandwich review to follow). I imagine the first bakers', when taking their yeasty treats out of the oven for the first time said something like this: "Man I can't wait until someone invents Miracle Whip so I can fux with a Ham and Cheese".

IMO the sandwich represents one of the truly comprehensible things in our world. Bread + Filling + Condiment= perfection!

Later this week, TGCSB (not an erotic sounding yogurt spin off company but rather the anagram of this blog) will be reviewing: lamb satay burritos, a french fry stuffed roast beef sammie and a spattering of pastrami, smoked chicken and pulled pork.

The Appetizer

This is my first foray into food-blogging, and for that matter non-lankyjew travel blogging, so I ask that all of you readers be patient as I get my sandwich blogging game up to par.

As an internet sandwich enthusiast I have longed for a site with an authoritative listing of the tastiest, hugest and most stupefying sandwiches this great Dominion of Canada has to offer.

We will be featuring delicious sandwiches, paparazzi oops-style sandwich shots (turkey on rye w/ mustard slip) sandwich gossip and all the sandwich news thats fit to print.

And to close off this appetizer post, one my favorite sandwich jokes:

A club sandwich walks into a bar and orders a Vodka Martini with a twist.
The bartender says, "I'm sorry, we don't serve food here."