Former chain of vegan subs out of SoCal named Subvegan had some of the best sandwhiches I have ever tasted, vegan or otherwise. Vegan deli meat and vegan cheese quality vary, but this place had the hookup for the best of both. A 9in sub was $12, loaded so fat it barely closed and was two meals worth for any normal person.

Their italian sub, the Godfather, had (vegan) turkey, ham, salami, provalone, cheddar, pepperoncini peppers, tomato, arugula, olives, onions, mayo, and italian dressing. The bread was always the perfect ratio of crunch to fluffy, their sauce portion was always on point, and their veggies were fresh as fuck. I salivate even just typing it out.

My fiancee and I would order in advance to have a sub waiting for us whenever we visited her family in Anaheim. It was the best. We started making plans in June to move out there so she could live near her parents and they closed their doors in July. Good vegan subs are a rarity, let alone vegan subs that stand out in quality against their non-veg counterparts. I am still in mourning.

I’m supposed to avoid gluten these days, but a banh mi is frequently on my mind

When I was 14 i flew to california to visit my grandmothers place in sacremento. Down the street there was an ice cream shop/diner called Vic’s my grandmother would take me there every few days and I’d get their reuben. I don’t know what it was specifically about that reuben but I still think about it.

It was pretty heavy on the swiss cheese and there was a significant amount of beef. The saltiness from the cheese and beef mixed with the sour and slightly sweet of the thousand island and sauerkraut so perfectly and I had a chocolate milkshake and some ruffles too. The sandwich had been pressed and pan fried in butter too so it had a really nice crisp to it

Warm ciabatta with pesto, heirloom tomatoes, fresh mozzarella, a pinch of salt and black pepper, balsamic glaze, and some greens.

For some variety add grilled portabella patties, Parmesan, or brie.

I call her Hamela Sandwerson.

I gotta get the good sourdough from the bakery down the street and I have to get there before they slice them all so I can get an unsliced load and slice it myself, extra thick. This bread retains heat without burning like no other, so I throw the thick slices in my extrawide toaster and gather the other fixings.

On each slice, a mix of Kewpie mayonnaise (good for ages 0-99, IYKYK) and mustard. Now, at any given time I have five different styles of mustard ready to use, but for preference, to give Hamela her due, I go with the Kosciuszko beer mustard, which is readily available at the Polish deli a block from the bakery, where I also get:

Black Forest Ham! Sliced as thin as the surly teens at the deli can manage. Now, you may think this is a ham sandwich, but we want to use the most flavorful, fragrant, savory ham exactly because we’re only going to use enough to impart delicious hammy flavor, and for that, thin slicing and bunching it when we put it on the sandwich is key. I’m talking maximum surface area, babies.

Atop the ham, cucumber pickles. I prefer dill over bread-n-butter. Then a one-year-aged white cheddar, cut thin with a, I don’t know what you call it, but I call it the “cheese peeler”.

Finally, the star of the show, fresh greens. The urban farm halfway between my house and the deli & bakery are always bagging up all the edible greens they gather from the edge of their growing areas and it’s heavy on the mustard greens, making it a good complement to the ham and aged cheddar. I put enough greens on to double the height of the sandwich, then smash it down with the second slice of bread.

Warm bread on the outside, savory ham and cheese, a little bite from the mustard and pickles, and the crisp greens… it’s perfect.

This local lunch restaurant have what they call Mississippi club sandwich, with bacon, cream cheese, pesto, tomatoes and avocado. It’s a seriously great combination of flavors.

Home made: a Shooter sandwich.

it’s a reuben; but that name is licensed so they call it a russian sandwich.

it’s near the museum of modern history in manhattan.

the corned beef is chunked out into thin-ish shards instead of sliced like all of the other reubens.

the saurkraut is homemade; thick; crunchy; and tart af and the rye is also homemade and super tangy. i suspect that they make the saurkraut the same way they make mexican style pickled jalapenos/carrots/onions/etc.

they also make their own dressing and it’s got a fantastic kick to it entirely due to the fact that the entire staff is mexican; no one speaks english and none of the patrons are wasp americans. (you’re not welcome if you can only speak english).

i haven’t had that sandwich since 2009 and i still crave and fantasize about it each time i want a delicious sandwich so good that it makes you lick your hands clean after you eat it.

i’ve stopped eating reubens because they pale so badly in comparison that it makes me angry to be reminded that i paid for such a THOROUGHLY mediocre alternative.

I use to get a “trk special” at the local takeaway - they literally added it to their menu board because I got it so frequently and other people who heard also got it.

It was three pieces of bread, all the salads (tomato, lettuce, carrot, onion, cucumber, beetroot) and aioli sauce on the bottom, then a spicy kebana sliced horizontally with a heap of pepper sauce and a slice of cheese on the top layer. Quick toast with butter so the outer slices gave a tiny bit of crisp and the cheese starts to sag and voila.

Another one they added to their menu board was the “xxxx trucks special” which was named after a local business. All the apprentices there used to buy this one because it was cheap and filling. It was a fresh toasted hotdog roll, with a sausage roll instead of a sausage, and a heap of butter and tomato sauce.

Hamssalad sandwich, made fresh at a sandwich shop, I need not say more. Brits know what I’m on about

There’s a chain near me that makes a breakfast sandwich with eggs, bacon, white cheddar, a really excellent garlic aioli, and Ciabatta bread.

I go there way too much.

Sandwich

I was in Dingle, Ireland. We were walking around, enjoying the town, and popped into a pub I didn’t catch the name of. Their menu looked good, so we decided to get some food. I ordered the tuna melt, and it was the best damned tuna melt I have ever had. The fish tasted great, and there was very little dressing. The red Cheddar was perfectly melted, and the rye bread was toasted, but light.

This was almost 18 years ago, and I still think about that sandwich.

In a restaurant that no longer exists called The Night Owl in Guildford BC they had a Monte Cristo sandwich. It was two thick slices of french toast with a ton of thin slices turkey, a nice slice of ham and a few thick melted slices of Swiss cheese with a decent pile of french fries served next to it.

In 20 years I haven’t found another place that made it as good as they did.

They were replaced with another restaurant that made incredible pasta, but that is another post entirely.

There’s a sandwich shop around Vancouver that’s only open like 10-2 on weekdays so I hardly ever get to go, but they get their bread from a local bakery every morning and it makes all the difference. It’s a simple turkey and cheddar sandwich, lettuce, tomato, pickle, a hint of mayo and Dijon mustard, but the ingredients are all quality and, again, the bread is fresh and super soft.

When I was younger there was a place that sold the most fucking bomb samosas. But more so, they sold a toasted cheese and chips

• Bread
• Ketchup
• Cheese
• Masala chips
• Mustard
• Bread
• Mustard
• Cheese
• Masala chips
• Ketchup
• Bread

And it was fucking outrageously tasty.