Eat a Sandwich

All the sandwich news that’s fit to (re)print. Here’s what we’ve been reading this week.

Sandwiches and The City (via America’s Test Kitchen) — We’re big fans of America’s Test Kitchen, and their Food of Yore column this week features a brief history of the rise of the sandwich in the Big Apple. “In the years before prohibition, New Yorkers were said to eat only six kind of sandwiches. The varieties were limited to sardine, tongue, roast beef, swiss cheese, liverwurst, and egg…” Who knew? Many of these delicious early varieties are still available at your corner deli, while others  – lemon prune and baked bean and celery are examples — have thankfully faded from prominence. The recipes included in the article, all of which look like winners, are available for free through next week.

Cap City’s 5 Most Incredibly Melty Sandwiches (via Thrillist DC) — This week’s obligatory best-of list celebrates National Grilled Cheese Month, which is April. How did April become National Grilled Cheese Month? As Thrillist rightly answers: Who cares? D.C. is a town that loves its grilled cheese, and this list details five of the very best examples available. (You can also check out Eat a Sandwich’s commentary on grilled cheese and let us know your thoughts.)

Pollan Cooks! (via the New York Times) — I’ve been a fan of Michael Pollan since my World of Plants professor assigned me to read “Botany of Desire,” still one of my favorite short reads on human manipulation of nature. Pollan has since become something of a messiah among those interested in rehabilitating our food system, and with his most current book “Cooked: A Natural History of Transformation,” he makes his first foray into the actual practice of preparing food. In this conversation with Mark Bittman, Pollan offers support for his insightful observation that our food problems began when we stopped cooking at home. “People who cook eat a healthier diet without giving it a thought. It’s the collapse of home cooking that led directly to the obesity epidemic.” Moral of the story: Buy a Griddler and start making your own damn sandwiches!

Save DC Food Trucks! (via savedcfoodtrucks.org) No recent dining-related trend has contributed more to advancing the art of sandwich-making in this country than the popularization of food trucks. And in case you missed it, D.C.’s food truck industry is under attack by what some townspeople, including yours truly, consider to be a misguided and overzealous mayor and city council. Facing new regulations that could effectively outlaw food trucks in vast swaths of otherwise food-barren downtown areas, operators are asking for the public’s support. As sandwich lovers, it’s our duty to check out the video the video below and sign the petition at www.savedcfoodtrucks.org. (You can also read the most prescient policy argument against the new regulations at the Greater Greater Washington blog.)

All the sandwich news that’s fit to (re)print. Here’s what we’ve been reading this week.

Nil by Mouth (via the Chicago Sun Times) — The first thing everyone should be reading (or re-reading) this week, particularly anyone who’s fond of food, or movies, or just generally remarkable and inspiring people, is “Nil by Mouth,” the late Roger Ebert’s heartbreaking and beautiful 2010 essay on coping with losing the ability to eat, drink and speak. It was not so much a particular dish or snagging a table at the newest, trendiest spots that he missed most, Roger wrote: “What I miss is the society … The food and drink I can do without easily. The jokes, gossip, laughs, arguments and shared memories I miss.” (Roger was also a fan of the tuna melt, evidently: “If a place doesn’t advertise ‘Breakfast, Lunch and Dinner’ and serve tuna melts, right away you figure they’re covering up for something.”)

The 10 Best Sandwiches in NY Right Now, in GIFs (via Complex City Guide) — Now, Eat a Sandwich is based in and focuses primarily on Washington, D.C., and as weary as we are of the Everything is Better in New York mentality, this animated package from Complex magazine’s city section is aces. ”We may occasionally drop an entire paycheck on fine dining, but we run on sandwiches.” TRUTH.

6 Trends We Noticed at the Craft Brewers Conference (via Serious Eats) — In her post-mortem on last week’s 2013 Craft Brewers Conference, held for the first time in Our Nation’s Capital, Serious Eats’ drinks writer Jen Muehlbauer shares her observations on the state of the industry. For the casual beer drinker, the main takeaway is this: New craft breweries are opening all the time, but just because it’s “craft” beer doesn’t mean it’s good beer, so ignore the cool packaging and trust your palette. My personal observation? Beer industry people don’t hesitate to leave beers half-finished, particularly when they’re on the company dime.

In-N-Out is the First Stop for Innocent Arizona Man After 42 Years in Jail (via Eater) — What’s the first thing you would do after spending 42 years in jail for a crime you didn’t commit? Head to the red-light district? Learn about exciting new technologies likLouis Taylor, upon facing just this conundrum, grabbed a burger at In-N-Out (which didn’t exist in Arizona at the time of his jailing), and took a literal hike. See his story here:

All the sandwich news that’s fit to (re)print. Here’s what we’ve been reading this week.

A Sandwich Worth Flying For? (via Bon Appetit) – A tipster let us know the entire April issue of Bon Appetit, a magazine we don’t read, is dedicated to the glorious sandwich. The whole rag is worth a look, but we liked this piece, in which the editors shout out their favorite out-of-town (read: not in New York) sandwiches, including one in nearby Charm City!

Slideshow: Hot Melted Sandwiches (via Food and Wine) — It might not feel like it now, but spring will eventually arrive. In the meantime, while the mornings are still frigid and the nights blustery, we’ve been warming ourselves in the glow of Food and Wine’s slideshow of hot, melty sandwiches. Our favorite? The Double-Grilled Antipasto Sandwich, which features grilled, prosciutto-wrapped provolone. No kidding.

America’s 11 New Sandwich Heroes (via CNN) — This forward-looking piece from CNN highlights some emerging non-native sandwich varieties in various stages of the journey to ubiquity in the United States. Some, like the Vietnamese bánh mì and Mexican torta, are already Eat a Sandwich favorites, if not yet as widely known as the pantheon of homegrown favorites. Others are more obscure. Please, if you know where in D.C. to find a Danish smørrebrød (pickled herring, paté and egg served open-face on rye), do let us know.

And Now, D.C.’s Iconic Sandwiches Revealed (via Eater DC) — Eater did a nationwide series on each of their cities’ iconic sandwiches this week, and the list compiled for our nation’s capital is actually pretty well done. While it’s true anyone well-versed in the D.C. sandwich scene will find little surprising about Eater’s choices, it’s a great primer for the uninitiated, with picks ranging from the obvious critical darlings — Fast Gourmet’s Chivito, the Italian Store’s Capri, Wagshal’s brisket — to lesser-known but equally-beloved favorites from local haunts like A. Litteri and Stoney’s.

Eating Around Town – Stachowski’s Market (via Prince of Petworth) — Earlier this week I described myself as the Pavement of sandwich writing in D.C. Why? Because Prince of Petworth’s feature on Stachowski’s not the first example of a better-known, more widely-read blog nicking my story ideas almost immediately after I wrote them. In all seriousness, in fairness to PoP’s Abbey Becker, she chose to focus primarily on the absurdly mammoth Four-Meat Grinder, while I paid homage to the equally hefty pastrami. The lesson? You can’t go wrong at Stachowski’s.

Man Arrested After Throwing Dinner at McDonald’s Worker (via NBC Connecticut) — Man, McDonald’s workers just can’t get a break. Long hours, shitty pay, thankless work, and you never know when somebody might cock back and toss a quarter pounder in your face. Apparently this guy in Connecticut was dissatisfied with the construction of his sandwich, so he chucked it through the drive-thru window and hit the pregnant employee in the chest. Look, dude, we’ve all been there. Any can get emotional about a sandwich. But if you’re expecting an expertly-crafted, tidy burger, perhaps you best choose a different restaurant next time.