Tag Archives: San Jose

NY Steak Sandwich – Mini Gourmet, Bascom Ave, San Jose, CA

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I have a soft spot for this style of steak sandwich, the non-sliced, non-minced, just-a-plain-old-steak-on-a-roll steak sandwich. I’ve featured one here before, and while this one came with a bit more than that one, it was still fairly plain. A NY strip steak, lettuce, tomato, red onion, and mayonnaise. The steak was well cooked, tender and juicy. Sadly, that’s about as much good as I can say about this sandwich. I can deal with a plain steak sandwich. The steak may have been well cooked, but it was bland as the dickens, and I’m not asking for much. I’m not asking for mushrooms sauteed in a burgundy sauce, I’m not asking for a roasted garlic herb butter, I’m not asking for whole grain mustard, and apple compote. You want to serve me a steak on a bun, that’s fine. But for crying out loud, throw a little salt and pepper in there. It’s a stunning mistake, really. How on earth does this happen? Is this not a professional establishment? Don’t they cook things regularly, and know what makes things good? Never mind all that, are they not human beings? Do they not eat, do they not taste? What excuse could there possibly be here? The Roman Empire has long since gone to its grave; these days there’s plenty to go around. Spare some for my steak, please. As for the rest of it, the lettuce was iceberg, the tomatoes standard hothouse mush, and the red onion sadly sparse. I take no issue with plain, have no grudge against simple. Lackadaisical, though, careless, well that’s another matter entirely.

Dungeness Crab Salad Sandwich – Billy’s Boston Chowder House, E Main St, Los Gatos, CA

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When one has strong opinions about any given subject, it is all too easy to settle in to a position where one’s own thoughts and philosophies are the only correct ones. We know that what we think is right, and therefore if someone else thinks something different, well, they must be wrong. After all, if they were right then they would think what we think. The world, of course, is much bigger than can fit in even the most inflated head, and all of the issues that we have settled in our own head have been settled countless times by countless others, all to equally satisfying conclusions. All of that is to say that this wasn’t the crab salad sandwich that I would have made, but it was still very good. I would have preferred larger, meaty chunks of crab, and this was smoother in consistency, the crab present as finely chopped floss. Not my first choice, but there was plenty of it, it had a fresh, bright flavor, and I can deal with it. The avocado was a nice touch, and the lettuce and tomato unobjectionable. I would have liked a bit more lemon as well, as a squirt of fresh lemon juice really took the sandwich up a level, but with a scant slice available I could only treat half the sandwich. The choice of bread reflected someone giving things some thought: a hard crusted loaf would send a soft filling like crab salad sliding all over the place, you’d be scooping it off your plate rather than enjoying it as a proper sandwich. But that mistake was well avoided here, as a soft roll paired perfectly with the interior of the sandwich.

I’ve had a couple not-so-great sandwiches lately. It would be all too easy to grow discouraged, retreat into myself, stay home, make myself a crab salad sandwich, and putter on powered by self-satisfaction. But I’d be missing things I didn’t even know I was missing, robbed of unknown unknowns without ever knowing it. The next time I finish a sandwich with a frown on my face, I will I think of this sandwich. I’ll think of this one, and I’ll know that I’ve simply got to keep going, that someone out there is putting together a sandwich I’d never even consider, that it’s waiting for me, that I’m going to find it, and it is going to be delicious.

The Bronx – Flames Eatery, S 4th St, San Jose, CA

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I’ve been to the Bronx, and if you asked me to imagine a sandwich named after it I wouldn’t come up with corned beef, swiss cheese and sauerkraut topped with thousand island dressing on rye. First of all, this sandwich already has a name; it’s basically a reuben. And second of all, nothing about this sandwich suggests the Bronx. It’s in the wrong language, for one. It’s not even on point in the historical sense, the reuben was either invented in Midtown or Nebraska, nobody knows for certain. I digress. A misnamed sandwich can still be a delicious one, after all. The high point here was the marble rye, a dark, flavorful loaf grilled to a perfect crisp. The rest of the sandwich didn’t quite measure up, unfortunately. The sauerkraut was tasty enough, but the corned beef was far too salty. I know that when it comes to cured meat one has to expect a certain level of salt, but it’s all too easy to exceed that amount. Perhaps a bit more dressing might have leveled things off a bit, the sandwich was noticeably stingy with the dressing. But hypothetical solutions have never saved a sandwich-in-hand, and in the end the only thing I gained from this sandwich was a parched tongue.

Carnitas Torta – Iguanas, S 3rd St, San Jose, CA

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I try not to write too many negative reviews. I want people to come here for a celebration of sandwiches, not a festival of gripes. I’ve got a file full of sandwiches about which I didn’t have anything nice to say, so I didn’t say anything at all. But every so often a sandwich comes along that just strikes me the wrong way, something that I find genuinely offensive, and I feel compelled to tell others about it. This afterthought of a torta is one such sandwich.

Plenty of taquerias don’t pay much attention to their tortas. They’re focused on other things, and that’s only fair: In most taquerias, the torta isn’t the big seller. Luckily for these establishments, the torta is a forgivingly simple sandwich. It doesn’t require much effort or care. Good meat, good bread, a bit of cheese, avocado, or a tasty salsa, and there you go. The torta at Iguanas is a failure on all fronts. The bread, sliced down the middle, began to fall apart as soon as I picked it up. I’m not sure if it was old or improperly stored or the victim of some manner of hex, but it lacked all integrity and literally went to pieces on me. Sandwiches are held, as we all know, and it’s hard to enjoy one that’s making a quick escape from your grasp. The meat was dry and bland, part of the appeal of carnitas is the bark it develops in the second stage of cooking; roasted at high heat or laid out on a griddle, the fatty pork develops a crisp, chewy exterior. That was completely lacking in this sandwich, and wherever it was hiding it had all the flavor to keep it company. With the bread and the meat failing, everything else went into a free fall. Iceberg lettuce isn’t going to save anything, nor is mayo. Cheese wasn’t advertised as being part of the sandwich, so it’s hard to complain about it lacking, but guacamole was promised and was not delivered. In short, everything that can go wrong did, and I ended up making my way through the worst torta I’ve ever come across. I take no joy in recounting this for you today, but some things are inescapable fact.

Mushrooms on Toast – Little Chef Counter, N San Pedro Sq, San Jose, CA

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Marinated portabella and cremini mushrooms in a mascarpone cream sauce, topped with arugula, on a crunchy bit of bread. That’s it. You don’t need much for a sandwich, but it’s tough to put together a genuinely simple one that’s also quite good. With the excellent experience I had the first time I stopped by Little Chef Counter, I decided to see if they were up to the task. I’ll cut to the quick: I was delighted by this sandwich, but I can easily see where others wouldn’t think quite so highly of it. I happen to really love mushrooms, and I’ve got a number of associates who are with me on that. Good mushrooms have a dense, earthy flavor that’s complex and subtle, with a sort of humble richness to it. The mushrooms were undoubtedly the star of this sandwich, and their flavor came shining through. The sauce was creamy and boosted the richness, and the arugula gave a contrasting bit of peppery bite. The bread was crunchy, but given that it was stuffed with creamy mushrooms and not much else, a little filling creep was inevitable. Still, it was manageable and well worth the effort.

If mushrooms aren’t your thing, then this isn’t the sandwich for you. There’s simply not much else going on; this sandwich is mushrooms for the sake of mushrooms. But if you feel they way I do about mushrooms, there’s everything here to love. Little Chef Counter is two for two as far as I’m concerned, and I look forward to seeing what they come up with in the future.

Tuna Melt – @YC, E Taylor St, San Jose, CA

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@YC cafe is a coffee house, one of those numbers that’s tucked into the corner of a block of new condos. It really seems like espresso and pastries are the focus, but there’s a half dozen or so sandwiches on rge menu. Breakfast sandwiches seem to be the specialty, but I wasn’t really in rge mood for eggs. So, figuring I might be degrees of separation from the specialties, I wasn’t really sure what to expect. I ordered the tuna melt, the proprieter asked me if I wanted cucumber and onion included, and I settled in.

Some time ago I wondered just how much impact context had on sandwich quality, and that’s a question that comes up again with this tuna melt. Contextually, it had two things going for it. The first was rgw aforementioned uncertainty, and the second was that it was a cold, rainy afternoon. A grilled sandwich on a day like that is pretty much the definition of “hit the spot,” isn’t it? So with those two things going for it, I was pretty darn pleased with this sandwich. Canned tuna, some cheddar cheese but nothing special, a bit of cucumber and onion, @YC seemed to have made a pretty good something out of not much. It was warm, cheesy, buttery, crunchy goodness, and I don’t think I could have asked for much more.

Pork Awesomeness™ – Rookies Sports Lodge, Meridian Ave, San Jose, CA

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Rookies is the kind of establishment that serves a sandwiched named the Pork Awesomeness™ (the ™ is theirs, naturally, not mine.) The Pork Awesomeness™, in turn, is the kind of sandwich you find at a place like Rookies. You’ve all been to such an establishment. The walls boast all manner of decoration and sports paraphernalia, the wall behind the bar is covered in currency that’s been decorated by patrons, the beer comes in mugs the size of a small boot. Though this is not my preferred type of establishment, I do not offer this description as an insult. No bar ends up like this by accident; it is a cultivated image, a cultivated atmosphere, above all else it is deliberate. And, of course, the way that this deliberate effort manifests in sandwiches is via excess. A fair number of sandwiches come with the top half of the bread to the side, but very few of them will leave you at a loss as to how the come together. But that’s what I found at Rookies, as a pile of meat tilted away from two thick slices of toast. Two breaded and fried pork cutlets, a few slices of ham, a few slices of bacon, and a fried egg. Pork upon pork upon pork, with an egg. 

I was able to put together something resembling a sandwich, and for all of that the eating wasn’t tremendously difficult. That said, it wasn’t tremendously rewarding either. This connects to the point I made in the previous post, about harmony. Rather than unwelcome levels of contrast, what this sandwich presents is too many items working far too close together. All the flavors are playing on the roughly the same level, and that’s not a recipe for success. The sandwich wasn’t terrible, but it was flat. Dense and chewy, rich in fat and gaining even further richness from the fried egg, for all of its excess and LOOK AT ME attitude it was dull. It’s as if a six-piece band formed, only everyone plays the bass guitar and nothing but the bass guitar. That might make an interesting concert, but it almost certainly won’t make a good one.

The Special – The Freshly Baked Eatery, N 3rd St, San Jose, CA

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As I stood in The Freshly Baked Eatery and considered my options, an employee behind the counter held up a just-sliced length of sourdough bread. “Fresh and hot,” he told me, “ready to go!” I’m not usually one to rush to order, but bread so fresh as to literally be steaming waits for no man. I spied the words “The Special” and “Sausage” and told the man I’d have that. The Special turned out to be custom sausage (said to be a combination of German, Polish, and Yugoslav cooked in beer), and Swiss cheese, served on sourdough with a crispy crust and a wonderfully chewy interior. Naturally, I got “everything” on it, so it also included mayonnaise, dijon mustard, lettuce, tomato, and red onion. I know I’ve complained about iceberg in the past, but here it played as part of a larger ensemble and I would rank it at unobjectionable. The sausage was plenty tasty, with a unique peppery flavor reminiscent of any number of sausages you’ve had before. There was enough Swiss that you could tell it was there, but not so much as to overwhelm anything. Almost everything about this sandwich was done right, but there was one big issue that nearly derailed everything.

Having been poached in beer, the sausage had a tough casing that couldn’t be snapped by the pressure of an average bite. As a result, taking one bite often meant pulling the whole of the sausage with it. Then you have to try to grab on to it with your fingers and stuff it back in to the sandwich, or rotate the whole thing around and see if your eye teeth are up to the task of slicing through, or just give up, eat the sausage, and then deal with what is essentially a cheese sandwich. None of these options are satisfactory, and simply searing the sausages off in a pan before they’re poached eliminates this problem, as the outside becomes crispy and gives easily to the bite. I’m not quite certain what The Freshly Baked Eatery’s setup is, I know they bake their own bread and roast their own meats, but perhaps there are no actual burners involved. If that’s the case, I would advise them to can the subtle beer flavor and bake the sausage. In any case, equipment limitations and my advice and neither here nor there; ultimately this sandwich just wasn’t everything it could have been. The bread was really quite good, though, and given the fine flavors and balance displayed in the rest of the sandwich, it was still quite enjoyable. Perfect sandwiches are few and far between, and I suspect had I gone with the spicy salami or the garlic herb turkey I wouldn’t have had much about which to complain.

Fried Catfish Po Boy – The Louisiana Territory, San Francisco Bay Area

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The Louisiana Territory is another Bay Area food truck, and their Po Boy is a fairly standard offering: Fried catfish, lettuce, tomatoes, special sauce. All of that is perfectly satisfactory, the fish is moist and the sauce, bearing a strong resemblance to tartar sauce, pairs nicely. It was a tasty number, and I want to be perfectly clear about that. This was tasty. Here’s what it wasn’t: A sandwich. Let us return briefly to August of 2009, and our review of the now-closed Hank’s Eats:

The idea of what is and is not a sandwich comes down to the obvious and the intent. The obvious is the precious few simple qualifications that must be met, namely bread on the top and the bottom and some other ingredient in the middle. The intent is what makes it a sandwich and what ends up disqualifying the Porky’s Revenge. In order to be a sandwich the intent must be for the food to be eaten aligned horizontally. It is in this that we find sandwiches in harmony with our mouths and indeed our larger selves. It is in this that we find each bite encompassing the sum total of the ingredients in the sandwich, all of them represented in their proper proportions. It is in this that a sandwich becomes a sandwich.

It might not be clear from the photo, but the bread for the Louisiana Territory’s Po Boy isn’t sliced horizontally. It isn’t sliced at all. The loaf is hollowed out to a thin crust, then filled with ingredients. Now, I’m going to get a bit pedantic here, and if other people aren’t willing to join me I hold no grudge. That said: Whether this is or isn’t a sandwich is not just an academic distinction. In filling a hollowed out roll, everything is to be mixed together. You construct a salad, then stuff that salad into a casing. A sandwich, as we all know, is constructed in layers. A big part of what matters is what I mentioned above, that each bite (ideally) contains the sum total of the sandwich. A great many sandwiches do not meet this ideal, but similar to serving a sandwich with a fork in it, to stuff a roll with a salad is to surrender without even making an attempt. The torta I had recently at Casita Chilanga didn’t feature a bit of everything in every bite, but it is intention that makes that an honest failure and this a sin. The mixture at Casita results from an abundance of starring ingredients and enthusiasm. Here you’ve just got catfish and friends, all thrown together, taking your chances. You surrender all control over the arranged presentation of ingredients. If that’s the choice an establishment makes that’s their business, I simply ask that they not sully the good name of sandwiches with the lackadaisical attitude.

Braised Short Rib – Little Chef Counter, N San Pedro Sq, San Jose, CA

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Little Chef Counter is part of San Jose’s San Pedro Square Market, a bid to create something of a public square in downtown San Jose. It sits to one side of a large open room, surrounded by other similar establishments and with little to it but a kitchen and a counter. I mean similar establishments in that they also sell food, because I would speculate that when it comes to quality Little Chef Counter is in a class of its own. Simply put, this is the best non-ethnic sandwich I’ve had in San Jose. That’s not an attempt to damn with faint praise, it’s just that most of San Jose’s stand out sandwiches are of the bánh mì or torta variety. There’s plenty of competition with standard American fare, though, and Little Chef Counter comes out pretty far ahead of any sandwich I’ve had thus far. The sandwich is braised short rib, crispy onions, a horseradish slaw and a cheese sauce. The short rib is juicy and flavorful, a succulent, tender base for the rest of the sandwich. The slaw is crunchy and has plenty of zing via the horseradish, the it joins the fresh fried onions as a wonderfully crispy counter to the texture of the  short rib. Layered on the bread under the short rib, the cheese sauce is rich but never overwhelming, in no risk of drowning out the other ingredients. I have nothing but praise to offer this sandwich; it’s wonderfully balanced and tremendously flavorful. Little Chef Counter may be a sparse in appearance, but the sandwich they put together was a grand success.