Anarchy at Lunch

Today I want to address a critical issue facing our society. I know in the past few days I have focused on fluffy topics. But this is an issue that simply can no longer be ignored. I am talking, of course, about the issue of sandwich usability.

The sandwich as we know it was an 18th century English innovation. The purpose was to provide a meat delivery vehicle. The purpose of the bread is to provide a means by which the innards of the sandwich can reach your mouth without the need for utensils. That’s it. Somewhere along the way, the sandwich makers of the world have conspired to make this, at worst impossible, and at best damned irritating. There are four major offenses I have encountered in the last week:

1.) The Burger Slide: This is typically a burger offense but is often found in a variety of hot sandwiches. However, it is particularly egregious when you are talking about a round beef patty on a round bun. I get a burger with at least 33% of the patty sticking out of one side. The burger is round, the bun is round… how difficult is this geometry? To add insult to injury, there is also a subcategory of the infraction where the cheese is also slid over the top of the patty an additional 33% (often in the same direction as the patty). This forces me to open the bun, and physically, re-position the burger into the center of the bun and then (using a utensil) scoop the cheese back into the center of the burger. Why God? Why?

2.) The Bacon Dilemma: OK, I have this great sandwich with big juicy slices of bacon on it. Mmmm. Sounds good right? Wrong. The two strips of bacon are, I don’t know, maybe a foot long? So what I get is two strips of bacon (often set directly on top of one another) which have at least half of the bacon sticking outside the bread/bun. This forces me to pull apart my delicately assembled sandwich and break the bacon in half and re-apply it evenly to my sandwich so that I get a nice bit of bacon in every bite. Why do I have to reverse engineer my sandwich to enjoy it?

3.) The Bulge: Not quite the opposite of the Burger Slide, the Bulge is typically a deli style sandwich infraction. What happens is, some sandwich artist carefully places a bunch of ingredients all neat and tidy in the middle of the bread. This sounds like a good idea right? I mean, that way you can pick up the sandwich without the delicious ingredients squirting out one side or the other right? Wrong again my friend. Because the last thing this guy does before serving it to you is cut in half. There you go. Now you’ve got two sandwiches with a huge bulge of ingredients on the very edge of the bread just waiting to go squirting out the second you pick it up. What you are left with is 2 giant bites of meat and ¾ of your bread sitting on the plate covered in mustard and mayo, with nothing to go with it. What a waste of condiments.

4.) The Not-a-Sandwich Sandwich: Typically, this problem occurs with your “open-faced hot turkey sandwich”. At least a dozen places I have been to have had this on the menu. You get turkey on top of a slice of bread covered in gravy, with another slice of bread on the side. This is almost universally served as a meal designed to remind us of thanksgiving, so you also get mashed potatoes along with stuffing and, of course, a dinner roll. What the fuck do I need that much starch for? First, this is not a sandwich. Not even close. It is a turkey dinner with gravy and for some reason a piece of soggy gravy-soaked bread underneath it. I am offended by the audacity these people have to even call this a sandwich. I usually end up throwing the extra (dry) slice of bread onto the table (since there is no room on the plate), and then scooping the soggy gravy-bread out from underneath my pile of turkey and piling it up on top of the stuffing. Now I can’t get to my stuffing damn it!

These are just the recent occurrences. There are more I am sure. This menace must be stopped. I am open to suggestions on what we can do as a society to end this barbarism.