Today I made a sandwich that had so many vegetables on it. It was an epic pastrami and pepper jack cheese sandwich on medium-toasted whole grain Franz bread. In addition to probably an inch thick pile of thick-sliced pastrami and a slab of that awesome deli pepper jack cheese, it had plenty of 50/50 mix salad greens (arugula and spinach leaves), slices of delicious Roma tomatoes, white onion, pickles, and pepperoncinis. Plus catsup, spicy broun mustard, salt and black pepper. It was so good.
I took my time making it, more time than it took to eat it; maybe 10 or 15 minutes from start to finish. I had to get out all the ingredients. I’m very methodical when I make a sandwich. I start with putting the bread in the toaster, and then start pulling the rest of the ingredients out of the fridge. Sliced a whole Roma tomato just to use two thick slices. The tomatoes I got from the store yesterday were very big examples of the type; I put the rest of the tomato in a container to use them for another sandwich in the future.
The white onion was already sliced and in a ziplock bag; I just cut off what I needed and put the rest in the bag. The pickles and pepperoncinis came in a jar. I store the cheese in a plastic bag. I buy the salad greens in a large-ish plastic tub. I like buying the greens that way because they keep for a while and I don’t have to worry about cutting them up.
The pastrami was in a brand-new package; when I cut it open I put the rest back in another ziplock bag for later. I make this sandwich a lot. Can you tell?
Eating it was a challenge; it was so tall that the top layers were sliding off. I had to carefully scoop up the sandwich halves (I cut it on the diagonal which is the best way for me to cut, and by best way I mean my preferred way to cut a sandwich, do what you want I’m not the boss of you) carefully, and hold the whole thing with both hands.
Biting in to this sandwich brought delightful sensations of texture, smell, and taste. The textures were the tough and rough texture of the toasted bread, the juicy flesh of the tomatoes, the crisp snap of the pickles and onion slices, the dense spinach leaves and the delicate arugula leaves, all before the soft cheese and feeling the fall-apart stack of pastrami beef. All coated liberally in the sauce of catsup and the seed-y mustard. Top to bottom, inside to outside, a crescendo of mouth feel.
The smells were a wonderful mix of the toasted bread, the fresh lettuce and tomato, the vinegar and salt of the pickles, and the hit of spice from the banana peppers and mustard, plus the sugary catsup, more salt from the beef, and the wine-like smell of the cheese, flecked with more bits of peppers.
And the tastes mirror the scent; spicy and fresh and vinegar and toasty grains and salty meat and tangy sauces. It was the best sandwich I’ve eaten all week.