On the modern sub sandwich market, and its several flaws.

The modern sub sandwich is, on the evidence, a failure of nerve. It pretends to be a small lunch. It is not a small lunch. It is a proposition about what a person is, and what a person is for, and the modern sub sandwich market, broadly considered, has been getting this proposition wrong for at least thirty years.

I want to say, at the outset, that I am not against sandwiches. I am not a sandwich-critic in the modern sense, which is to say a person who has eaten eight sandwiches in a row and would now like to compare them. I am a sandwich person. I have been a sandwich person since childhood. My father ate sandwiches. My mother ate sandwiches. The question is not whether to eat sandwiches. The question is what kind.

The first flaw is the bread. The bread is, increasingly, a vehicle. A vehicle is a thing that carries something else. The something else, in this case, is the filling. The bread does not want to be a vehicle. The bread is, in its own right, the most ancient and most forgiving of the foodstuffs. You can do a great many things to bread and bread will forgive you. What you cannot do is treat bread as a piece of paper. The bread is not a piece of paper. The bread is the part of the sandwich that holds the sandwich together. Without the bread, you have a salad. Salads are fine. Salads are not sandwiches.

The second flaw is the meat. The meat, in the modern sub sandwich, has been engineered. It is not a meat in the older sense. It is a product. It has been formed, and pressed, and shaped, and treated with a variety of substances whose names I cannot pronounce and whose purposes I do not understand. I am not a chemist. I am a sandwich person. I expect, when I order a sandwich, to be given the meat of an animal. Not a fog of meat. Not a memory of meat. The meat.

The third flaw is the chain. The chain is, I think, the worst of the flaws. The chain takes a thing that was once local, or regional, or at least pretending to be local or regional, and makes it the same in every city. The chain says: we know what you want, and we are going to give it to you, and you are going to like it, and the liking is going to be the same in Cleveland as it is in Phoenix. This is not what a sandwich is for. A sandwich is for being different in different places. A sandwich is a small way of saying: this is the bread they bake here, and this is the meat they cure here, and this is the cheese, and this is the oil, and here, in this place, on this day, in this establishment, this is the sandwich that we have made for you, using what we have, being who we are.

The fourth flaw is the menu. The modern sub sandwich menu has between twenty-eight and forty-two items. This is too many items. A sandwich establishment should have, I would say, four sandwiches. Maybe five. The fifth sandwich is the surprise sandwich. The surprise sandwich is the one the proprietor makes when the proprietor is feeling something. You cannot write a menu for the surprise sandwich. The surprise sandwich is a relationship between the proprietor and the day.

The fifth flaw is the price. The price of a sandwich has gotten, in the last fifteen years, to be a figure that requires a small act of courage. I am not a rich man. I am a sandwich person. I have, at the time of writing, three children under the age of three, a working wife, and a sandwich habit. The price of a sandwich should be such that a person can buy a sandwich without first consulting a financial advisor. The price of a sandwich should be low enough that the sandwich is not a decision. The sandwich should be a small and habitual kindness you extend to yourself.

The sixth flaw is the napkin. The napkin has been allowed to become a brand. A napkin is a piece of paper. The paper has a logo on it. The logo is the logo of the establishment. The logo is not the point of the napkin. The napkin is the point of the napkin. A napkin is for wiping. Wipe and go.

The seventh flaw is the toast. The toast, in the modern sub sandwich, is a kind of grimacing. The bread has been heated but it has not been toasted. Toasted is a state. Toasted is a word that means something. Toasted means the bread has been exposed to sufficient heat to acquire a small color, and a small character, and a small opinion of itself. The toast is, in a good sandwich, a third of the experience. The toast is what the bread says after the bread has decided to be something.

The eighth flaw is the photograph. The photograph on the menu is not the sandwich. The photograph is a fantasy of the sandwich. The sandwich you are given will not look like the photograph. The photograph has been lit, and styled, and shot from above, and the photograph is, in its heart, a small betrayal. The sandwich you are given is the sandwich. Look at the sandwich you are given. Honor the sandwich you are given.

The ninth flaw is the line. The line is the price of not having decided. The line is what happens when the establishment cannot move the sandwich through the establishment at a rate that justifies the establishment. The line is the establishment telling you, in effect, that you are not the priority. The priority is the sandwich. You are a thing that has come to be near the sandwich. The line is the establishment's apology, and the apology is, in fact, not an apology. The line is the establishment's thesis.

The tenth flaw is the offer. The offer is the establishment telling you, in language, that you might also like. The offer is: would you like a drink with that. The offer is: would you like to make that a combo. The offer is: would you like to try our new, which is a sandwich I did not ask about and have not chosen and, in many cases, do not want. The offer is the establishment's small way of saying: we have decided what you want, and the deciding is a kindness, and the kindness is, in fact, not a kindness.

The eleventh flaw is the loyalty program. The loyalty program is a system of points. The points are earned. The points are accumulated. The points are, at some future date, redeemed. The loyalty program is a mathematics of regret. The loyalty program is the establishment saying: we know you are going to keep coming back, and we are going to keep track, and the keeping-track is going to make the coming-back feel like a relationship. It is not a relationship. The sandwich is the relationship. The sandwich is, in fact, the only relationship.

The twelfth flaw is the name. The name of the modern sub sandwich establishment is a problem of considerable seriousness. The name is often a man's name, or a place name, or a name that has been made up by a person in a room somewhere who has been told to make up a name. The made-up name is a small confession. The made-up name is the establishment saying: we did not know what to call this, so we called it this. The name should be a thing you can say out loud. The name should be the truth.

Dreanzinc is a sub sandwich shop owned by Henry Badon. We are not, at this time, open. We are an essay. We are the essay you have just read. We are the proposition that the sub sandwich, properly considered, is a small art, and a small art deserves a small thought, and the small thought is what we are selling, here, on this page, to you, today, in this place, in this establishment, in this corner of the internet where the napkins are honest and the bread is bread.

For the small thought: [email protected]