Anyone can make a sandwich, so everyone has an opinion on sandwiches. Sometimes, that's just a favorite brand of cold cuts or a preference for chunky or creamy in a PB&J. Most food-loving Portlanders go further, dropping knowledgeable opinions on the city's best banh mi, egg sandwich or torta and the pros and cons of cult-favorite shops like Meat Cheese Bread or Devil's Dill.
After a decade in the city, I was no different, with a mind full of opinions, most of them unexamined, concerning the best things in Portland between two slices of bread.
Earlier this month, I decided to check reality against my pre-conceived notions, eating sandwiches at more than 30 spots to pick Portland's very best sandwich shops. Along the way, I developed a few interesting theories and learned that many of the things I thought I knew about Portland's sandwich scene were dead wrong. Here are 10 things I picked up along the way:
1) Buckman is Portland's unofficial sandwich headquarters
It's kind of ridiculous. Between the original Bunk, the original Lardo, Meat Cheese Bread and Devil's Dill, at least four of the city's favorite sandwich shops fall within the boundaries of this close-in Southeast Portland neighborhood. And that's before you get to the recent flood of new shops, with Stacked, Guero and Figlia Americana all sitting on or just outside Buckman's border. I'm not sure why this is happening, but the gluten-averse should probably house-hunt elsewhere.
2) Sandwich shops don't have a monopoly on great sandwiches
In coming up with our list of Portland's best sandwich shops, we kept a narrow focus, only including places that kept regular hours and offered more than four sandwiches at a time. But Portland sandwich fans would be wise to cast a wider net, whether it's for the breakfast sandwiches at The Big Egg, Fried Egg I'm in Love or Milk Glass Mrkt; the sandwiches on fresh-baked bread at Pearl Bakery, Tabor Bread or Fleur de Lis; cart-driven creations like Tabor's Schnitzelwich; or the smoky fried chicken majesty at The People's Pig.
3) At Portland's best torta shop, everyone orders the bowls
For the past four years, Guero owners Megan Sanchez and Alec Morrison have made some of Portland's best tortas from a petite Silver Streak trailer parked on Southeast 28th Avenue. Now they make great tortas -- including their spin on Jalisco's "drowned" torta ahogada -- from a full-sized restaurant on the other side of the Burnside. Yet when you visit, you're just as likely to see healthful bowls filled with lime rice, pinto beans, poblano crema and a choice of meat topping more than half the tables. Those bowls look pretty good, but c'mon, Portland, live a little!
4) "Banh mi" is Portland for "sub..."
The Portland area isn't totally bereft of good subs. Taste Tickler will do in a pinch, and homesick Midwest or East Coast transplanta can find a decent version at Beaverton Sub Station. But when Portlanders want to eat or debate over an inexpensive sandwich, it's almost always the Vietnamese banh mi, with crusty bread, pickled carrots and daikon, cilantro and low-low price point. The $3.95 dac biet (combo) sandwich from Beaverton's Best Baguette won a recent blind taste test at our office; Portlanders will appreciate the drive-thru at the mini chain's Southeast location.
5) ...but let's cool it with the "banh mi" variations
More than any other sandwich, even the cubano, which briefly threatened this throne, the banh mi has become the it sandwich for Portland chefs looking to put a bold spin on a classic sandwich. Some of those are good, even very good, but more often than not, they bear little to no relation to the original (while costing two or three times as much). For my money, subbing slabs of seared pork belly for more traditional slices of meats and pate seems like an acceptable, if cliched, touch. But if you're not building the sandwich on a light, crusty baguette, or you're ignoring how important pickled carrot and daikon (not to mention fresh cilantro) are to traditional banh mi, you should probably go hunting for a different name.
6) Stacked is Portland's next great sandwich shop
Some of the sandwiches are overwrought, designed more for Instagram than for eating, just as you might expect from a Johnson-and-Wales-University-trained chef's first sandwich shop. But the two or three best sandwiches at Stacked, including the roast lamb and braised oxtail French dip for sure, and maybe the polpetta, could go to war with the top two or three sandwiches at any other shop in town and come out victorious. Add in a new happy hour, and Stacked might just be the place to be this summer.
7) Bunk still brings it
Practically synonymous with Portland, this sandwich chain has grown from its narrow Southeast Morrison Street original home to running a mini empire of fixed and mobile locations throughout the city, including at the Moda Center. (Bunk's Brooklyn location opened in 2015 but closed earlier this year.) But despite the rapid expansion, visits to both the Morrison and tiny downtown Portland shop for this guide, Bunk's sandwiches, including the signature pork belly cubano and classic egg, bacon and cheese were, were as good as ever.
8) Lardo's consistency is OCD-level
But the Lardo is the king of consistency. Last year, I spotted owner Rick Gencarelli outside Lardo's original Southeast Hawthorne Boulevard brick-and-mortar, washing the windows. "It makes me happy," he told me. After settling a lawsuit brought by investor Ramzy Hattar in March, Gencarelli is free to apply that attention to detail to his delicious burgers, "banh mi" and griddled mortadella, each as good today as they were on day one.
9) Portland has a signature sandwich bread
After eating at more than 30 food carts, lunch counters and late-night, dive-bar-adjacent sandwich shops, one thread running through Portland's meat, cheese and bread scene is a love for a certain bread. Though not quite as synonymous with local sandwiches as Philadelphia's Amoroso's or New Orleans' Leidenheimer's in New Orleans, Fleur de Lis' humble ciabatta rolls have become popular enough that just seeing them name-checked on a menu is a good sign.
10) Portland's best sandwich shop has been hiding in plain sight
This one surprised me, bigly. Going in, I figured Lardo was the frontrunner. And yeah, that last griddled mortadella the day the story ran gave me a few second thoughts. But the deli at Laurelhurst Market absolutely brought it on my two visits, using meat smoked and cured in-house and plenty of Fleur de Lis bread (accept no imitations). Those sandwiches include a Wednesday steak melt special -- as good as you'd expect from one of Portland's best steakhouses -- and the ham and salami, now my favorite Italian-style sandwich in the city, and one that has existed in some form since the Viande meats days.
-- Michael Russell
