On the side

One member of our “Just Right” investigative team subscribes to some of those services that plop (what you consider) interesting posts from here and there into your inbox or facebook.  I think one is called “gawker”, but it’s beyond my capabilities.   He kindly forwards some to me that he thinks the Feeder would enjoy (and does).  Recently he sent me one that was entitled “An Expensive Sandwich Should Come with a Side”, that turned out to be from some blogger hack like me (with obviously more success) with a subtitle “When did it become okay for a $12 sandwich not to come with a side?”.  Below that there were several conversational postings with varying opinions, both supporting and critical.  I am not real passionate on either side.  Who cares?

The picture of the sandwich in the blog was of a tasty looking maybe corned beef or pastrami sandwich with slaw on it, some nice looking rye bread, with a (dill) pickle tucked along side – apparently the pickle does not in his mind qualify as a bona fide side.  (As a quick aside, one of my pet peeves is when they tuck that wet pickle beside the sandwich, it turns the bottom of the sandwich mushy .)

But it does kind of bring up an interesting question:  If you order a sandwich, is the restaurant obligated to provide a “side”, be it chips, pickle, or slaw for free?  Certainly it is the custom of most places to do that, and generally give you a small handful of non-descript chips (usually “wavy”, yes?) or a little cupful of slaw of varying crispness.  My friends, I don’t always eat a sandwich, but when I do, I almost always ignore those sides anyway.  And also generally tucked away someplace on the menu are options for onion rings or fries for an extra charge.  Generally anything that comes in a “basket” implies you get fries or rings…

As to the sandwich in question, charging twelve bucks for the one pictured may seem a bit overpriced, but I’ve never been to a New York Deli, and i wouldn't be surprised at that price point.  On a whim, I veered over to the Zingerman’s Deli site, the revered Deli in Ann Arbor Michigan with a National Reputation, and looked at their menu.  They have a wide ranging selection of sandwiches made of corned beef, pastrami, beef, turkey, chicken, pork and so on.  Since we’re sort of Deli oriented here, the corned beef section contains eight choices (each with numbers and also catchy names - #13, Sherman’s Sure Choice: Zingerman's corned beef, Switzerland Swiss cheese, coleslaw & Russian dressing on Jewish rye)  

There are two prices listed for each sandwich, and I finally found they were for the size of sandwich you wanted.. Nosher, or Fresser – the English translation from Yiddish is left to the inquisitive reader.  For Sherman’s Sure Choice they were: $15.50 and $18.50.  As usual with high end deli sandwiches they are huge! I don’t think you could get your mouth around it.  You could add Zapp’s potato chips for a buck and a half for small (presumably to go with the Nosher, or three and half for the Fresser size.

Most of the other sandwiches (pastrami, pork, etc.) were in the 15 or 18 buck range.   It was interesting that at the bottom of the menus is a section called “Why our sandwich costs what it does”.. there was lots of stuff about refusing to cut corners, keeping the quality up, and so forth and I thought fairly straightforward explanations like:

Better ingredients really do make better sandwiches. At the same time, we’ve tried to remember that while raising prices is a difficult thing to do, much of the industry operates under an unwritten guiding principle that “the customer can’t tell the difference.” If cheese prices go up, buy a less expensive cheese — ”no one will notice.” If meat prices go up, cut an ounce off your portion — “who can tell?” Sorry guys, but as far as we are concerned, customers

can and do tell the difference.

When we price a sandwich (or anything else we sell) for the menu at the Deli, we do it according to algebraic formulas, not a whim. We price according to widely-used formulas that allow us to pay our banker, pay our bills, pay our staff, pay ourselves (yes, it’s true) and stay in business to keep serving the best possible food to our customers

Sure, you can think this is just web site marketing hooey, but it sounds sincere to me.  Now I’m hungry, and of course the person who whined about no sides with his sandwich will never read this, but maybe he would prefer the golden arches. Where he wouldn’t have to

DFD