It's about nouveau banh mi places in New York that are putting twists on what I consider to be one of the best sandwiches ever created. Needless to say, I'm going to try to hit all of the places that are mentioned in the article. So far I've gone to the following two:
- BAOGUETTE CAFE 37 St. Marks Place (near 2nd Ave.) - I had the classic Vietnamese sandwich, which was really big and juicy but not as good as the classic at Nicky's. The bread at Baoguette was chewier and a little denser than the flakey baguettes used at Nicky's. Baoguette tries to achieve a balance of bread and filling by stuffing the bread with a mountain of meat, carrots, radish and cilantro but I don't like that very much. I just makes the sandwich really hard to eat and supersized in that not-so-good American way. Nicky's is still my gold standard for the classic vietnamese banh mi. The catfish sandwich was pretty good but the sauce they use is a little too sweet for my palate. Beware; if you order the sandwiches very spicy here, they really really lay on the hot sauce. I'd suggest ordering medium spicy and adding more hot sauce as you eat it. I like that they have the other Vietnamese staples here that I love - bun, pho, crepes, spring roll, summer roll, etc. I'd definitely go back to try the other sandwiches and dishes. One thing I really appreciate about Baoguette is that they are happy to customize your order (e.g., extra cilantro, no mayo, etc.)
- NUM PANG 21 East 12th Street (near University Place) - The disclaimer on this place is that it's not really Vietnamese. It's a sorta-kinda-but-not-really Cambodian take on the Vietnamese sandwich, so effectively, it's neither Cambodian nor Vietnamese nor anything else but itself. I tried the pulled pork sandwich, the shrimp sandwich and the catfish sandwich. The shrimp was definitely my favorite. The pulled pork tasted like any other pulled pork at a bbq restaurant, except with some hot sauce instead of bbq sauce. The shrimp was juicy, spicy, well-seasoned and worked well with the bread and veggies. The catfish was a little dry and uninspired. Num Pang is the opposite of Baoguette when it comes to customizing; they will not do so at all. One final thing to note is that Num Pang is pretty expensive. I think the sandwiches were all $7.95 and were fairly small, which might seem normal to New Yorkers who are used to getting ripped-off as a way of life but, given that most banh mi places charge about $5-$6 for a sandwich, this place has got some nerve. In Vietnam, a banh mi costs about a quarter at the street carts.
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