Oakfire Pizza & Pub in Los Angeles is known for its pizza, but owner Greg Morris has been seeing more of his customers ordering sandwiches in recent months, and not just at lunchtime.
Accessible, easily customizable and usually less expensive than full plates of food, sandwiches in full-service restaurants have expanded beyond their home daypart of lunch. Having conquered breakfast long ago, they’re now becoming more commonplace on bar, lounge and late night menus.
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Some chefs are packaging sandwiches as bar food, such as Daniel Stern, chef of R2L in Philadelphia, who offers “Cocktail Reubens” on the bar menu.
At Elate in Chicago, chef Randal Jacobs put his grilled chicken sandwich and his hamburger on the restaurant’s happy hour menu -- weekdays from 4:30 to 6:30 p.m. -- for $3 each. At lunch they're priced at $12.
But it’s not only cheap sandwiches that are doing well these days.
On the lounge menu at Naha in Chicago, chef-owner Carrie Nahabedian offers an open-faced sandwich of braised short ribs with foie gras, foraged mushrooms and a fig aioli made with fig preserves imported form Armenia. It’s served on wood-grilled, sea-salt-crusted ciabatta. She charges $28 for it.
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