The MTA's 1904 sandwich

No, the other subway sandwich

We interrupt your regularly-scheduled programming. There’s emergency D-list food news.

I was on the 7 train the other week staring at one of those new iPad screens that exclusively show TikTok-style recipe hacks for, like, homemade Cheetos made out of dish towels. Is this what people are doing instead of drugs?

Anyways, a new ad appeared that day: a sandwich, created by the MTA.

I perked up. A municipal department creating a hoagie?? Like Jake Gyllenhaal in Nightcrawler, I had to be first on the scene.

As the ad read, the ‘1904’ celebrates the anniversary of the first subway car departing the City Hall station on October 27th, 1904. That’s right: the seminal 118th anniversary. What will they do for 150: Make a commemorative Chopt salad?

The sandwich, the iPad screen explained further, is “a tantalizing combination of Katz’s deli pastrami, garlic confit cream, Calabrian pepper dijon slaw, and aged provolone, all on a fresh rye sourdough long roll.”

For those unfamiliar, Katz’s is a Jewish delicatessen on the Lower East Side that has been around since 1888, a whole child-factory-worker’s lifetime before the New York metro. I have randomly only been to Katz’s once, and ordered what my mom described as a “diaper’s worth” of chopped liver on rye.

This 1904 sandwich will be sold until the end of October at four participating locations of Alidoro, the fast-casual chain of bistros serving Midtown office workers.

I guess the idea behind partnering with these restaurants is that they represent two classic New York culinary traditions: Italian and Jewish delis (albeit, in a non-Kosher sandwich). And as the press release reads, both are reachable by the subway. Which, uh, is true of most things.

I thought about the pomp and circumstance of that first subway ride. It is said that seven thousand people showed up at the City Hall station to catch a glimpse of this revolutionary new transportation system. The subway, like the railroad before it, transformed the very space-time experience of the city and democratized the neighborhoods New Yorkers could visit. For one small price everyone would be equal, if only in that moment.

And now it is being commemorated with a meat sandwich from an office lunch cart. This is my America!!!

The press conference for the sandwich pushed me over the edge. A shlubby MTA official in the middle of Penn Station — the new, piss-free Penn Station — speaks to a skeletal press pool, flanked by the svelte owners of Alidoro and Katz’s. People behind him are queueing at food stalls, unaware of the occasion.

I thought of all the Marketing Laurens who came together to create this alchemical moment. I thought of all the email threads with subject lines that read “Re: Re: Garlic Confit Cream vs. Garlic Aioli Creme.”

Think government doesn’t work? Then explain how it created a sandwich.

Needless to say, I had to get my hands on the thing. So I went to an Alidoro location near Bryant Park at 12:30 on Monday and pretended like I had a real job. Being in Midtown at lunchtime was a hallucinatory experience. There’s a seamless rhythm to it all: Postmates couriers in AirPods wordlessly held their phone up to the cashiers; bankers rushed in and out decked in Columbia puffers, or Columbia fleeces, or Columbia fleece vests, AirPods flush to their lobes. The Brett sitting next to me was reading a book about the first month of World War I. I realized this was a whole decade after the opening of the New York subway.

But what I didn’t see? Anyone eating a 1904.

I, though, was excited for my sandwich. It sounded good! Conceptually, it’s an Italian banh mi. As a confirmed Jew and aspiring Guido, I thought it could scratch both itches. I might have considered ordering it even if a city agency hadn’t invented it.

But I guess the problem a lot of people are having with this sandwich is that it is bad. Taking my first bite, I understood the complaints. It was just so, so dry. Whichever MTA official thought to use a rye baguette is a sick bastard because that bread is not meant to be so thick. The garlic confit cream, which could have helped lubricate it, was indiscernible. It is unclear if they forgot to add it altogether or the bread just sucked it dry, like putting on a dollop of moisturizer after a heavy night of drinking. Then there was the pastrami: so salty and no marbling. A sorry imitation of Katz’s. I was rooting for the coleslaw — vinegar, not mayo-based — and while it did have good texture and heat from the Calabrian pepper, it lacked acidity to brighten up the sluggish dish.

America’s got a problem voice: America’s got a problem.

From the looks of it, I don’t think this sandwich will become a viral hit. People randomly aren’t taking culinary advice from the MTA. I haven’t seen much chatter online about it. Nor have I seen any subway ads showing how to make a 1904 sandwich dupe using only dish towels.

But there is one thing we can take away from this: more things need commemorative sandwiches. There’s something precious about this to me. In a city as muscular and fast-paced as New York, we can still have quaint political moments that resemble a small town parade for a girl who made it to the semi-finals on The Voice.

Screw the commemorative penny. The day Alec Baldwin’s Latin wife Hilaria was outed as being Hillary from Connecticut? Salmon bagel from Russ & Daughters. The day Liz Truss resigned? Hamburger from Minetta Tavern. The day we killed Bin Laden? Caprese from Defonte’s.