· 2 min read

Picante at El Tiny Cafe

Chipotle aioli, jalapeño, tomato, cucumber, lettuce, red onion, salt and pepper on choice of bread. Sandwich Score 46, rough. At El Tiny Cafe, Berkeley.

Picante at El Tiny Cafe: an illustration of the sandwich.
Illustration, AI-generated

A sandwich at El Tiny Cafe, a cafe in Berkeley, California.

Bread (generic)OnionLettuceCucumberTomatoJalapeñoBread (generic)
46
Sandwich Score
out of 100 · rough

Rough, with one move worth +36.

Uncharted, three of six roles on the board.

Holding the summit: a finished composition

Balance
46
Harmony
72
Contrast
80
Structure
73
Focus
75
Composition
46
Quality
100
Envelope
94

−5 a wet layer on soft bread

Less fat than almost everything in the catalog.

Each bar is one pillar of the score, 0 to 100. The tick marks what a sandwich at the summit needs; an amber bar is the one holding this sandwich back.

choice of bread, served cold: chipotle aioli; jalapeño; tomato; cucumber; lettuce; red onion; salt and pepper.

Balance

salt0.1 · 6thacid0.7 · 56thfat0.0sweet0.5 · 65thumami0.5 · 13thheat0.7 · 90thbitter0.4 · 84th
Flavor axes
AxisValueCatalog percentile
salt0.16th
acid0.756th
fat0.0n/a
sweet0.565th
umami0.513th
heat0.790th
bitter0.484th

46 Balance, out of 100

The seven flavor axes of the whole sandwich, each summed across its layers. The shaded ring is the catalog's middle 80%; the small number under each axis is where this sandwich falls in the catalog. A shape that sits inside the ring is in the range most sandwiches live in; a spike past it is where this one stands apart.

What each layer brings

LayerRoleFlavor and texturePoints
choice of breadbreadsoftthe frame
chipotle aiolinot scored
jalapeñotextureheat 4 crunchy fresh raw+2
tomatotextureacid 3 umami 3 sweet 2 juicy soft fresh+9
cucumberbulkcrunchy juicy fresh+8
lettucetexturecrunchy juicy fresh+5
red onionscored as Oniontexturesweet 2 crunchy juicy fresh−1
salt and peppernot scored

Points: what the Sandwich Score would lose if that one layer were left out, everything else the same. A negative number means the sandwich scores higher without it. Flavor runs 0 to 5 on each axis.

How to raise it

Build this sandwich

Load its stack into the Sandwich Builder. Swap a layer, watch the score move.

Open in the builder

Read next