A sandwich at Lucca Italian Delicatessen, a deli in Castro Valley, California.
out of 100 · excellent
Excellent. Small moves left on the board.
Reads as a fully realized turkey sandwich, six of six roles, most layers have a partner.
Holding the summit: a focused, restrained build
More acid than 90% of 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.
hoagie roll (the menu offers a choice of bread; scored on this one), served cold: peppered smoked turkey; choice of cheese; mayonnaise; mustard; lettuce; tomato; pickle; red onion.
Much of this build is inferred from the name; the score is a reading, and it stays out of Lucca Italian Delicatessen's typical score.
Balance
| Axis | Value | Catalog percentile |
|---|---|---|
| salt | 1.8 | 81st |
| acid | 1.9 | 90th |
| fat | 1.5 | 27th |
| sweet | 0.4 | 45th |
| umami | 1.3 | 41st |
| heat | 0.3 | 77th |
| bitter | 0.2 | 70th |
95 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
| Layer | Role | Flavor and texture | Points |
|---|---|---|---|
| hoagie roll (the menu offers a choice of bread; scored on this one) | bread | soft crusty | the frame |
| peppered smoked turkeyscored as Turkey | protein | umami 2 soft juicy tender | +9 |
| choice of cheesescored as Cheese (generic) | protein | fat 4 salt 3 umami 3 creamy soft gooey | −2 |
| mayonnaise | sauce | fat 5 acid 2 creamy saucy | −1 |
| mustard | sauce | acid 3 salt 2 heat 2 saucy smooth | 0 |
| lettuce | texture | crunchy juicy fresh | +10 |
| tomato | texture | acid 3 umami 3 sweet 2 juicy soft fresh | +13 |
| picklescored as Pickle (cucumber) | acid | acid 5 salt 4 crunchy juicy pickled | −4 |
| red onionscored as Onion | texture | sweet 2 crunchy juicy fresh | −1 |
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.
Pairings
- Turkey + Mayonnaise: turkey and mayo, the deli default
- Turkey + Tomato: lean bird and summer tomato, the deli standard
- Mayonnaise + Tomato: summer tomato sandwich: acid on rich
How to raise it
- Between you and 90: a focused, restrained build (0.05 short).
All the sandwiches at Lucca Italian Delicatessen · The menu this was read from · Build your own in the Sandwich Builder