A burger at Cafe Napolina, a restaurant in Concord, California.
out of 100 · outstanding
Outstanding, and the road to 90 is open.
Uncharted, five of six roles on the board.
More salt 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.
burger bun (inferred from the kind of sandwich), toasted: beef patty; lettuce; tomato; pickle; caramelized onions; bacon; cheese.
Balance
| Axis | Value | Catalog percentile |
|---|---|---|
| salt | 2.2 | 90th |
| acid | 1.3 | 82nd |
| fat | 2.2 | 53rd |
| sweet | 0.9 | 87th |
| umami | 2.1 | 77th |
| heat | 0.0 | n/a |
| bitter | 0.2 | 58th |
98 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 |
|---|---|---|---|
| burger bun (inferred from the kind of sandwich) | bread | sweet 2 soft springy | the frame |
| beef pattyscored as Beef | protein | fat 3 umami 3 juicy chewy tender | +9 |
| lettuce | texture | crunchy juicy fresh | +17 |
| tomato | texture | acid 3 umami 3 sweet 2 juicy soft fresh | +3 |
| picklescored as Pickle (cucumber) | acid | acid 5 salt 4 crunchy juicy pickled | +2 |
| caramelized onionsscored as Caramelized Onion | bulk | sweet 4 umami 3 fat 2 soft silky | 0 |
| bacon | protein | fat 4 salt 3 umami 3 crispy chewy | +2 |
| cheesescored as Cheese (generic) | protein | fat 4 salt 3 umami 3 creamy soft gooey | 0 |
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
- Beef + Pickle (cucumber): pickle brine against rich beef
- Beef + Caramelized Onion: sweet onion jam on seared beef
- Lettuce + Bacon: cool crunch against hot smoke
- Tomato + Bacon: smoke against sweet acid, the blt core
How to raise it
- Outstanding, not legendary: the menu does not name its bread.
All the sandwiches at Cafe Napolina · The menu this was read from · Build your own in the Sandwich Builder