The Sandwich Provençal is the cold, oil-dressed register of Provence, a sandwich seasoned by the south's pantry rather than by a cure or a melt. The defining elements are ripe tomato, herbes de Provence, olive oil, and the local table: black olives, sometimes a few peppers or a leaf of basil, the tomato salted and the oil and herbs doing the work a sauce would do elsewhere. It goes into a split crusted loaf, no béchamel, no broiler, no onion confit, eaten at room temperature. The region is Provence.
The craft is the behavior of tomato and oil in bread, which is the central problem of every southern sandwich and the thing that decides whether this one works. Ripe tomato is mostly water, and water destroys a loaf, so the technique is to salt and drain the tomato first and to lay a film of olive oil against the crumb so the bread is sealed before the moisture reaches it. Done that way the oil is an asset rather than a hazard: it carries the herbs, softens the interior, and lets the bread take on the flavor of the dressing without going to paste. The herbes de Provence, thyme and rosemary and savory, supply the scent and the seasoning; the olive a bitter punctuation; the tomato the sweet, acidic body. The bread needs a real crust to brace a soft, oil-rich interior. Like the other oil-soaked southern builds it improves with a short rest as the dressing settles into the crumb, but only a short one: past its window the bread tires and the tomato weeps through.
Variations stay within the Provence pantry, more olive or a smear of tapenade, a few strips of grilled pepper, a little goat cheese or a slice of a southern ham set against the vegetables. The herbs and the oil are the constant. The toasted, béchamel-bound treatment of the same flavors is its own sandwich, the Croque-Provençal, and the onion-anchovy world of the Pissaladière Sandwich sits adjacent; this entry is the cold oil-and-vegetable register distinct from both. The Sandwich Provençal belongs with the place-named builds the catalog groups under Regional Specialty Sandwiches. Its specific contribution is Provence served cold and uncooked, a loaf seasoned by tomato, herb, and olive oil and held together by the discipline of draining the tomato first.