The Sub, Hoagie, Hero & Grinder

Zep

The zep is Norristown's long-roll sandwich, defined by its refusals: one meat, salami, never lettuce, thumb-thick raw onion, oregano, and oil. Named for a zeppelin around 1938.

• USA
• Submarine Sandwiches
• The Sub, Hoagie, Hero & Grinder

Wedge (Westchester)

In a stretch of suburban New York the Italian sub is a wedge, and nowhere else is. The word draws a small dialect border a few towns wide, and ordering one is a quiet way of saying where you are from.

• USA
• Submarine Sandwiches
• The Sub, Hoagie, Hero & Grinder

Wawa Gobbler

Hot turkey, stuffing, gravy, and cranberry sauce folded into a roll at a gas-station counter. The Wawa Gobbler is Thanksgiving dinner as a hoagie, sold only a few weeks a year.

• USA
• Submarine Sandwiches
• The Sub, Hoagie, Hero & Grinder

Wawa Classic Hoagie

Italian deli meats on a hoagie roll customized via touchscreen kiosk; Wawa convenience stores are a Mid-Atlantic institution, annual 'Hoa...

• USA
• Submarine Sandwiches
• The Sub, Hoagie, Hero & Grinder

Vegetable Hoagie

The Philadelphia hoagie with the meat checkbox left blank: the official-city-sandwich build minus the cured pork, a Catholic Friday and Lenten order that still lives on Wawa's build-your-own counter.

• USA
• Submarine Sandwiches
• The Sub, Hoagie, Hero & Grinder

Veal Parm Hero

The veal parm hero is the parmigiana sandwich at its most delicate: a milk-fed cutlet pounded near translucent, breaded, sauced, and handed over before it toughens. Chicken's older, pricier sibling.

• USA
• Submarine Sandwiches
• The Sub, Hoagie, Hero & Grinder

Turkey Hoagie

A turkey hoagie is what a Philadelphian orders when the case feels too heavy: lean roast turkey on a hoagie roll, leaning on oil, oregano and provolone to carry a near-flavourless meat.

• USA
• Submarine Sandwiches
• The Sub, Hoagie, Hero & Grinder

Turkey Hero

Sliced turkey breast on hero with lettuce, tomato, and mayo.

• USA
• Submarine Sandwiches
• The Sub, Hoagie, Hero & Grinder

Tuna Hoagie

The Philadelphia hoagie counter's answer to a meatless Friday: canned tuna salad dropped into the city's official roll and dressed the city's way, for the crowd that's off cured pork until Easter.

• USA
• Submarine Sandwiches
• The Sub, Hoagie, Hero & Grinder

Tuna Grinder

Mayo-bound tuna salad on a New England torpedo roll, capped with melted American or provolone and run under the salamander. The word grinder is the local cue for the hot version.

• USA
• Submarine Sandwiches
• The Sub, Hoagie, Hero & Grinder

Subway Meatball Marinara

Italian-style meatballs in marinara sauce with optional cheese on a sub roll; Subway's signature hot sub.

• USA
• Submarine Sandwiches
• The Sub, Hoagie, Hero & Grinder

Subway Italian B.M.T.

Genoa salami, pepperoni, and Black Forest ham on Subway's sub roll, built down a glass line in front of you. Named in 1975 after a New York transit system the Connecticut chain had never operated in.

• USA
• Submarine Sandwiches
• The Sub, Hoagie, Hero & Grinder

Submarine Sandwich

Generic term for a long sandwich on a cylindrical roll; regional names vary.

• USA
• Submarine Sandwiches
• The Sub, Hoagie, Hero & Grinder

Stinger Sub

Buffalo's maximalist order: a whole steak sub and a whole hot-sauced chicken-finger sub built into one roll, blue cheese between them. The portion is the joke and the appeal at once.

• USA
• Submarine Sandwiches
• The Sub, Hoagie, Hero & Grinder

Spiedie

Day-marinated meat cubes grilled on a skewer and stripped into a plain slice of Italian bread that grips the metal and shields the hand. Binghamton's signature, char and vinegar all through.

• USA
• Submarine Sandwiches
• The Sub, Hoagie, Hero & Grinder

Spiedie Sub

Marinated fire-grilled cubes of chicken, pork, or lamb stripped off the skewer into a split roll with onions and peppers, the loaded form of Binghamton's spiedie and its vinegar-and-mint marinade.

• USA
• Submarine Sandwiches
• The Sub, Hoagie, Hero & Grinder

Sheetz MTO Sub

Made-to-order subs customized via touchscreen at Sheetz gas stations; Appalachian/Western PA rival to Wawa's hoagies.

• USA
• Submarine Sandwiches
• The Sub, Hoagie, Hero & Grinder

Sausage and Peppers Hero

Grilled Italian sausage with sautéed peppers and onions on Italian bread.

• USA
• Submarine Sandwiches
• The Sub, Hoagie, Hero & Grinder

Roast Beef Hero

Cold rare roast beef sliced paper-thin off the deli blade, ribboned into folds on a long seeded New York hero roll with horseradish mayo, lettuce, tomato.

• USA
• Submarine Sandwiches
• The Sub, Hoagie, Hero & Grinder

Riggies Sub

Chicken riggies (spicy chicken with rigatoni) served in a sub roll.

• USA
• Submarine Sandwiches
• The Sub, Hoagie, Hero & Grinder

Quiznos Classic Italian

Quiznos built a chain on one machine: the countertop conveyor oven that toasted every sub by default. The Classic Italian, four cured meats and molten mozzarella.

• USA
• Submarine Sandwiches
• The Sub, Hoagie, Hero & Grinder

Providence Grinder

A Providence grinder is the cold Italian: shingled cured meats and provolone on a crusted roll, with a marinated banana-pepper relish run its full length. Rhode Island's word for the sub.

• USA
• Submarine Sandwiches
• The Sub, Hoagie, Hero & Grinder

Potbelly A Wreck

Potbelly's Wreck stacks roast beef, salami, turkey, and ham with Swiss, then runs it through a conveyor toaster until it welds into one warm fused sub, the flagship of a chain born in an antique shop.

• USA
• Submarine Sandwiches
• The Sub, Hoagie, Hero & Grinder

Pepper and Egg Hero

On a Friday in Lent the Italian-American deli puts up a hero with no meat: soft scrambled eggs folded with slow-stewed sweet peppers on a long roll, a thrift sandwich the calendar built and kept.

• USA
• Submarine Sandwiches
• The Sub, Hoagie, Hero & Grinder