Many of my associates have lamented the lack of olives on Subway sandwiches, while others have griped that a request for “just a little mayo” is oft-interpreted as “all of your mayo, please.” I prefer the oil and vinegar, which the sandwichier also goes crazy with. But my concern is more with the lack of olives.Regardless of which sub I order, I always get tomatoes, banana peppers, spinach and olives. Without fail, the sandy artisan delicately places each sliced black olive, one by one, on the sandwich … usually five or six total. I’ve given up on asking for more because the request is usually met with a sigh and the placement of three additional olives, followed by a look of “anything else, your majesty?”
According to Subway’s FAQ, the Olive Problem is the blame of a formula. It says “all restaurants must follow a formula when preparing subs and salads,” adding that “charging for extra toppings is not recommended.” Does this mean some Subways will actually charge you for extra olives? That's twisting the knife.
I wouldn’t recommend reading the FAQ — the only other fun facts are that you cannot purchase the wallpaper found in Subway restaurants (it’s made for the “sole use of SUBWAY® restaurant décor”) and that the BMT in the their Italian BMT sandy stands for “Biggest, Meatiest, and Tastiest.” So now you know.
Note that Subway spells its name using all caps. I suppose they want people to yell the word whenever someone says something like “I dunno, why don’t we just eat at SUBWAY!” I refuse to capitalize beyond the S for moral reasons. The only formal name I will spell in all caps is that of MF DOOM, because he went to the trouble to write a song requesting as much (see bottom of post).
Review
Olive troubles aside, today I enjoyed a 6-inch Seafood Sensation on wheat at one of the six Subways in my office’s immediate surrounding area. We have Subways the way major cities have Starbucks. The sandy was decidedly meh. If you’re down with imitation crab (AKA krab), then you’ll probably like it.
Oddly, the Seafood Sensation has disappeared from the main Subway Web site’s menu page, and Google has no cached version. But renegade offshoot Subway Pacific reveals the sandwich’s filling to consist of “a processed seafood and crab blend.” The presence of real crab is encouraging. The blend also has lots of mayo, obviously.
There is nothing sensational about this particular sandwich, despite its name.
Madvillain – ALL CAPS
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