Why Wasn't I Told?

Damn, damn, damn, I just found out that August is National Sandwich Month. You read that right, National Sandwich Month. Hell, if I'd a known, I'd a jumped on this bandwagon, rather than going quite a few days without consuming any sandwiches at all.

Luckily, my go-to cookbook in the summer is Claudia Roden's Book of Middle Eastern Food, with it's plethora of no-cook dishes. I consume a lot of hummus, tahini with yogurt, and tahini pureed with canned fish, and if I'm ambitious enough to fire up the grill, baba ghanouj (it tastes best when the eggplant is charred over an open flame). Needless to say, I've eaten a lot of pita sandwiches this month. I've been meaning to make falafel, and I even have dried chickpeas and shelled fava beans on hand- I'm just too lazy to grind the bejesus out of them lately.

That being said, I have to step up my sandwich consumption in order to catch up. Luckily, I live near a lot of fine Italian delis, so capocollo and provolone sandwiches with roasted red peppers will be in my near future. Another go-to sandwich for me is roast pork and broccoli rabe or spinach with provolone. Of course, Cuban sandwiches and Bánh mì are certainly affordable delicacies, perfect for National Sandwich Month.

I remember once, as a somewhat appalling experiment, I made a "combo platter sandwich", putting a mozzarella stick, a jalapeño popper, and a chicken finger (chicken fingers got no bones!) on a sliced baguette and slathered it with hot sauce and bleu cheese dressing. It was a glorious horror, and I never have to do it again.

Yeah, I have to make up for my failure to celebrate National Sandwich Month, so I'll have to eat some ridiculously large sammiches in order to make up for this oversight.