57 Sandwiches That Define New York City (2024)

Many people wouldn’t guess that C & B, by the looks of it, serves some of the finest sandwiches in the city. Ali Sahin’s tiny cafe has been located for nearly a decade on the south side of Tompkins Square Park in the East Village, serving breakfast sandwiches that exemplify why New Yorkers love breakfast sandwiches: they’re simple as can be, but every component is on point. Lining up for a weekend breakfast sandwich there feels a little like being at a model casting — one wonders if the name is a play on “see and be seen” — but ordering well is a great equalizer: a fat, rich chorizo patty straight off the griddle and wobbly scrambled eggs, all piled high on an housemade roll to soak up the sausage’s spiced fat. BECKY HUGHES

178 East Seventh Street (Avenue B), $13, candbnyc.com

New York is no stranger to smoked salmon — we’re practically aswim in lox — but it usually arrives in sandwich form on a bagel. Not so at the popular Radio Bakery in Greenpoint, where the pastry chef Kelly Mencin serves smoked salmon with a schmear of whipped cream cheese seasoned with pickled red onions and dill, all sandwiched between airy, crispy, everything-seasoned focaccia The bread recipe was perfected by Rafiq Salim, a partner here and a Gramercy Tavern vet, but the idea to serve it in this inventive, satisfying form is all Ms. Mencin’s. On weekends, the sandwich tends to sell out well before 11 a.m., but hopefully that won’t be an issue when a second Radio Bakery opens in Prospect Heights later this year. NIKITA RICHARDSON

135 India Street (Manhattan Avenue), $15, radiobakery.nyc

Elyssa Heller is a pandemic pop-up success story. She started selling hand-rolled bagels and dishes inspired by the Jewish diaspora out of Paulie Gee’s pizzeria in 2020 before opening Edith’s Sandwich Counter in Williamsburg, where the menu is tight but clever: egg sandwiches on bagels, breakfast wraps on Yemeni flatbread and deli classics like tuna melts and pastrami on rye. Their most popular sandwich is the bacon, egg and cheese on a bagel, the platonic ideal of hangover food, with an added latke layer. It may not be kosher, but it’s texturally thrilling — the bagel chewy, eggs impossibly fluffy, the latke doing that crunchy-outside, creamy-inside thing that will cure what ails you. BECKY HUGHES

495 Lorimer Street (Powers Street), $14, edithsbk.com

So many portmanteau foods can go horribly wrong: the cookie croissant, the everything doughnut, the Nutella calzone. But at Daily Provisions, the mash-up of its celebrated bacon, egg and cheese sandwich and its cult-favorite maple cruller tastes very, very right. The housemade peppery bacon and runny egg work with the maple glaze, as if you’ve swiped the egg and bacon from your lumberjack breakfast through the syrup on the pancake side of the plate. JULIA MOSKIN

Multiple locations, $12, dailyprovisionsnyc.com

Bialys and sable can seem like afterthoughts on a bagel-store menu, the oft-overlooked urchins only a Jewish mother could love, and so often overshadowed by their powerhouse cousins, bagels and lox. But at Shelsky’s, these two stalwarts shine magnificently in the Newhouse sandwich. Made from toasted, housemade bialys and translucent slivers of wild Alaskan smoked sable, the sandwich is rounded out with scallion cream cheese for plushness, and sliced tomato for a touch of juicy sweetness. It’s an if-you-know-you-know combination that aficionados of appetizing might build for themselves from a bat mitzvah brunch platter, but it’s rarely seen preconstructed in the wild. For smoked fish lovers, this is a real opportunity to kvell. MELISSA CLARK

453 Fourth Avenue (10th Street), $18, shelskys.com

We’re living in a golden age of katsu sandos in New York. Still, it’s worth a special visit to Little Egg for its take, which shines thanks to, well, the egg. The sandwich is inspired by a fried tamago that the chef Evan Hanczor first encountered in Tokyo — where he owns another restaurant. The eggs are cooked in a water bath at a low temperature, giving them their custardy texture, then sliced into planks and fried in a mixture of flour and panko. The end result is impossibly fluffy and tender yet crispy, and tastes even more luxurious in a brioche bun, embellished with a punchy yuzu kosho, pickled shallot mayo and arugula. PRIYA KRISHNA

657 Washington Avenue (St. Marks Avenue), $17, eggrestaurant.com

Few people head to the airport for an early-morning flight expecting a breakfast any better than a stale bagel or a granola bar. But the passengers flying out of Terminal 4 at Kennedy have grown accustomed to something much better. Here, the ubiquitous burger chain Shake Shack serves its far less ubiquitous breakfast menu, including a simple yet elegantly constructed egg and cheese sandwich: silken eggs with crisp edges, a slice of American cheese and a squishy burger bun. For several months in 2013, this was the only Shake Shack in the world that offered a breakfast sandwich. Now the morning offerings have expanded to other locations, including Grand Central Terminal, and the menu has more zhuzhed-up egg sandwiches including a version with bacon and tater tots, but the sheen of Terminal 4’s pioneer status remains. PRIYA KRISHNA

Kennedy International Airport, Terminal 4, $5, shakeshack.com/location/jfk-airport-nyc

Frank Tuttolomondo grew up in the Upper West Side slice shop his grandmother opened in 1959, but it was only after he went out on his own, mastered the New York slice and created a legendary pepperoni square, that he turned to hot heroes. His chicken Parms are giant torpedoes, overstuffed and quick-blasted in the pizza oven. The housemade sesame rolls have the signature savory, extra-browned crust of Mama’s Too pizza; even more impressive, so does the chicken cutlet. The basic chicken Parm with marinara sauce and mozzarella is top-notch; his new variation, with creamy stracciatella, vodka sauce and a bright dribble of pesto, is quickly approaching modern classic status. JULIA MOSKIN

Multiple locations, $20, mamastoo.com

At just 31 years old, Casa Della Mozzarella is downright youthful compared with some of its weathered neighbors along Arthur Avenue in the Bronx. But in a world of monster hero purveyors (see: other entries in this category), this Italian deli opts for simplicity. The house sandwich, also called the Casa, is little more than ciabatta or a hero filled with sun-dried tomatoes, prosciutto, balsamic vinegar glaze and mozzarella di bufala. Emphasis on the mozzarella — taut, shiny, white blobs of salty goodness made fresh daily in the house that mozzarella built. NIKITA RICHARDSON

604 East 187th Street (Arthur Avenue), $9, instagram.com/casadellamozzarella

Before pistachio cream, wild arugula and hot honey came along, Italian American sandwich shops made their reputations with humbler materials. Fillings don’t get much more basic than roasted potato cubes, scrambled eggs and mozzarella stuffed into a hero roll, yet few sandwiches are as fortifying, economical or versatile as this $8.95 staple (or its sibling, the hero Defonte’s makes with eggs, peppers and mozzarella). Both are as welcome today as they must have been back when the Red Hook docks were in full swing; they’re sandwiches made for hungry stevedores. PETE WELLS

379 Columbia Street (Luquer Street), $9, instagram.com/defontes1922

What does an Italian deli look like in 2024? At Regina’s Grocery, a small chain of Italian sandwich shops from Roman Grandinetti, a native of Bensonhurst, it looks like breaking up with Boar’s Head and forgoing gut-busting mega-sandwiches for better ingredients in a slightly smaller but no less delicious package. The Uncle Rocco, a caper-dotted Italian tuna sandwich served on a hero with mozzarella, roasted red peppers, spicy Calabrian pepper paste and arugula, is oily perfection. NIKITA RICHARDSON

Multiple locations, $18, reginasgrocery.com

Royal Crown Bakery is to Staten Island what Junior’s is to Brooklyn, sitting squarely at the center of every kind of celebration from first birthdays to retirement parties. Though the original location was in Bensonhurst, its arrival on the island heralded a new love affair with freshly baked stirato and all manner of buttery Italian cookies. You can always get a chicken cutlet sandwich at Royal Crown, but the sandwich is nearer to perfection at the bakery’s offshoot cafe on the south shore, where oozy mozzarella and a tangy-sweet balsamic vinegar glaze soak into a crisp chicken cutlet swaddled in freshly baked bread. It’s so simple, so effective and a superlative version of an old-school sandwich. NIKITA RICHARDSON

4569 Amboy Road (Retford Avenue), $15, filoncino.com

You can throw a dart at Alidoro’s menu blindfolded and hit an excellent sandwich. When your eyes are uncovered, though, look closely at the ones made with prosciutto. Alidoro understands that prosciutto needs to be sliced and folded with care so when you bite down it doesn’t come zooming out of the bread in a big, stringy pink wad. On our more Spartan days, we gravitate toward the Galileo, which augments the ham with fresh mozzarella and nothing else. When we’re seeking thrills, we like the Alidoro, which buries the prosciutto under sweet peppers, hot peppers, arugula leaves and curls of shaved fennel, all inside bread slathered with mushroom paste and spicy-chile spread. But when life hasn’t pushed us to either extreme, we heed the call of the Michelangelo: provolone and hot peppers with arugula over layers of that meticulously arranged prosciutto. PETE WELLS

105 Sullivan Street (Spring Street), $14, alidoronyc.com

In the pantheon of comically large sandwiches, the Bomb, from this tiny deli in Astoria rules supreme. It’s not unusual to see pictures on social media of this 14-inch behemoth set next to newborns or cradled in the arms of an influencer, neither of whom is likely to finish the whole thing. With its five meats, two cheeses, two peppers and all the other hero fixings, the Bomb is ultimately a deliciously messy gimmick — and a bandwagon worth hopping on for the story alone. NIKITA RICHARDSON

33-12 23rd Avenue (33rd Street), $17, facebook.com/salkrisandcharlies

Many of the offerings at Court Street Grocers would qualify as the best sandwiches in New York City. The veg-Italian — an Italian combo that swaps the meat for a plank of roasted squash (or sweet potato, depending on the season) — stands out because it’s a vegetarian sandwich that doesn’t feel lacking. Here, the roasted vegetables, with their oiled, caramelized edges, provide the creamy, rich and slightly chewy qualities of cured meat; their sweetness nicely balances the three kinds of cheese, arugula and thin slivers of onion. Many customers have told the shop’s co-owner Eric Finkelstein that they like this version better than the meaty one. They’re right. PRIYA KRISHNA

Multiple locations, $16, courtstreetgrocers.com

For all the talk of lab-grown beef and perfecting the veggie burger, it’s chicken that is really at the heart of the American diet. So any plant-based alternative is welcome, whether going meat-free is a choice for life or just for the day. The Crispy Chick’n sandwich at this inventive kiosk inside Bowery Market isn’t trying to imitate its meaty brethren as much as to capture its essence, which has always been about shattering crust (in this case a wheat-based patty that’s been dredged and fried) under something acidic (usually pickles, but here, a vegan gribiche made with minty Peruvian huacatay). NIKITA RICHARDSON

348 Bowery (Great Jones Street), $16, eatatsunday.square.site

How does a sandwich becomes a classic? Born in 2009 Williamsburg at Saltie, this focaccia sandwich was meant to be a seasonally changing vegetarian option. A clean-out-the-fridge kind of sandwich that the chef Rebecca Collerton ate as a child, it had hard-boiled eggs, pickled beets and carrots, capers, olives and a mix of herbs held in check by a pimentón aioli. Ms. Collerton and her partners, Caroline Fidanza and Elizabeth Shula, couldn’t change it: “People would get very, very mad, send us angry emails and would cry,” Ms. Fidanza said. It remained a best seller until Saltie closed in 2017, a year before Ms. Collerton died from cancer. But in 2020, Ms. Fidanza brought the sandwich back as a pandemic grab-and-go option at Marlow & Sons, where the Scuttlebutt has charmed once again. SARA BONISTEEL

81 Broadway (Berry Street), $15, marlowandsons.com

For some regulars, of which there are many, Superiority Burger’s collard greens sandwich trumps the titular burger. In 2015, Brooks Headley, formerly the pastry chef at Del Posto, stirred meatless mania when he opened Superiority Burger as a tiny East Village sandwich shop. The restaurant has since moved into a much bigger space on Avenue A with a full bar and a much larger list of dishes, including the collard greens sandwich: Rich, cooked-seemingly-forever greens are held together with strands of melted Cooper sharp cheese. The sesame focaccia that contains it all is, as Pete Wells once wrote, “the object of a small cult” — it functions as a reminder of the original sandwich shop and its well-deserved frenzy. BECKY HUGHES

119 Avenue A (East Seventh Street), $22, superiorityburger.com

How to improve on the minimalist perfection of a grilled cheese? Extra ingredients would be superfluous to the pure harmony of melty cheese oozing from toasty, oily bread. And yet the French onion sandwich at Houseman, in Hudson Square, is the brilliant exception to prove the rule. One afternoon in 2015, the chef Ned Baldwin, inspired by gooey cheese-topped French onion soup, slid some caramelized onions he had on hand for a burger in between slices of brioche and funky raclette cheese. He griddled it and served it for staff meal, where it was such a hit that he moved it to the lunch menu — with a few canny tweaks. Now the sandwich is seasoned with grainy mustard for tang and maple syrup for sweetness, and the brioche is coated in Parmesan, then crisped, frico-like, in the hot pan. It’s a maximalist grilled cheese that manages to keep its balance. MELISSA CLARK

508 Greenwich Street (Spring Street), $23, housemanrestaurant.com

Defying New York City’s reputation for a lack of hospitality, Spring Cafe draws a clientele often greeted by name. (“No smoothie today, Cindy?”) Though they occupy a modest amount of space on an eclectic vegan menu, the bao buns are some of the best deals in the city, priced at two for $10.95. The most popular one, the vegan barbecue pork bao, folds brittle-edged, caramelized coins of deep-fried seitan into puffy buns, along with cool rounds of cucumber, crisp iceberg lettuce and a swipe of the house barbecue sauce, which tastes like hoisin with nuance, more spice than sweetness. Easily clutched and devoured on the go, this sandwich is all texture — cool, crisp, crunch on a cloud of yeasted dough — and delivers a hint of five-spice that lingers. ALEXA WEIBEL

153d Centre Street (Canal Street), $6, springcafenyc.com

As you might have guessed, there is absolutely no lobster in the vegan lobster roll at Aunts et Uncles in Flatbush. But you’ll be surprised by how close vegan mayo-smothered hearts of palm mixed with diced red onions and served in a toasted pretzel bun can come. Also, have you seen the price of lobster lately? NIKITA RICHARDSON

1407 Nostrand Avenue (Martense Street), $17, auntsetuncles.com

At his deli in Greenpoint, Zach Frankel has taken a classic New York-style bacon-egg-and-cheese sandwich and given it an update. He started out by simply substituting housemade pastrami for the bacon, yet this re-engineering took more than just swapping out the meats. In the original sandwich the wavy, textured bacon grips the eggs and holds them in place. But Mr. Frankel found that his thin slices of pastrami slipped around too much, sliding off the egg and out of the roll. So he cut the pastrami into thick, soft chunks that sink securely into the fluffy cloud of scrambled eggs. Each mouthful yields just the right combination of silky egg; smoky, gently spiced meat; and melty pulls of American cheese — and it all stays put. MELISSA CLARK

631 Manhattan Avenue (Nassau Street), $14, frankelsdelicatessen.com

Shalom Japan’s Wagyu pastrami sando has just three components — bread, meat, mustard — but its elemental ingredient list fails to reflect its complexity. Sawako Okochi and Aaron Israel, co-chefs and co-owners of this Williamsburg restaurant, start with Wagyu beef brisket, prized for its marbled fat. They separate the flat and the deckle, which cook at different rates, and brine them with salt, brown sugar, peppercorns and coriander for about two weeks. Next rubbed with black pepper, coriander, paprika, garlic powder and ground nori, the brined meat is smoked over cherry wood, then steamed until tender. Sliced into heftier pieces than your average pastrami, the meat melts in your mouth. It’s tucked into delicate, untoasted shokupan with caraway seeds — a nod to rye — and just enough Gulden’s mustard to remind you you’re alive. ALEXA WEIBEL

310 South Fourth Street (Rodney Street), $23, shalomjapannyc.com

This sandwich, with layers of thinly sliced pastrami and corned beef topped with rich coleslaw and Russian dressing, isn’t unique to Liebman’s. (Though its creation may be unique to New York City — where else would Eastern European pastrami have crossed paths with Irish corned beef and a dressing invented in the United States?) Liebman’s exceptionality, rather, stems from its status as the last Jewish deli in the Bronx, a dubious honor perhaps in a city that is running short on classic delicatessens. But it’s going strong, possibly poised to last another 71 years after a second location opened last year in the Westchester County village of Ardsley. “It doesn’t matter if we’re one of 100 or we’re the last one,” said Yuval Dekel, whose Israel-born father bought the deli in 1980. “We’re kind of stubborn, we just stay the way we are.” NIKITA RICHARDSON

552 West 235th Street (Johnson Avenue), $26, liebmansdeli.com

Much has been written about Blue Sky Deli, also known as Hajji’s, the Spanish Harlem corner deli and purported birthplace of one of the city’s most beloved sandwiches. The history is fuzzy: It was either inspired by a Yemeni dish (minus the cheese) or it was invented by Carlos Soto, a longtime employee who died in 2014. Either way, it became a phenomenon, and that is reason enough for Blue Sky’s chopped cheese to make our list. But the version served here — essentially a chopped-up patty melt with tomatoes, lettuce and onions on a fluffy roll or a fragrant hero, your choice — lives up to the hype. You’ll want to order two: one for now and one for five minutes after now. NIKITA RICHARDSON

2135 First Avenue (110th Street), $8, instagram.com/hajjis110

The governor was George Pataki, said to have a soft spot for the combination of mushrooms and melted Muenster between dark planks of pumpernickel. If Mr. Pataki’s culinary bona fides aren’t good enough for you, maybe you’ll listen to the chef Wylie Dufresne. Mr. Dufresne has been an Old Town regular for at least three decades and an appreciator of the sandwich for almost as long. “It’s definitely simple, but smartly chosen,” he said, pointing out dairy’s affinity for mushrooms and Muenster’s ability to “melt like nobody’s business.” At his restaurant Stretch Pizza, a few blocks away, Mr. Dufresne translates the Governor’s Choice into pizza form. Like its source material, it brings to mind the flavors of Eastern Europe in the contours they assumed as naturalized citizens of New York. PETE WELLS

45 East 18th Street (Park Avenue South), $17, oldtownbarnyc.com

It takes a lot for a white-bread sandwich born in the 20th century to make this list. And it’s not here because the filling is a thick schmear of sustainable, domestic caviar, offset by the mildness of chopped hard-cooked egg. Or that it comes with a cool, crunchy cucumber-onion salad that — who knew? — is just what you want to eat between bites. It’s that the sandwich is a perfect expression of the art of white toast: golden but not brown, crisp but not hard, sturdy but delicate. It’s a perfect appetizer for two with a martini or Champagne, especially as a lead-in to clams and oysters from the peerless raw bar. The only pain point is its price, which has gone from about $14 in 2019, when caviar prices were at a historic low, to $45 amid today’s high demand and inflation. JULIA MOSKIN

89 East 42nd Street (Park Avenue), $45, oysterbarny.com

There are many distractions at Roll N Roaster, a Sheepshead Bay mainstay since 1970. A wheel to spin on your birthday for $5, $10, $15 or $25 worth of gold Roll n Roaster coins. The “Pleezes” and “Cheezes” that litter the menu. Bottles of Moët Champagne for $59.95. But the true thrill is the Roll-n-Roast Beef, the top-selling sandwich at the shop. It’s a delight best eaten in the moment: slow-cooked beef on a sesame bun that slowly dissolves in the gravy. The sandwich arrives on a paper plate in a restaurant that is also a time capsule of another, more golden time. Truly golden. Just look at the tables, the light fixtures, the liquid Cheez. “When a place is nostalgic,” the general manager Eric Rodriguez said, “you cannot change anything.” SARA BONISTEEL

2901 Emmons Avenue (East 29th Street), $8, rollnroaster.com

An unholy mash-up of a salad, a sandwich and a burrito, the chicken Caesar wrap is the 21st century’s contribution to the deli canon. (McDonald’s Snack Wraps, introduced in 2006, inspired countless copycats.) You can get it delivered, but some of the pleasure of this TikTok-famous sandwich is the frenzied cornucopia at Upper West Side and Upper East Side locations of Milano Market, which are filled with walls of deli meat, pyramids of panettone and the metallic clanging of tongs against bowls. Show up any time (after school is rush hour here), order your wrap toasted and admire the tong technique of the workers who toss the chunks of chicken breast (grilled or fried), romaine, shredded Romano cheese and the garlicky croutons that provide a much-appreciated crunch. JULIA MOSKIN

Multiple locations, $15, milanomarketnyc.com

What makes a tuna or chicken salad sandwich so good? The combination of ingredients, sure, but also the perfect distribution of ingredients, made possible only by chopping everything to bits. Farmer in the Deli asks the question: What if that same ethos was applied to any sandwich? Turkey, bacon, lettuce, provolone, salt, vinegar and tomatoes? Chopped. No longer a sandwich as you might have imagined it, but the sandwich you didn’t know you were waiting for. NIKITA RICHARDSON

357 Myrtle Avenue (Adelphi Street), $11, instagram.com/farmerdeli1

This is one of the borough’s best bites, and it’s not just because of the ham. To be sure, it’s got a prosciutto of provenance, made from whey-fed Parma pigs and cured for 36 months before being shipped across the Atlantic. But just as important is the exquisite Rodolphe Le Meunier butter (affectionately nicknamed R.L.M. on the Larder’s menu), which is handmade in France in wooden churns and seasoned with fleur de sel. Then there’s the Runner & Stone sourdough baguette — thinner, chewier and crisper than many of its ilk. Still, the magic comes together in the sandwich’s construction: Equal parts creamy butter and salty ham are slathered on the bread and layered into a filling almost as thick as the baguette slices themselves. It’s substantial but not at all overwhelming, a lovingly made Brooklyn take on an elegant classic. MELISSA CLARK

228 Flatbush Avenue (Bergen Street), $9, bklynlarder.com

The 2016 closing of Porchetta, the chef Sara Jenkins’s ode to roasted pork in the East Village, was something of a hyperlocal, food-related tragedy. But a successor quietly appeared in 2015: Foster Sundry, an upscale shop in Bushwick from a Murray’s Cheese alumnus. All the meats are butchered and prepared in-house, including the smoked porchetta rubbed down with what the owner, Aaron Foster, calls “a luxurious amount” of fennel pollen imported from Italy and served with arugula, fennel mayo and pickled fennel, all of it cut through with lemon and garlic. Foster Sundry may have been born of Brooklyn’s peak artisanal era, when everything was small-batch or bust, but its longevity proves that well-made sandwiches are not just a passing fad. NIKITA RICHARDSON

215 Knickerbocker Avenue (Troutman Street), $16, fostersundry.com

There’s not a sandwich at Golden Diner that doesn’t merit an interminable brunch-rush wait. Take the chicken katsu club, which integrates the chicken katsus the owner and chef, Sam Yoo, grew up eating into a classic diner club. He starts with three slices of soft, Japanese-style milk bread and composes a two-layer sandwich, creating a Kewpie-mayo-sweetened BLT on one side and the katsu elements on the other: panko-crusted chicken thighs, cabbage slaw and Bull-Dog tonkatsu sauce. Consider just the cabbage. It’s sliced; salted, 2 percent by weight, to remove excess moisture; then rehydrated and seasoned with housemade Thousand Island dressing that uses bread and butter pickles from the Pickle Guys. “For every sandwich we do, our R&D process is similar to when we were in fine dining,” Mr. Yoo said. Because each detail has been perfected, each bite is perfect. ALEXA WEIBEL

123 Madison Street (Market Street), $19, goldendinerny.com

The devotion to this sandwich is so great that even joking about taking it off the menu — as the chef Jeremy Salamon did this past April Fools’ Day — can send diners into a tailspin. In its original iteration, the tuna melt was an open-faced tuna salad sandwich topped with matchstick fries. “I don’t know why we’re serving an open tuna sandwich when it really should be a tuna melt,” Mr. Salamon said to his sous-chef, before creating Agi’s now-beloved version. Oily, slow-cooked tuna, alpine Cheddar, pickled peppers, celery, dill and Kewpie mayo come on toasted, pillowy Pullman bread, with a small cup of cutting French mustard for every last bite. It’s an ever-so-slightly-elevated take that proves that, maybe, it is worth trying to build a better mousetrap. NIKITA RICHARDSON

818 Franklin Avenue (Union Street), $17, agiscounter.com

There’s a reason the tuna melt at S & P Lunch has a devoted audience, and that reason is the tuna salad. Take away the American cheese and what you’re left with is a model of the smooth, soft, mild, reassuring, ungentrified type of tuna salad that prevailed before the rise of aspirational mix-ins like pimentón and grapes. Like an expensive mattress, it is neither too soft nor too firm, and an encounter with it can fix aches and cricks you didn’t know you had. PETE WELLS

174 Fifth Avenue (West 22nd Street), $13, sandwich.place

It’s the small details that separate good sandwiches from sandwiches you’d cross four lanes of traffic for. The patty melt that Jody Williams and Rita Sodi came up with for the Commerce Inn is a prime example. Unlike so many patty melts one meets, it hasn’t got any dry corners or meatless edges or dull patches. Note the texture of the beef — hand-chopped, like tartare, so it’s tender and unstringy. See how the patty stretches all the way to the edge of the rye bread and a little beyond. Taste the salt and pepper in the meat (“Season it like you would a steak,” Ms. Williams said) and the rosemary in the caramelized onions. Somebody has thought about these and countless other small details — small, but not minor. PETE WELLS

50 Commerce Street (Barrow Street), $18, thecommerceinn.com

In a city where shawarma often serves as a late-night snack to curb tomorrow’s hangover, Spice Brothers takes the popular Middle Eastern street food very seriously. Every element of the sandwich — the spit it’s roasted on, the single origin of the spices that perfume the meat, the spelling of tahina — has been fussed over. But it’s not so precious that it doesn’t fit in perfectly on the eternally scruffy strip that is St. Marks. NIKITA RICHARDSON

110 St. Marks Place (Avenue A), $17, spicebrothersny.com

Thanh Da on Seventh Avenue in Sunset Park has a long list of pho, bún and cháo, but the reliable all-star is No. 4 on the sandwich list: the bánh mì xiú mai, or Vietnamese-style meatball sandwich. The nine-inch crusty loaf comes stuffed with juicy meatballs, pink in the middle, with pickled carrots and radishes and bracing cilantro. Wash it down with a pleasingly bitter cà phê sũa dá, Vietnamese coffee rich with condensed milk. SARA BONISTEEL

6008 Seventh Avenue (60th Street), $9, no website

Admittedly, a ham sandwich is not an obvious thing to order at a place called Hamburger America. This burger counter, though, is animated by a deep regard for simple roadside foods, and makes its sandwiches with the same respect for local traditions as in its Oklahoma-style onion burgers. In the case of the hot ham, the tradition is Wisconsinian and began in Milwaukee, where bakeries would give away rolls with the purchase of a pound of ham on Sundays to lure in people on their way home from church. Hamburger America slices the meat thin and warms it on a flattop under a sheet of Swiss cheese. This goes on a hamburger bun rather than a roll baked that morning, which is too bad, but the bun is buttered and crisped to order in the vertical toaster that stands behind the counter. PETE WELLS

51 Macdougal Street (West Houston Street), $7, hamburgeramerica.com

Most people probably go to Xi’an Famous Foods for spicy hand-pulled noodles, but it’s a mistake to skip out on the cumin lamb burger — though it is entirely unlike the hamburger you’re thinking of. It starts with slightly risen bread that is cooked on a griddle and flipped like a pancake, resulting in a crispy brown exterior and a fluffy center that hugs the chunks of spicy cumin lamb. The cumin lamb, a signature item at the restaurant and a staple in Xinjiang, in northwest China, is a family recipe and one of the few dishes that Jason Wang, the owner, enjoyed as a child. CHRISTINA MORALES

Multiple locations, $6, xianfoods.com

In 2009, Danny Lyu took a vacation to Mexico, where in the city of Puebla he tried a cemita for the first time. That seeded-bun sandwich remained on his mind until 2011, when he created his own version and sold it at the Smorgasburg food market; in 2015, he opened Cemitas El Tigre in Sunnyside, home to a large Latino population, where he’s been welcomed with open arms. The thick sandwich is stuffed with a barbacoa made with short rib, similar to a version he ate in Mexico City. And it is served with most of its traditional elements, including bread — made at a nearby Mexican bakery — that is crustier than a hamburger bun. A layer of pinto bean purée is smeared on, along with a paste made with chipotle peppers and mayo. The barbacoa is topped with avocado, lettuce, tomato, pickled onions, the Mexican herb papalo and a cold mound of shredded Oaxacan cheese. CHRISTINA MORALES

45-14 48th Avenue (46th Street), $14, cemitaseltigre.com

The options for a proper Cuban sandwich in New York City are scant. Tico’s Cuban American Cafeteria, in Bushwick, is one of the few restaurants making the sandwich just as delicious as any you’d find in Miami. (Take it from me, a native Miamian.) Albert Teran, whose nickname is Tico, marinates pork cushion meat for a day in a mojo sauce made with fresh orange and lime juice, garlic and oregano. That pork is roasted and packed between Cuban bread from La Gran Via Bakery in Sunset Park, along with smoked ham, garlic and dill pickles, Swiss cheese and yellow mustard. Brushed with butter, the sandwich is pressed until the crust is crisp and the cheese is gooey. “I wanted to make the most authentic Cuban sandwich in New York City,” Mr. Teran said. CHRISTINA MORALES

151 Wilson Avenue (Suydam Street), $15, ticocubancafe.com

It’s been only a few months since this Italian cafe and provisions shop opened in SoHo, and already it’s serving one of the city’s best new Italian sandwiches. Made with mortadella, rosemary ham and hot soppressata — all imported from Italy — it also includes sweet roasted red peppers, made in-house, a drizzle of balsamic vinegar for tartness and a Calabrian chile mayo that adds a subtle heat. The only thing that varies daily is the cheese, which could be either provolone, fontina or burrata. “It’s our discretion to see what we’re feeling,” said Salvatore Carlino, the owner and founder, who also operates Lucia Pizza next door. But the real star is the fresh, pillowy focaccia, made crunchy with flakes of salt. CHRISTINA MORALES

301 West Broadway (Canal Street), $12, instagram.com/lucia.alimentari

We all had our pandemic-era hyperfixations: sourdough baking, roller-skating, “The Queen’s Gambit.” For Ruben Santana, it was an obsession with barbecue that also reflected his Dominican roots. What does Dominican American barbecue look like? A take on tres golpes, maduros as a side dish and this sandwich, which is a nod to both Santo Domingo and Central Texas. (Mr. Santana was inspired to start barbecuing after watching a video about the chef Aaron Franklin.) The success lies in the combination of crispy pork, fatty brisket, pickled onions and a slather of a sauce made with Constanzera Melaza, a popular brand of Dominican molasses, for a touch of sweetness — something completely different and completely familiar. NIKITA RICHARDSON

55 Water Street (Dock Street), Fifth Floor, $18, instagram.com/bark_barbecue

To be fair, a rubber ball wrapped in a flaky scallion pancake would taste great. But at this tiny Brooklyn storefront serving both Korean and Syrian food (sometimes together), the Bulgogi Fatboy feels particularly special. The sandwich is a hulking specimen bursting at the seams with savory, soy-and-ginger laced beef, lettuce, rice and a gochujang-based sauce. It’s hangover food that still manages to taste fresh and bright. The flavors of bibimbap meet the anatomy of a shawarma. Most notably: It is easily two (if not three) meals in one sandwich, so make sure you leave with extra sauce. PRIYA KRISHNA

126 Windsor Place (Prospect Park West), $20, sykorestaurant.com

Both portions of the Rowdy stand out in a city that over the past few years has become thick with chicken sandwiches. One of this Manhattan chain’s tricks is to treat chicken like a pakora by coating it in a spiced batter dominated by chickpea flour. This produces a rugged and remarkably sturdy shell that maintains its crunch even as it laps up Rowdy Rooster’s fire-breathing chile butter. Pickled onions and mint chutney are brought to bear, too. Yogurt blended with scallions does the job often performed by mayonnaise, and does it in a more interesting way. PETE WELLS

Multiple locations, $9 and $12, rowdyrooster.com

The husband-and-wife duo Mika Ohie and Yoshihito Kida have been serving soba at Cocoron since 2011. They’ve since moved the soba restaurant down the street and opened Cocoron Market in the original space on the Lower East Side, where they’re now serving bento boxes, ramen and stellar Japanese sandwiches. There aren’t a thousand layers of fried pork in their “mille-feuille” pork katsu sando, only six, but you wouldn’t want any more. Rich with Japanese mayo and katsu sauce that seeps into fluffy white bread, it’s a delight to dig into on a bar stool, or hunched over standing outside on the Delancey Street sidewalk. BECKY HUGHES

61 Delancey Street (Allen Street), $11, cocoronandgoemon.com

This ingenious cross between the sticky-sweet dim sum staple char siu and a certain famous fast-food sandwich received so much glowing attention when it landed at this Cantonese American restaurant in Williamsburg that McDonald’s sent a cease-and-desist letter to the chef Calvin Eng in November. Now, the dish formerly known as the Char Siu McRib is the char siu BK Rib, but it remains the top seller, and for good reason. It takes three days to marinate and steam the ribs, which are deboned and paired with a sesame milk bun, a smear of Chinese hot mustard, sliced onion and bread-and-butter pickles. The pork melts into the bun, and the pickles and spicy mustard bring tangy, sharp relief. PRIYA KRISHNA

398 Manhattan Avenue (Frost Street), $28, bonniesbrooklyn.com