I have high hopes for today's sandwich, The Club (on toasted oatmeal bread) bought to us by our friends at Marks & Spencer - creators of the alluring TV adverts which temptingly tease "this isn't just food... this is Marks & Spencer's food", along with other retail-based pursuits like that skirt worn recently by the likes of Alexa Chung which subsequently had bloggers in a frenzy. I travelled today to the Marks & Spencer store along Piccadilly for my sandwich, which in itself was worthy of note for the unholy amount of pedestrian traffic. The ordeal didn't stop there; the store in question has its weary patrons travel down a narrow and curved flight of stairs, dodging American tourists and haughty business men, just to reach the sandwich and 'food on the go' section. Surely food on the go should deserve a more easily accessed location for it's consumers? The sandwich counters are then split in two, sandwiches divided by no logical algorithm that I was able to identify.
The Club itself stood proudly on a top shelf looking down on me, giving allusions of superiority early doors which I could not resist. After a similarly tiring queueing experience, for £3.25 I was the owner of The Club, and it's proud proclamation of 'toasted oatmeal bread'. Back in the office, I was immediately pleased by the weight and volume of sandwich as I pulled it from my hand - it is my strong opinion that more sandwiches should follow the club blueprint of bread:filling:bread:filling:bread for each half, as opposed to the more common bread:filling:bread. Here is a sandwich for a working woman, a sandwich that is willing to pour forth the carbs I so crave halfway through a day working to hasten our country's economic recovery!
The first bite was also most pleasing, with moisture immediately apparent as one of this sandwiches main strengths. Chicken, cucumber, tomato, cheese and a welcome quantity of mayonnaise filled my mouth, with a daring peppery kick, the origin of which I could not quite place. Bites two and three, and, MY WORD, this is not your standard supermarket sandwich. So much chicken! So much bacon! The cheese, layered with mayo, layered with salad, this sandwich! This Club sandwich is here to hug my mouth, here to cheer my day, here to nourish and sustain me for an afternoon of interval data analysis and conference calls. The Club sandwich is my ally in this crowded, crazy City. As a note - the bacon in this sandwich was somewhat scant; I felt for part of the Sandwich Experience it would be fitting to display posters asking for information of its whereabouts.
I was impressed by the structural integrity of the Club - refusing to scatter ingredients as I enthusiastically tucked in. Whilst I do not want to advertise details of my table manners on a public domain, my mother has once told me that if I go on a first date to a restaurant with a new beau, there is unlikely to be a second date. So that gives some indication of how I like to enjoy my food. The Club held fast, adamant it would stay looking picture-perfect up until the last hurdle of crust. I felt I typed too soon around the bacon at one point, for a clump of it appeared in the midst of the second half, filling the throat with that familiar salty-pig scent. Unfortunately the bacon was a little gristle-heavy, and so loses marks (for an excellent example of perfect bacon-creation, see my review of the Tesco BLT). There was also an interesting flavour for one bite of the second half that can only be described as 'unpleasently earthy' which may have related to one or more of the salad ingredients, I didn't panic as this soon passed.
I have noticed whilst writing these blogs that the second-half review of my sandwiches inevitably seem to shine a less flattering light on my sandwich friends. Perhaps this is down to my enthusiasm for the first half inflating my opinion of the sandwich to the point where the second half can only be something of a disappointment. Perhaps the higher the pedestal, the harder the fall. I promise this, sandwich friends, no! more! fallen! idols! From here on out I will be as objective and fastidious on my taste reviews of the second-half of the sandwich as I am the first. Sandwiches, I am a scientist, as well as a lover.
To conclude, the strengths of this sandwich were undoubtedly the hearty content, the slightly scandalous nature of the persistent peppery kick, and the sandwich's heroic refusal to move from its uniform ratio or spill its filling during any point of the feeding frenzy. It was also entirely pleasing to look at, a very neat sandwich, and the toasted oatmeal bread added a pleasent rough texture to the tongue. For these reasons I award the Marks & Spencer Club a Sanwich Experience Score of 73.4375. For a full data breakdown, please see below.
Experience: 13/17
Branding: 2/3
Content: 3/4
Ingredients: 2/3
Appearence: 3.5/5
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