I have eaten many things over the course of my disappointing time on this planet. Barbecued chicken lungs. Balut (fertilized duck egg). A plate of “trash can nachos” at one of Guy Fieri’s restaurants in New York. None of these were particularly bad, by the way, and all would make sense with context (for example, the egg was at a wedding in Cambodia and remains a delicacy there; I wouldn’t have it again). They just sound unappetising, at least to people in Britain where the most popular foods are, for the most part, safe and unadventurous.
Consider the full English. And jacket potatoes. Two of Britain’s culinary traditions and for good reason: they’re the best of simple cooking. But the two together? That is to say, a cooked breakfast in a jacket potato? Not part of Britain’s culinary canon.
Subway, the American sandwich slinger of middling repute, has decided to combine a fry up and a jacket potato. The chain started selling the latter earlier this year, presumably in a desperate bid to claw back a little relevance and/or gain traction. Subway has been a high street fixture since 1996 — the first shop was in Brighton, curiously — and now there are 2,300 outposts across the country. But it’s hardly part of the conversation. I fail to recognise the chain’s appeal: I find the meats are cheap and unseemly, the salad flavourless, and the bread is sugary and stale. A meatball sub with cheese or an Italian BMT just about work after a big night out, but only at a push, I’d say. Times have changed. Or I thought they had.
Subway launched its new “breakwich” jacket potato on Friday. It was an abomination. Genuinely shocking, actually. My jacket potatoes was held cold in a steel tray, and was taken, opened up and filled with mixed cheese upon order. Bacon is anaemic looking and flabby, the egg one of those poached sorts you see across food chains these days, and the sausage was a grey puck of salt and mistrust. All of these elements were combined and laid out in and around the potato together with four soggy hash browns to be run through whatever heating device the place uses for its sandwiches.
I’m not convinced I’ve ever eaten a worse plate of food. Not that I ate much of it. Two mouthfuls and the whole thing was in the bin. And I was really hungry after a 30-minute row in front of half an episode of Slow Horses.
There should be no place for food such as this any more. It’s insulting to consumers, to the animals who died to feed us, and to two great traditions of British dining. To end on a lighter, happier note, I must shout out the off-licence opposite which I go to normally, The Shoreditch Stop. At the back, there are various homemade curries for little over a fiver a go — with rice. The samosas are £1.50. If you find yourself hungry in Shoreditch and don’t want to spend a lot, that’s your answer.
