Recipe: How To Make a New York-Style Hoagie

In New York, a sandwich isn’t just a sandwich. Whether it’s called a sub, hero, grinder or hoagie, the long roll wrapped around freshly sliced cold cuts is king. Even at Saul’s – Melbourne’s purveyors of NY-style sandwiches in the southeast – the hoagie comes out on top.

“The hoagie roll is quintessentially New York,” says Brittany Gebert, operations manager for the Carnegie deli. “It’s that kind of generous style meets organised chaos – a meal in between two pieces of bread.”

While it means plenty of everything – meat, cheese and condiments – the idea behind Saul’s hoagie is to balance heft with freshness, leaving you with something substantial but still summer-friendly. “That’s the one sandwich we say, ‘Grab a hoagie, go sit in the sun and eat it’,” says Gebert. “It’s the summer sandwich, in my opinion.”

Simplicity means the quality of the component parts is crucial, so don’t skimp on good bread. “You should be looking for a sub-like roll,” says Gebert. “Whether it’s a baguette or a white sesame-crusted roll, it needs to be crusty on the outside and soft on the inside. You’re going to be putting a lot of stuff in there so it’s really worth looking for a good sub.”

You can buy red pesto at the supermarket, but at Saul’s they make it from scratch. You’ll need roasted red peppers (the kind in a jar is totally fine), semi-dried tomatoes, almonds, cashews, basil, olive oil, garlic and pecorino. Then it’s just a matter of blending the ingredients together until they form a paste. “If you want to do it the old-school way, mortar and pestle,” suggests Gebert. “For our chef, that’s his favourite way to do it, at home at least. If you’ve got a food processor, blender, Thermomix, whatever you have at home, just blend it up.”

Slice your bread roll horizontally, then slather the pesto on the bottom half. On the top half, drizzle a little balsamic vinegar and add some aioli. (At Saul’s they make aioli in-house, but whatever works.) Then it’s time for the cold cuts.

“We use three different types of pork meats: mortadella, salami and ham,” says Gebert. If you’re getting your meats from the deli, ask for thin slices. “The thinner the mortadella the better, because it is quite salty,” says Gebert. “You want all the cuts to be relatively the same slicing so all of the flavours are balanced.”

Lay the meats across the bread in layers, with the mortadella taking the most real estate. The salami (Saul’s uses hot sopressa) is potent and you only need a few slices Add the ham last – more than the sopressa, but less than the mortadella.

After your deli meats, layer on the cheese. At Saul’s, it’s the deli and bodega staple provolone, which is a mild style of cheese. Sub it out if you can’t find it, just don’t opt for anything too sharp. Lay your cheese on top of the cold cuts for that picture-perfect sandwich. “You want the cheese to be in the middle because it’s the best for the cross-section,” says Gebert.

Finish with thinly sliced red onion, kosher pickles (sliced lengthways for extra crunch) and butter lettuce. “I always put the lettuce on the aioli side of the bread to let it stick to it,” says Gebert.

She also suggests wrapping your creation in butcher's paper. “It’s definitely on-brand for New York, but there’s a purpose – it holds in the sandwich. It’s huge and hard to hold with two hands, and that’s the whole point. You need something to hold it together.”

Here’s how to make Saul’s New York-inspired hoagie at home.

Serves 1–2
Preparation time: up to 30 minutes if you make your own pesto
Assembly: 5 minutes

Pesto
100g marinated sun-dried tomatoes
1 roast pepper from a jar, or 1 red capsicum, seeded, roasted and peeled
100ml olive oil
50g pecorino cheese
50g cashews and almond mix
30g fresh basil
1 clove of garlic
Salt and pepper to season

Sandwich:
1 long white sesame seed bread roll
1 tbsp red pesto (as above, or store-bought)
1 tsp aged balsamic vinegar
1 tbsp aioli (house-made or store-bought)
100g mortadella
100g hot salami sopressa
100g ham capicola
3 slices provolone or other mild cheese
½ red onion, thinly sliced
50g kosher pickle, thinly sliced
3 leaves of butter lettuce

For pesto, mix all ingredients in a food processor until incorporated into a paste.

To assemble the sandwich, cut white sesame bread roll lengthwise and open side by side. On the bottom side of the roll, spread red pesto. On the top side, drizzle with balsamic vinegar, then spread aioli.

Construct sandwich with layers of deli meats. Follow with cheese slices, then onions, pickles and butter lettuce.

To serve, close top to bottom, cut directly in the middle and plate. You can make it look more authentic by wrapping it in butcher’s paper and slicing it through the middle to give it that deli feel.