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Bull City Vegan Challenge: A Tale of Two Sandwiches–Toast and Parker and Otis

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My favorite book from 9th grade English was A Tale of Two Cities. My friends thought that the book was boring and that I was crazy. Beowulfat least had action and A Midsummer Night’s Dream at least had Shakespeare’s name behind it. But A Tale had a simple complexity about it. The characters were palpable. The cities–London and Paris–were foreign, but the people’s plights were familiar. The story was relatable and yet unlike anything I had ever read.

This week, as I ate my fourth and fifth meals of the Bull City Vegan Challenge, I embarked on my own tale of sorts–A Tale of Two Sandwiches. As unique as Paris and London, the sandwiches at Toast and Parker & Otis brought really distinct flavors to the Challenge.

The aroma of the Toast panino was sweet and charred; the greens were peppery. The overall flavor of the sandwich was so tasty that although I had every intention of eating only half, I ate the entire thing. In hindsight, I should have known that the sandwich would be amazing, as I have never eaten anything at Toast that I haven’t completely fallen in love with.

The sandwich at Parker and Otis had sharp, acidic, and earthy flavors. The raw spinach, carrots, and onions created a lot of texture. I thought that the artichoke spread could have used a bit of salt and pepper. The corn and tomato salad that accompanied the sandwich was delicious.


I didn’t think I would like the Toast sandwich (something about squash on bread seemed a bit odd to me), but I adored it. And I thought I was going to love the artichoke sandwich from Parker & Otis, but I thought it could have benefited from a bit of tweaking.

The lesson from this Tale of Two Sandwiches? You can’t judge a book by its cover.

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Tiffany M. Griffin is the woman behind Como Water, Washington DC’s premiere veg-centric cuisine consulting company. Through cooking classes, demonstrations, catering, and consultations, Como Water gives people the opportunity to learn how to prepare veg-centric cuisine that boasts maximum flavor, with minimal effort. Tiffany is quickly becoming a go-to expert on the future of veg-centric cuisine, and is a regular contributor to Como Water, the blog, as well as to vegetarian and vegan sites across the Internet. For over a decade, this self-taught, entrepreneurial expert has developed a set of tried and true techniques for making simple, delicious, and sometimes decadent veg-centric dishes. Featured on the Steve Harvey Show and other leading media outlets, Tiffany was born and raised in Springfield, MA. She then earned Bachelors degrees in Psychology and Communications from Boston College and a PhD in Social Psychology from the University of Michigan. She now resides in Washington DC, where she has worked in the US Senate and at a federal agency on issues around health, food, nutrition, and international food aid/development, and of course, as the owner of Como Water. Tiffany gets culinary inspiration from the food she grew up eating, and from her travels throughout Latin America, the Caribbean, Western Europe, and Sub-Saharan Africa. She is dedicated to sharing her wealth of knowledge on veg-centric cuisine with others and to help others live by her mantra—love life, live long, and eat veg-centric cuisine!

Comments

  1. Anonymous

    I too truly enjoyed the Toast sandwich. It came out steaming hot but felt it was flavorful and quite unique. In general Toast always does right by me.

    October 18, 2010
  2. Tiffany and Keyla

    I couldn't agree more!

    October 19, 2010