The Bad Lieutenant, from Now Make Me a Sandwich.
  • Molly Bauer
  • The Bad Lieutenant, from Now Make Me a Sandwich.

A few weeks ago, a single Australian teenager kicked off a worldwide social-media protest that was, like most social-media protests, a quaint mixture of meaningful activism and outright silliness. It started with a Facebook post showing a "footlong" Subway sandwich next to a tape measure that clearly showed the sandwich measured 11 inches. The photograph was promptly shared thousands of times all around the world, and other people documented their local Subways' shortcomings with their own photos. Three lawsuits were filed against Subway in the United States. Subway Australia responded with a soon-to-be-deleted Facebook post claiming that the footlong name was "not intended to be a measurement of length."

Subway eventually came around, apologizing and promising that all their footlong sandwiches would measure a foot from now on. But what, exactly, did those online protesters win? It's like that awful joke about winning a gold medal at the Special Olympics: The only thing better than winning an extra inch of a Subway sandwich is not eating a Subway sandwich in the first place. There's no reason, when you live in a city, to eat a damned Subway sandwich. No excuses. There's always a better sandwich within five minutes' walk.

Sometimes, there's even a great sandwich. There are at least 10 Subways within a mile of Zaccagni's (97B Pike St, 765-6605), a new lunch counter in Pike Place Market just across from Seattle's Best Newsstand. (Zaccagni's replaced the beautiful Wonder Freeze storefront, and, sadly, the shiny new counter is strikingly dull in comparison to Wonder Freeze's gaudy glory.) They have fewer than half a dozen sandwiches on offer, but any one of those sandwiches would cause a Subway sandwich to shrivel a couple of inches out of sheer shame....

Keep reading to discover four great, unmeasurably delicious sandwiches >>