Grandaisy’s bread, which contributes to both the wonderful flatbread pizzas and the rotating selection of sandwiches, is the brainchild of Jim Lahey, who recently attracted attention with the opening of  Co. pizzeria. This bread is serious stuff – it takes something as simple as the pomodoro pizza (just bread and tomato sauce) and makes it into a complex eating experience: chewy, flavorful and satisfying.

But this is a sandwich blog, so I’ll move on to the sandwiches. Grandaisy offers a daily selection of 2 or 3 different sandwiches, both vegetarian and meaty. On recent visits the most interesting options have been the veggie ones, so I present you with the most breakfast-y sandwich I’ve eaten for lunch in a while (since I scarfed down a Defonte’s egg and potato sandwich after their Manhattan location opened).

The spaghetti squash, butter, and apricot jam sandwich ($5), studded with golden raisins and walnuts, would have been way too sweet without the bread. I think throwing in some salty prosciutto or peppery arugula would have evened things out a lot, but even with the sweetness, I couldn’t find fault with this sandwich. The squash provided mostly a background texture, with the flavor coming from the jam and the ungodly amount of (excellent) butter slathered everywhere. Encountering the occasional raisin or walnut was a nice surprise, though there could have been a few more nuts, in my opinion. And the bread – the crust was so crisp my entire office turned towards me when I first bit into it, yet the interior was perfectly moist and chewy, with a lovely, open crumb. The bread perfectly balanced out the softness of the fillings. While the sandwich felt more like eating jam and bread for breakfast, and probably won’t fill you up if you’re starving at lunchtime, it’s a tasty snack from a fantastic bakery – and if you’re still hungry, there are pizza slices and baked goods to tide you over.

The sandwiches are straightforward, but made with fantastic ingredients:

Full frontal:

Check out the crazy amount of butter:

The packaging looks nice (even if the name is silly):

I worry that as you ate the sandwich, the crust would push the fillings out torwards the long edge. Or maybe it works if you eat from the long edge in at the risk of pushing the fillings out the edges. After all, isn’t this why the crust is on the outside? This sounds like a challenge for the SANDWICHLab! Also see SANDWICHLab Submissions and Lab Results.

(Image care of Gutenberg @ Daily Feed)