Restaurant Review: Hoagies serves up a long sandwich gone wrong

This Karachi-based eatery suffers from the soggy sandwich curse

KARACHI: In this challenge of human versus hoagie, the heavyweight sandwich will get the better of you. No matter how fearless you are, at Hoagies the sandwiches are either too salty or soggy to swallow with determination alone.

Situated at Saba Avenue, in DHA, Karachi, with an outlet at Dolmen Mall Clifton, Hoagies is not for people on a 1,200 calorie per day meal plan. The eatery prides itself as a fast-food sandwich joint that dangles the promise of a glorious, greasy sandwich, elevated with chunks of crispy chicken and juicy steak strips – but delivers a sloppy, squidgy mess concealed in two loaves of bread.

However, if you want a quick meal with a lot of carbs, proceed to Hoagies. The restaurant is wheelchair friendly and has generic bright cafeteria decor. All sandwiches are labelled with a sticker which makes identifying your order when dining with a large group easier. When you open the tightly wrapped sandwich however, most of the excitement is dampened by a soggy bread roll.



Their Hogan Hoagie (Rs550) came fresh from a salt mine. In between two slices of jalapeno cheddar bread were strips of deep fried chicken with breading falling off it, a frail lettuce leaf, fresh tomato rings, jalapenos and olives, all smeared with too much ranch dressing and then glued together with lashings of mayo. Even the Honkie Style Fries (Rs350), garnished with sautéed onions, stuck out of a puddle of thick ranch dressing and mozzarella, along with dry steak strips.



The basic elements in all hoagies are similar, but several details place the steak-filled hoagies above the others. Had the bread been ‘deliciously toasted’ (as it reads on the menu), their Hooligan Hoagie (Rs480) could have easily qualified as a foot long meet-and-cheese stuffed flavour bomb. When it comes to pizzas, their medium-sized thin-crust Pepperoni Pizza (Rs550) is a better choice. Although the topping is sparsely scattered – some slices not having any pepperoni – the base is light and crisp.

When it comes to sandwiches today, eateries aim at filling regional colours in variations of beige. Although Hoagies has all the right ingredients to step up the sandwich game, it is far from a hoagie haven. It lacks in execution and most sandwiches taste the same. Keeping Subway standards in mind, you’ll end up tossing the crumpled wrapper aside and ending this sandwich adventure with a heavy heart and a mouth full of disappointment.

Verdict: There are no hero sandwiches at Hoagies, what you will find however is a larger-than-life stuffed bread roll that you can re-purpose for a day’s worth of meals. Their pizzas fare slightly better, but then who would want to go to a sandwich shack for that.



Published in The Express Tribune, May 27^th, 2016.

Like Life & Style on Facebook, follow @ETLifeandStyle on Twitter for the latest in fashion, gossip and entertainment.