I got the same thing I got last time, the BBQ pork banh mi. I paid the same thing I paid last time, $8.81 and a two dollar tip. And I got my banh mi faster than any place in town. We’re talking about maybe, maybe, three minutes. Sure, Jasmine’s faster but that’s because they make a dozen and leave them on the counter.
I watched the guy behind the counter make the sandwich and it seems the philosophy at Vellee isn’t to just drop the fixin’s in the bread but to stuff, roll, massage, and outright cajole the fixin’s into the bread. If the guy tried any harder to fill my sandwich, he’d have pounded my bread flat and manhandled it like the ruby-lipped gal at the Chipotle in the USBank building who has a very enchanting smile that takes your mind off the fact that she very plainly either doesn’t know how to roll a burrito or needs a much larger tortilla. This guy filled my sandwich with such dead-eyed fervor, such lackadaisical passion, you’d swear that he had just come from a funeral and the only thing keeping him going was staring off into space as he made sandwiches to take his mind off the pain while understanding that the rote process of making each sandwich the same way every time did nothing to distract him, so maybe Vellee does skimp and he was attempting to bring sunshine into his own life by changing the game and hooking that gringo in the green helmet up.
So, I got back to the mail room and pull out my sandwich and the thing is fucking huge, like last time.
Anything changed about?
Well, first of all, the bread. This fucking bread, holy shit. This fucking bread, it’s like it deliberately wants to fuck up the roof of your mouth. It wants to fuck up the roof of your mouth so bad, it makes a bowl of Cap’n Crunch seem light and pillowy.
Once you get past the bread, however, the fuck ton of BBQ pork in the sandwich is on point. And last time, how I bitched about the shredded carrots and (lack of) daikons? Well, somebody got their act together because the daikons were visible and the pickled veggies tasted like they were supposed to. It really was a huge improvement over what I remember. Not that there was anything wrong with them in the first place except they tasted different than what I’m accustomed to last time. Which… I guess… Means, uh… Wrong? This time? Flavor game was on point. A little on the sweeter side, not so much savory, but well within the lines of the banh mi coloring book. Add in that they don’t try to fuck your whole universe up by overloading with jalapeño, and you’ve got a pleasant sweet-hot combo happening.
For real, the only thing that keeps this from being an A+ lunch is that the bread was trying to fuck up my mouth like the Zuni fetish doll from Trilogy of Terror trying to fuck up Karen Black and if you don’t get that reference, we have to seriously reconsider our friendship because, evidently, nobody took the time to teach you right.
I’ll still recommend Vellee and at some point I’ll try a different menu item but, hey, big ups for them fixing their pickled veggie game. And their portion size? I’m about to take a shit and a nap. I mean, not at the same time. Obviously. I mean, I hope that would be obvious. OK, fine. I’m about to take a shit then a nap.
* My Five Guys jam is mayo, pickles, tomatoes, grilled onions, green peppers, A1. Because you really were curious.
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