Italian Hero Sandwich Recipe (2024)

No mustard or mayo on an Italian sub! Olive oil. Tomatoes are essential.

I’m a Philly girl and grew up with many iterations of the classic hoagie. Some constants: the roll is from Amoroso’s bakery—crispy outside, with a crust that shatters with every bite, and pillowy inside. Slice and drizzle with olive oil. Layer sliced cappicola, genoa salami, ham, mortadella, and provolone, and top with thinly sliced onion, lettuce, and tomato. Finish with another drizzle of oil & vinegar, oregano, black pepper. Some folks like mayo (not for purists); some like hot peppers.

When we were kids (there were 4 of us) and our parents were going out for the evening, mom would give us a special treat - covering our table with a basket of deli sub rolls; plates of Italian cold cuts & provolone cheese; sliced tomatoes, onions, & bell peppers; shredded lettuce; pickled peppers; jars of mayo & mustard; and cruets of oil & vinegar - leaving us each to create and eat our own sub. I still cannot eat an Italian sub without remembering those nights and the best subs I ever ate.

Thank you for making it iceberg and for making it thinly sliced. Here in California, so many places use spring mix or full slices of romaine or iceberg. These huge pieces of greenery are merely slip-n-slides for your condiments to fall into your lap. Keep it sliced! Keep it cool! A rotary slicer helps if you're making lots of sandwiches.Also, i've turned to "boating out" my roll, especially the bulky top piece. It holds the contents like a little pocket and improves the meat-to-bread ratio.

This is very close to how my son makes Italian subs, and they're excellent! He uses champagne vinegar, Italian seasonings and adds thinly sliced tomatoes. He makes them on freshly baked french baguettes and a combination of 4 or 5 different meats with cheese. The mixture of finely shredded lettuce, onions, oil and vinegar with the seasonings really improves on the typical Italian sub, definitely my favorite sandwich!

Counter to what is stated at the end of this recipe- You don’t need expensive parchment paper to wrap this or any cold sandwich; wax paper is the old fashioned unsung kitchen wrap which is inexpensive and keeps persistent single use plastic wrap to a minimum. Always keep a roll of wax paper handy for wrapping most sandwiches.

Roasted red pepper (cento brand) makes a good substitution for out of season tomatoes.

You forgot the thinly sliced tomato, for color!

This is one of my favorite sandwiches. I just use oil and vinegar versus mustard and mayo. All else is perfect !

As with really any sandwich, THE most important ingredient is the bread.

Nothing better than a good, overfilled goopy sandwich. The perfect meal which permits one to have all components from a dinner plate in one’s mouth at one time without the necessity of a knife, fork or table manners. Long Live the Sandwich!

I LOVE mayo on my Italian sub!! Come at me!!

The list of ingredients calls for thinly sliced meats. That should be emphasized. The meats in a sandwich are far more tasty if thinly sliced.

All Italians in San Diego know of Mona Lisa deli in Little Italy downtown. They make the best sub sandwiches and would never use mustard or mayo. Mustard is okay in the vinegarette whisked with lemon juice or wine vinegar, mashed anchovies, minced garlic, salt, and pepper then a slow drizzle of EVOO. Then add dry oregano and parsley. Perfetto!

In the late 60’s we got the best Italian subs/hoagies/grinders at Greasy Tony’s in New Brunswick, NJ. The filling was much like this recipe but the extra oil & vinegar really made it. Once I got a full size, about 18”, to have for the weekend. Never found out if it would over-marinate. Ate it all the first night.

Going to college in Pittsburgh (Duquesne University), we ordered Italian hoagies from PV’s Pizza, about three blocks off campus. There were always wrapped in foil and baked. The result: A crispy, crackly hoagie roll filled with hot Italian meats, melted provolone cheese, warming tomatoes, and crunchy lettuce. Having grown up in Michigan, I had never experienced such a treat, and after leaving Pittsburgh in 1980, I have not experienced it since.

I made many of these growing up in Delaware. Layering the meats and cheeses is key. We started with EVOO on the bread, then laid provolone down the middle (important because it keeps wet ingredients from soaking the bread and preserving the integrity of the sandwich.) Then add Genoa salami, and cappicola. On top of that lettuce, tomato and onion and dressing and seasonings. Then pickled peppers if desired. Then another layer of cheese and then ham - or prosciutto if you wanna get fancy.

I went to school in Pittsburgh (Duquesne University), and there, a hoagie was always wrapped in foil and baked, which gave the roll a crispy crust, heated the meat, and melted the cheese. I still remember how tasty they were, and how much they contributed to my “freshman 15.”

A fine recipe for much of the country, but in the I-95 corridor from Philly to Boston, let the pros in the sandwich shops show you how it's done. The photo is strictly inspirational for those of us who are lucky to have access to these wonderful places and are happy to keep them in business rather than do it ourselves.

This is one of the reasons that I'll never leave Astoria. I just go to Rosario's for the cold cuts and cheese, and if I haven't made them myself, the giardinera and pepperoncini. Then next door to Greenhouse market for lettuce, onions and tomatoes. And finally across the street to Rose & Joe's bakery for the rolls.

Sometimes, it's a good idea to take out some of the bread in the rolls, to make more room for the meats and cheeses. A Hoagie is all about the meats and the cheeses - at noted by several people here. The more, the better.

I make mine with a very sharp provolone and hot cherry peppers. Also I remove some of the bread inside the roll. I like the idea of adding the oil and vinegar to the lettuce first then to the sandwich. I used to add all that last after I put the sandwich together.

A crispy Italian roll is essential. Mustard and mayonnaise are not.

Not sure the obsession here lately but adding liquid ingredients between IMPERVIOUS meat or cheese is possibly the single worst thing here, and that includes use of mayo. Obsessing over keeping bread from getting soggy defeats the purpose of crusty roll and soft interior. Put it quickly, oil, vinegar, etc go against the bread and NOT on the guts of the sandwich

Just tried this. Used kosher turkey and salami, no cheese. Added chopped olives and the chopped red onion to the lettuce,,,but Gluten free rolls are less wide and when I folded it, the lettuce fell out! Very enjoyable, even if I had to keep replacing the lettuce.

"Sandwiches will keep for up to 4 hours refrigerated."Yeah, right. I make hoagies for a week's worth of lunches, and the Friday ones taste as good as the Monday ones. Though nothing I make can ever equal the ones I got as a Penn State student in the 60s from Les's Sub Shop, now just a memory in State College.

Roasted red pepper, tomato & mozzarella cheese? No mayo.

For a real Italian sub, no mayo or mustard, use white onions, no pickled veggies and add thinly sliced tomato.

One of the few things I miss about living in San Francisco is a sandwich on Dutch Crunch bread. Dutch Crunch is a soft roll with a mixture of rice flour and sugar brushed over the top before baking that results in a crackled, crinkly topping that shreds the roof of your mouth. Available at every deli in the Bay Area, a rare find anywhere else.

I won't buy Diamond Crystal Kosher salt anymore since they have gone "upscale" and quadrupled the price.Do I need to adjust the amount if I use Morton's Kosher?