Place: Subway
Item: Southwest Turkey Bacon and Sweet Onion Chicken Teriyaki
Price: $4.49, 6-inch

The Subway menu used to be like a subway map: It never changed. The Cold Cut Combo, the Bronx — they weren't going anywhere. Then came the Subway Select menu of gussied-up subs with boutique breads and exotic sauces. We were skeptical. What's wrong with the Bronx? Why is this subway making stops in Arizona for the Southwest Turkey Bacon on Parmesan Oregano and Japan for the Sweet Onion Chicken Teriyaki on Honey Oat? To find out, we hopped on board.

Tom: Simplicity is a virtue, yet Subway keeps seeing a need to go beyond the basic sub, first with the Jared diet, now with the Select Menu. But the teriyaki chicken is actually a success. The warm chicken strips are moist, tasty and every bit as good as the teri chicken at your upscale chains. Combined with the sweet sauce and sweet honey oat bread, the whole thing is a little over-the-top sweet, though. I would go for a plain white bread next time.

. Call it the Bacon Turkey Bacon, or better yet, the Bacon Bacon Bacon, and I'd be back tomorrow. The biggest problem was my own fault: I still ordered both sandwiches with the full salad bar of toppings, overwhelming the core ingredients that no longer need the extra bulk and flavors.

Tom: But is this still Subway? I suppose if people learned to eat Filet-o-Fish at a burger joint then I can open my mind to these sandwiches. The Chicken Teriyaki is a good outside-the-box sandwich, but I like the box. I'll keep my Subway conversations in your language: Wheat. Club. No mayonnaise.

Chris: The Subway Select menu embodies the giant leap for sandwich-kind. I hate to see you taking the step back, Tom. I think outside the bun, I eat outside the box, and I will order the Chicken Teriyaki (hold the olives, onions and cucumbers) until Subway introduces the next next generation.

Rating: Sweet Onion Chicken Teriyaki, 5 sporks out of 5. Southwest Turkey Bacon, 3 sporks.

E-mail The Lunch Guys:
tomandchris@thelunchguys.com

The Southwest Turkey Bacon isn't different from the region-less turkey bacon. The orange southwest sauce makes the sandwich about as southwest as Maine. It's good, but it's not going to turn me into a Diamondbacks fan. Go Yankees! Note to Subway in the words of New Yorker Billy Joel: “Don't go changing to try and please me. You never let me down before.”

Chris: For a few too many years, the conversation with my Subway sandwich artist was: “White. Cold Cut. 6 inch. Everything.” Now with the Select options, I'm in a whole new restaurant, choosing from 2 million combinations (really, some Subway accountant did the math). The Chicken Teriyaki sub is like nothing Subway has ever had, a light, flavorful sandwich that I would have gladly paid $9.95 for at Friday's.