If you’re a New Yorker, you know that reports of Fairway’s demise have been greatly exaggerated. The legendary gourmet grocer may or may not be in bankruptcy, but this news has yet to reach two important places: my wallet and the olive bar. Fairway has lots of great stuff that goes beyond the typical supermarket — a vast array of olive oils, pristinely lacquered danishes, seasonal flats of winter citrus and perfectly chopped chicken liver — but, for my money, the olive bar is the main attraction. It puts most other antipasto offerings in the city to shame, with huge vats of olives and various pickled things. (Their half-sours are exemplary deli fare.)
Every trip to Fairway — which, as an Upper West Sider, occurs nearly every weekend for me — includes a container from the olive bar. Normally I’m buying olives for salads and recipes, and frequently I’ll grab a selection of giardineria for a snack plate. But the real appeal of the olive bar, I’ve discovered recently, is jamming a bevy of its contents into a sandwich.
Whether or not you’re in proximity to Fairway, I highly recommend taking an assortment of classic antipasto accoutrements — in this case, I’ve used artichoke hearts, marinated mushrooms, a few different types of olives, and pickled cauliflower — and griddling them between slices of bread and fresh mozzarella for a wholly satisfying melt. The salt and brine of the antipasti work fantastically well with melted cheese, particularly after sizzling them a bit in some olive oil and tossing with chopped basil and parsley.
You can do this with any collection of pickled and marinated appetizers, as long as you cook a sufficient amount of moisture out of them before adding to the sandwich. And any bread works as well, but I’m partial to regular old grilled-cheese-grade white bread, rendered a deep golden brown from an exterior swipe of aioli.
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