Winnipeg… where you can bite into one of the world’s ‘nine greatest sandwiches’

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This article was published 13/11/2023 (711 days ago), so information in it may no longer be current.

If you knew, you knew.

But now, thanks to a recent article in the U.K.’s Guardian newspaper, everyone can savour one of the world’s “nine greatest sandwiches” prepared and sold by a Vietnamese deli in a nondescript single-story building on Notre Dame Avenue near Health Sciences Centre.

“My employees were so excited, ‘Oh, we’re so famous now.’ We really felt good,” Khanh Hoa owner Kim Le proudly told the Free Press Monday.

The editors of the independent British daily, which produces a print edition along with several online editions for global consumption, put out a call on Nov. 1 for readers to “Tell us: what is the greatest sandwich?”

And last Friday, those same editors published details of the planet’s nine best “rolls, hoagies and sarnies worth crossing oceans for.”

And there, rubbing shoulders among the divine nine with the roast beef (not pastrami?!) sandwich at Katz’s legendary deli in New York City, was Khanh Hoa’s cold cut banh mi art work, which had been nominated not by a native Winnipegger, but a 34-year-old Torontonian who has fallen hard for Kim Le’s heavenly hoagie and is still very much in love.

“Unrivalled by the dozens of Vietnamese restaurants and delis across Canada I’ve visited since, but its enduring quality brings me back whenever I’m in the city,” poetically waxed Jonathan Kauenhowen.

“From the perfectly chewy baguette (make sure to ask for it not to be toasted) to the rich paté adorning its inner walls, this sandwich and its nestled ingredients of pickled carrots and daikon, cilantro (coriander), Thai chillis and an assortment of intriguingly patterned cold cuts will compel you to always buy two — one for immediate consumption and the second to enjoy later.”

Le agreed her shop’s banh mi is great, but said with a laugh that she wanted to stay humble.

“It’s the freshness,” she said in the tiny counter-service restaurant at 834 Notre Dame, which has seating for five and does booming takeout business.

The “perfectly chewy” baguette is made daily by Harvest Bakery on Grant Avenue. The meats and pickles are fresh and made in house — the meat doesn’t sit in the refrigerator longer than a day, Le said.

“That’s what we’re doing that’s different than the others…. We’re so proud of what we’re doing,” she said.

Le bought the business with her sister from the original owners about four years ago, but kept the same menu — just 10 items, eight of which are different varieties of banh mi priced from $7 to $9 — and trained with the former proprietors.

Tyler Willner and Tyler Mathews, a couple of construction workers doing heating, ventilation and air conditioning work at HSC, popped by to grab a couple of sandwiches for Monday lunch.

It was Mathews’ maiden voyage to the shop, and he ordered the beef banh mi. Willner, who got the chicken, has been a devoted customer since a friend introduced him to Khanh Hoa a few years back.

He said the restaurant makes his favourite banh mi in the city, bar none.

“It’s something about the bread. I don’t even eat onions (normally), but the pickled onions on here are good,” he said, adding he’s introduced many friends to the little shop of delights.

“I’m from the south side of the city, so it’s usually a bit of a drive — but it’s worth the drive,” he said.

erik.pindera@freepress.mb.ca