Sandwich of the Week is For The Win’s celebration of sandwiches. If you have a sandwich you’d like to recommend, please direct it to the author’s Facebook page or email asktedberg@gmail.com.

This sandwich and sandwich shop came recommended by former For The Win colleague Adi Joseph, a man of distinguishing taste.

The sandwich

The Asian Sensation from Il Bambino. The restaurant has two locations in New York City, but only the one in Astoria features this particular sandwich on the menu.

The construction

A pressed panini with porchetta, cilantro slaw, spicy peanut butter, and something called “Kung Fu aioli.” Porchetta, for those unfamiliar, is defined by Il Bambino’s menu as an “Italian specialty of slow roasted pig, stuffed with a mixture of garlic and herbs and often referred to as ‘Italian pulled pork.'”

Important background information

I judge panini. Too often, it seems, subpar sandwich shops lean on pressing and grilling sandwiches out of convenience: Panini can sit, pre-constructed, in a deli case for hours before getting heated and served, and I often feel like the grilling of the sandwich is a crutch that allows places a way to sell stale or substandard ingredients. As such, I’m not sure I’ve ever reviewed so much as a single panini before this one in years of writing about sandwiches online. Seems crazy, I know. But it took a good and trustworthy panini conveyor like Il Bambino, as endorsed by a good and trustworthy sandwich scout like Adi, to jar me awake to the panini’s potential.

I tend to use a broad — albeit correct — definition of the term “sandwich,” and while I do believe a panini decidedly counts as sandwich, I want to briefly note here that I think a panini actually has less of a claim to sandwich-hood than the more controversial case of the hot dog. This is largely semantic and really doesn’t matter at all, but to me, one of the defining traits of a sandwich is that its bread (or substitute starch) and its filling are distinct from one another. If you put meat between bread, that’s a sandwich. If you bake the bread with the meat inside, that’s a savory pastry. But unlike the breading around, say, an empanada, panini bread is decidedly bread at the point of meat-insertion, and so, again, it’s definitely a sandwich.

What it looks like

How it tastes

You have your doubts, right? We tend to want to put peanut butter in its own little box, and even if you know from peanut butter and bacon sandwiches that peanut butter lowkey pairs well with salty pork products, and even if you’ve experienced the delight of a standard, peanut-butter based satay sauce from your local Thai place, you’re still a little skeptical about the idea of a sandwich that combines peanut butter, pork, the powerful flavor of cilantro, and some form of mayonnaise.

But friends, I am here to tell you that this sandwich is so, so good.

I enjoyed a different sandwich at the other Il Bambino location before I had this one, so I knew to expect fresh, high-quality ingredients, elegantly distributed onto smartly conceived sandwiches. But I never would have guessed the way this particular sandwich sings.

No, that’s wrong. This sandwich doesn’t sing. This sandwich is a full symphony orchestra, lush strings and triumphant horns and thundering drums of flavor all operating in perfect, dazzling unison. Every element is noticeable and distinct and delicious, but none overpowers the rest and all serve to improve the sandwich as a whole. Bite into it and you can taste peanut butter and pork and cilantro, and you can feel the crispiness of the bread and the crunch of the slaw, but what you’re eating is only the Asian Sensation sandwich from Il Bambino.

The pork is moist and tender, with just enough chew to lend heft to the sandwich. The peanut butter is creamy and gooey and warm, padding the sharp bite of cilantro, and a light, whole-mouth spiciness that I assume comes from the Kung Fu aioli amplifies every flavor. The bread is fresh, exactly as hearty as it needs to be to contain the sandwich but no more, and pressed to an optimal, golden-brown toastiness.

The sum of the parts is massive, but the whole is somehow better. The sandwich is loaded with familiar flavors but tastes exactly like nothing I’ve ever had before. It’s invigorating, but accessible — unusual in its combination of flavors and textures, but comforting enough to want to eat regularly. It’s fantastic, and I want another.

What it costs

It’s $13, and there’s wait service if you’re dining in, so you’ll need to leave a tip. It’s certainly a full meal’s worth of sandwich, but it’s not tremendous.

Hall of Fame?

Yes indeed.