“Put some potato chips in there” is a sandwich hack so timeworn, I’m hesitant to characterize it as anything more than generally accepted wisdom. What sandwich wouldn’t benefit from extra salt and texture? Who actually prefers a peanut butter and jelly sandwich without a hidden layer of fried potato (preferably the salt & vinegar kind)?
But what if you took this tried-and-tested formula one step beyond? What if you used it to bring together—and elevate—two classic sandwiches: the PB&J and the “Elvis” (typically understood to refer to peanut butter and banana between two slices of bread, usually toasted)?
My inspiration for this attempt at fusing two iconic sandwiches was born out of desperation: I waited too long to make lunch yesterday and didn’t have time to pick up my planned meal (falafel over rice from the cart by Target) before a meeting, but we were also out of chips, which meant my hasty substitution (a PB&J) was bound to disappoint. Unless...
Spotting a bag of Trader Joe’s plantain chips in the pantry, the thought occurred to me: After all, why not? Why shouldn’t I make a crunchy alternative to the Elvis—which always struck me as a tad too texturally uniform to satisfy; I’ll save the sandwiches I can eat without teeth for when I no longer have teeth. (Shouldn’t be too long! Dental care is prohibitively expensive!)
So I ran the idea by Lifehacker’s resident sandwich guru, Claire Lower:
So blessed, I proceeded to make a PB&J in my usual way (a 75/25 ratio of peanut butter to jelly—though I actually favor raspberry preserves), but instead of salt & vinegar or dill chips, I covered the peanut butter side in a tight layer of plantain chips.
The results did, indeed, fuck, marrying the pleasing textural variety of a PB&J and chips with the essence of banana that defines the Elvis, and without adding unpalatably yielding fresh fruit into the mix. And I didn’t even toast the bread first. That would probably also fuck, but I have to ask Claire.