WE LIVE in a depressing era of Instagram-driven food trends, when so many sandwiches have become grotesque aberrations—oozing, dripping, hulking, overstuffed monsters, designed to be photographed as much as or more than they were designed to be eaten. I propose a modest revolution in the face of this excess: a return to the notion that sandwiches are about the bread. We also live in a time when bakeries are producing high-quality bread in more places in the U.S., and possibly worldwide, than ever before. This isn’t just true of large cities on the coasts. Bakers across the country are laboring to provide better bread for their communities.

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