Great Banh Mi in Malasaña
The Big Banh is a recently-opened sandwich shop in the heart of Madrid’s hopping Malasaña neighborhood, but don’t expect to find traditional Spanish bocadillos here. The Big Banh specializes in banh mi, Vietnamese-style sandwiches made with freshly-baked French bread, home-made pickled vegetables, and marinated meats.
The small but carefully-selected menu offers options like lemongrass-marinated chicken with pickled cabbage, Chinese barbecue-style pork with pickled daikon radishes, Vietnamese-style beef, or vegetarian edamame and rice meatballs, all slathered in Sriracha-spiked Japanese mayo , finely sliced cucumbers, and fresh herbs. The ratio of bread to filling is perfect and the price runs about 5.50 euros per sandwich. I got the lemongrass marinated chicken and the flavors were as authentic as you can find in Madrid and the crunchy cucumber and fresh cilantro were an excellent touch.
