7-Eleven Japan starts selling Vietnamese banh mi sandwiches

1 week ago 21

Walk into a 7-Eleven in Japan and, as you’d expect, you’ll quickly find all sorts of very Japanese foods and drinks, such as green tea rice balls, matcha lattes, and takoyaki. However, 7-Eleven Japan is really all about offering a broad range of deliciousness. They’re more than happy to look beyond the country’s borders for inspiration, and is now offering banh mi, Vietnamese-style sandwiches.

One of the world’s truly great fusion foods, banh mi stuffs a short baguette with traditional Vietnamese ingredients and seasonings, with some sort of protein (most commonly pork) accompanied by carrots, radish, and plenty of cilantro/coriander. While long popular both in Vietnam and in parts of other countries with sizable Asian populations, banh mi has taken some time to catch on in Japan, perhaps because pho already occupies so much of Vietnamese-intrigued Japanese foodies’ hearts. In recent years, though, the number of restaurants and takeout shops offering banh mi has been on a slow but steady uptick in the Tokyo area, and now the fanbase has become large enough that 7-Eleven Japan is getting into the banh mi game.

The Sweet Chili Sauce Banh Mi is filled with roast pork, and 7-Eleven says the umami of the meat, tang of the pickled vegetables, and bold herbal fragrance of the cilantro make for a flavorful but refreshing sensation that’s perfectly suited to the upcoming hot summer weather. Sweet chili sauce is a less-than-ubiquitous banh mi condiment, but 7-Eleven says it’s used here as an added accent within the flavor profile, so it doesn’t sound like it’ll have a domineering presence and each ingredient will get its chance to shine.