This might come as a shocker, but Subway is one of the most popular fast food chains in today's crowded market. With gimmicks like "$5 footlongs" and the whole "putting the calories on the napkin" schtick, Subway has made quite a name for itself since its earlier days way back when. But with that success comes a lot of sandwiches, a lot of nasty, repulsive sandwiches that are eaten day in and day out by people who think that random ingredients slopped together make a good sandwich.
And who knows this better than anyone? Well, Subway Sandwich Artists themselves. The Subway employees recently revealed some of the worst creations they were forced to make during their days at one of the thousands of Subway locations. Take a look at some of the most disgusting "sandwiches" we could find.
Ordering Every Sauce Wasn’t The Worse Part
“A guy came in once and ordered an Italian sub with no veggies and every sauce.
Every. Sauce.
At the time, we were boasting around 14 sauces or so. We had everything from ranch to basil pesto to a raspberry vinaigrette. I almost threw up as I sent the goopy, dripping monstrosity through the grinder oven.
Of course, it couldn’t be a ‘to-go’ order. He sat down in front of us and started snacking. Heaps of barbecue sauce and ranch dressing and chipotle mayonnaise went dribbling down his cheeks every time he took a bite.
His eating process was slow, disgusting, and methodical. He would eat two bites, set the sandwich down, and wait five minutes. He never looked around or spoke to anyone after he’d paid. He simply stared, dead-eyed, into the corner. Bite, bite, wait. Bite, bite, wait. Tiny bites.
He didn’t wipe his face.
After a few bites, he would stand up and move to the bathroom. A few minutes later, he’d return to his viscous sandwich blob and resume. Bites, wait, bathroom, resume, repeat. A full hour and a half it took this bizarre space alien to finish that thing. He must’ve gone to the toilet at least six times.
At first, I thought he was intentionally inducing vomiting, but the bathroom was completely clean after he left. No signs of volcano vomit or anything. The smell, though…like chicken soup and old gym socks were microwaved together for twenty minutes. If not for the gobs of food snot dripping on his cheeks, it’d have been like that bit in Breaking Bad where Gus puts a little towel down for his knees and pukes up the poison. It was just so serial killer methodical.
Anyway, that. That’s the grossest. I almost puked just making that thing, let alone watching a man ingest it.”
The Creeper And The Sandwich Artist
“The worst thing I ever made at Subway was a salad and the entire situation was gross.
So this dude wearing tan and gold, rimless sunglasses walked in, but kept his sunglasses on.
He told me he wanted a chopped salad. I don’t remember the meat or veggies he asked for, but I do remember the toppings…
After reading my name tag, he asked for olive oil. As he peered at me over his glasses he said, ‘I like it really wet’ and licked his lips. I put in a whole bunch, but he kept repeating how wet he liked it, asking for more oil. I put in at least half a bottle of oil.
Then he went on to say how he loved parmesan cheese, like A LOT of it. I shook in a bunch of cheese, but he still wasn’t satisfied. I was ticked off and creeped out at this point so I took the lid off the cheese and dumped the entire shaker full into the bowl. He was thrilled. ‘You’re the best. You make the best salad, no one anywhere else gets it like you do. You’re perfect.’
He came back several times, asking for me, and if I was there he refused to be served by anyone else. Eventually, my shift manager stood next to me while I made the salad so the dude couldn’t make weird comments. He stopped coming in after that.”
They Only Thought They Knew Disgusting Before This Guy Came In
“I worked at a Subway the summer before and after my senior year in high school. I wouldn’t say it was a job I disliked—more along the lines of a job I absolutely despised. The nonstop stream of rude and entitled customers, all of which had some awful remark about your ‘Sandwich Artist’ skills, just left you feeling bitter and cold, like a bag of frozen Italian herb and cheese dough straight out of the freezer.
It was closing time on a weeknight, maybe five minutes before we could lock the door for the day. Week nights were usually dead slow after the post-work dinner rush, and the assistant manager who usually closed with me was cool with us putting up most of the tables, shutting down one of the bathrooms, sweeping—the usual stuff. More often than not, we didn’t see a single customer after 9 pm.
In walks this older white guy, upper 50s/low 60s. Absolute trailer trash. Huge belly hanging out from under his Walmart “Southern Pride” T-shirt, pants that clearly showed his crack, flip flops, mangy-unwashed hair. This dude was probably already two six-packs in when he decided to drive over to get the disgusting pig-slop sub he was about to order.
‘Gimme one of them footlongs on white.’
He’s clearly already annoyed that I have to wash my hands before I put on gloves and grab a fresh knife. He starts huffing and muttering ‘Jesus’ while waiting.
‘Go ahead and put some shredded cheese on there and microwave it.’
‘Sure, boss.’
Already gross, but whatever. People ordered gross stuff all the time (looking at you, mayonnaise in a salad.)
‘Gimme double tuna, chicken, and bacon, and put the chicken in the middle of the tuna.’
‘Uh, sure. I’ll have to charge you for triple meat and the bacon is extra; is that okay?’
‘Yeah, whatever.’
So I start creating this elementary school lunch from the shadow realm. I’m a little angry because normally for double meat, we would hollow out the bread to make room. Not possible when nuked cheese is glued to the bread already. He also orders three more cheeses on here. Toast it. Toast it again. At this point, the bread is hard as a rock, the tuna has these weird dried bits on the outskirts of the sandwich.
Then we get to the veggies and condiments.
‘Gimme a bit of everything.’
I just stared at him for a second. It already wouldn’t close, and he wanted a dozen veggies on top. So, I sigh to myself and grab the first one (probably cucumbers). It’s definitely closing time by now.
‘Go on ‘n put a lil more than that, now.’
If you’ve ever noticed, subway has specific amounts of the stuff they put on. Six tomatoes, Six cucumbers, four cheese slices. Normally, for a nice customer, we don’t charge for extra veggies, but it didn’t stop there.
He ordered double and sometimes triple of every single vegetable. The whole time being rude as possible about why I wasn’t putting as much as he liked, telling me he could make it better and faster, asking why some items were already put away in the fridge that he wanted. Nonstop complaining.
‘Alright now, gimme some extra mayo, mustard, ketchup, sweet onion, ranch, oil ‘n vinegar.’
I sighed, starting to break, ‘Sir, we unfortunately don’t carry ketchup.’
‘Well, boy, you better find some then, shouldn’t you?’
I bit my tongue and called my assistant manager out of the back. He explained the same thing, and they had a mini-back and forth that ended with him saying he would ‘call corporate tomorrow about it.’ Whatever.
Meanwhile, I am at my breaking point with Mr. Krabs’ appetizer. This monster is dripping with veggie water, sopped in mayonnaise, and definitely is not going to close. He noticed at this point, because he started watching me intently.
‘You ‘gone have to push down hard on that, now, boy. Better make sure it’s sealed tight.’
I don’t know what a sealed sandwich is, but as soon as I tried to close it, the entire thing just collapsed on itself. My hands are covered in tuna-ranch-mustard globs, and trying desperately to save it. This guy loses it.
‘Are you stupid or something? Work at a sandwich place and can’t even make a sandwich.’
‘Sir, I’m sorry but you ordered a large amount of items extra. I can definitely make you a salad—’
‘I don’t want no salad, get that manager of yours and let’s see you do it again, or this’ll be your last night.’
‘Sure.’
Almost half an hour after closing time, my assistant manager comes out, tosses his entire first sandwich straight into the garbage,and he makes the exact same sandwich, microwaved cheese, four or five meats, an entire garden, and a tub of lard on top. Surprise, surprise—it falls apart again.
My assistant manager tells me to go ahead and ring him up and the guy starts screaming, ‘I ain’t paying for no sandwich, that ain’t what I ordered!”
He starts to storm out, my manager yells, ‘Sir, if you don’t pay, we’ll pull the security footage and file a police report.’
He does not want that. Ticked off and half-wasted, he comes to the register. His total is like $45 for one sandwich. Best part? He makes it a combo with a dozen raspberry white chocolate cookies. ‘Have a nice day, Sir.’
‘Get bent, you piece of crap.’
He storms out and drives over the curb as he wheels out.”
Dinner And Dessert
“An older couple walks in. The husband has health issue and the wife won’t let him get cookies. They fight about it the entire time they’re in line. The wife steps away to use the restroom. The husband leans in and frantically whispers ‘I want those freaking cookies, smash them in my sandwich before she comes back.’
So I did. I watched him eat the entire thing with the biggest smile on his face. It was awesome…and gross.”
Just In Case
“I worked at Subway for a few months during my freshman year of college. The grossest thing I ever made wasn’t a sub but a salad I made for an older lady. She came in right before closing and she asked for a salad with shredded lettuce, cut up ham, and mayonnaise. So. Much. Mayo. I squeezed a few lines on her salad and looked up at her to ask if that was too much and she said ‘oh no baby, I’m going to need a lot more than that’ and I ended up squeezing what seemed like almost half of the squeeze bottle on her salad. The top of the lettuce ham bowl she asked for was completely covered in mayo like a blanket of creamy snow. I swear the ratio of mayo to lettuce was like 3:1. She even got extra mayo in a little cup on the side “just in case”. It really stuck in my memory because I remember she got so much mayo we had to prep another bottle of it before we could close.”
So. Many. Pickles
“When I worked at Subway, we once had a woman and her kid come in, and without exaggeration I could say she was 300 pounds, easy. Her kid looked like that would be his path later in life as well.
They were both incredibly nice, but very strict. The mom did the order and made it clear that she was ordering for her precious angel and it needed to be exact. They wanted a 12-inch Meatball Marinara with no meatballs – just the sauce. Next, every pickle that we had left on the front line was dumped into this thing. Easily more than five times the regular pickle amount. Enough pickles that I could make two solid rows of pickles on this behemoth and have pickles leftover that did not touch the bottom bread.
Next it would be extra double toasted. After one round of toasting, the bread was already hot, and the pickles totally baked of all life. They could not, however, be prepared for the rain of thermal torture that was about to assault them. After one more full toasting cycle and one additional partial toasting cycle, the bread was burnt a shade of black in most exposed parts; the tomato sauce was toasted to a crisp, and the poor pickles were disgusting yellowish crispy ghosts of their former glory. No other veggies would be unlucky enough to be added to this sandwich, bubbling hot and stinking of desiccated pickle.
The final step in this abomination was to retrieve another small cup of refrigerated, still cold tomato sauce from the back and dump a line of that on top of the broiled, charred brick of pickled tomato nonsense now currently smelling up my line. The kid was giving this whole situation a very pleased Pugsley Addams-esque smile from the back as I wrapped the sandwich, gross charred bread flaking off as I wrapped it up.
Then they bought a bag of Miss Vickie’s Jalapeño chips and a soda before leaving on their merry way so I could start cleaning up. The only thing that made the situation more bearable is that, despite being strict about the preparation, they were very nice and happy to get the food.”
He Could Never Wrap His Head Around This One
“Keep in mind I’m used to just about any random sandwich combination having worked in three different stores with interesting regulars, like the guy who sometimes got salads where the lettuce was replaced with jalapenos, but…
One time I’m working and a guy comes in and I ask him what he wants. He gets a foot long worth of bread but says he wants nothing on it. So I ask ‘Veggie?’ and head over to the veggie area – and we just stare at each other and I realize he meant nothing. So just as I’m about to tell him that I’d have to charge him for a veggie if he just wants the bread (I assumed for something else, as people tend to ask from time to time), he asks for salt and pepper. I pause for a moment and put it on. Maybe he doesn’t have any at home and wants some on. But then he asks for more. And more. And more.
There’s now a very strong layer of salt and pepper, as visible as if it were meat laid end to end and keep in mind there are holes in the bread so there’s even more hiding. And then he pays for it, sits down and eats it. The whole thing.
I can’t even. That’s just the one thing that has stuck with me.”
“I Was Shocked And Scared”
“This guy who came in pretty often (who always seemed on something) would always get a triple tuna footlong with triple American.
One day he was especially out of it and he decided he was not only gonna run it through the garden (an uncommon occurrence) but he also wanted it toasted after putting on all the veggies. I thought, ‘Okay, toasting spinach and lettuce, that’s interesting.’ I finished roasting it and it was whatever, but then I asked what sauces. He responded with a little bit of everything. I asked even Mayo and Lite Mayo? And he said ‘yeah, just give me everything and for each one I’ll just tell you when to stop’ which made it easy for me I guess? So then stripes of Mayo, Lite Mayo, Creamy Sriracha, Buffalo, Mustard, Brown Mustard, Sweet Onion, Honey Mustard, Subway Vinaigrette, Chipotle, Southwest Ranch, Caesar and BBQ adorned this monstrosity of gloops of warm tuna, american cheese and warm, wilted lettuce. But he wasn’t done. Then came 5 layers of oil and 3 layers of vinegar (I say layers because I would go up and down as I went across to cover the whole area).
When I finished this sub I was shocked and scared because if he said to go I had to fold that together and hope most of it won’t leak out. Luckily he wanted it for here so I handed him that swamp of a sandwich and went into the back to avoid puking.
I came out 5 or so minutes later and he was gone.
Later he started dating another semi-regular and they ended up sharing that sandwich nearly everyday. I had to learn to fold and wrap that beast. Thanks to him I never struggled with folding or wrapping a sandwich ever again.
Sometimes I miss that job despite minimum wage.”
‘No, Man, Like Lots Of Onions. I Love Onions’
“I had offered to buy a homeless guy a sandwich for him and his wife, and we had made it through bread and meat selection without incident. I can’t remember what he chose, because the ensuing horror made it irrelevant. Things started to fall off the rails at the vegetable station. He asked for raw onions, and received a normal sized portion of raw onions. He then said ‘no no no- more onions.’ He received more onions. ‘No, man, like lots of onions. I love onions.’ I kid you not he requested more onions at least four times. Sandwich artist (SA) and I kept making eye contact, but neither of us could stop what was happening. By the time he was satisfied with the onions on his sandwich, not only could you not see the meat, you could barely see the bread.
I had edibility concerns by this point, as did SA. I could tell because SA kept trying to save the sandwich with helpful suggestions, all of which were flatly rejected. I could see the desperation building in SA’s eyes as we went down the line with this onion sandwich. All other veggies? Rejected. Cheese? Rejected. Some sort of sauce to help mask the fact that an entire onion was resting on a pathetic slab of inadequate deli meat? Rejected. With a resigned sigh, SA asked if he wanted oil or vinegar. That’s when we learned it could get worse.
I don’t know what a normal sized dash of oil looks like on a sandwich, mostly because I’ve never seen anyone order oil on their sandwich before. Whatever the normal size was, SA gave him more. This proved to be not enough, as I then witnessed more rounds of requests for more until there was oil pooling on the paper. It looked more like he was planning on taking the onions to a stove to cook later than like an amount of oil that could ever be delicious.
SA had given up at this point and was obviously unhappy at having to use his time to make something that was appearing fairly inedible. And that’s when the request for ‘lots of black pepper’ hit.
You know those awkward scenes in Italian restaurants where people keep requesting more and more Parmesan cheese until the bounds of societal decency force them to stop? Picture that, but with progressively more horrified shakes of a pepper shaker until the pile of oily onions looked like it had been salvaged from Pompeii. There was no white space left by the time he was satisfied. SA and I kept making concerned looks at each other as round after round of ‘more’ passed, but neither of us were about to question the man. He was just so confident about what he wanted.
I still wonder sometimes if he and his wife actually ate those sandwiches and if that SA has ever been forced to make a more disgusting creation.”
“If This Wasn’t My First Job, I Would Have Quit Right There”
“I’ve been working at Subway for about a month now, but there is this one prick, oh my Lord, I hate him. Whenever I work in the evenings, I DREAD his arrival. First let’s go over what he looks like. He’s about 5’5” short little jerk. His beard is untamed, and he works at an auto-body shop, coming in right after work. His face is a mixture of depression, and anger. And his teeth. They’re either golden, or rotted to the gum-line.
And now, for his sub. FIRST day of work, he comes in and starts laughing. Then my trainer comes out and starts laughing. I had no idea what was about to happen. She says: ‘If you need help with his sub, I’ll be in the back.’ So I’m thinking he just wants a double meat double cheese big philly since they’re a pain to make. I was wrong. I was so wrong.
He chooses Italian, pronouncing it: ‘EYE-TAY-ELL-IT-AN bread.’ Then he says he’d like a simple club. No biggie I thought, should be easy. I looked at my cheat-sheet and 4 Turkey 4 Ham 4 Bacon. Super Simple. I put the bacon on, without asking if he wanted it toasted or not. And he calls me on it. ‘Remake it!’ Alright, that’s fine, it’s my first day and I’m going to make a few mistakes. Remade it, and asked what he wanted. ‘I want the meat from the other one, since you messed it up. And the cheese. No charge, since it’s in the trash. And then I want… Double meat and cheese. Since there’s already two times there… double that would be four times, yeah?’ FORGET THIS GUY. So I make his sub, 16 chicken 16 ham 16 bacon, it’s falling out of the bread. After I toast this demon sub, I go to veggies. ‘And what kind of veggies for you today, sir?’ And he just smiles this stupid toothless grin. He goes through each vegetable, one by one. Why does he do this? Because, if this prick doesn’t tell me everything at once, I have to assume he doesn’t want anything else. If he would have just said: ‘Everything’ I could put less of certain ones on, in order to save room. But no, one by one he lists them. After I get everything on, I look down and its bread with veggies stacked on top. That’s all there is. He laughs a bit more, and says: ‘Put that bread that you messed up on, on top for me. BUT, not before we get done with the sauces.’ However, the way that he says sauces is ‘SAUWSHES.’ After about twenty freaking sauces, I put the other piece of bread on top, ring him out, and go to the back. My trainer and coworker were laughing their butts off. The guy walks in the back, and puts an arm around my trainer. Apparently, it was her husband. And I hate him. ‘I can’t believe you actually made it for him!’ If this wasn’t my first job, I would have quit right there.”
Burn It, Please
“I worked at Subway for about a year. There was a lovely older lady that would come in a few times a week after her shift at Walmart, and she’d get subs for herself and her husband. Her sub was fine, but her husband’s sub, oh god. It was a footlong white sub, with double steak, and he liked it BURNT, so burnt that I normally would put it on the pizza setting THREE TIMES. Once it was literally a charred mess, I’d put about half a bottle of mayo on it. That was it. Our Subway was very small, and a few times making this sandwich set off the smoke alarm, and it always made the place smell terrible for at least an hour afterward. The only other one that stood out to me was another regular, and she got a footlong white sub, simply with an ungodly amount of both black olives and mayo. It was honestly horrible looking, I have no idea how she ate it.”
And Then The Cops Were Called
“Strap in, kids, this is a doozy.
Way back in the ancient era of 2012, when a younger, thinner me was a bona fide sandwich artist working the night shift in a small town with a opiate problem, we (the shift lead and myself) had a customer walk in at about 10:15 PM. To protect the names of the not-so-innocent, we’ll call him ‘Crazy Cheese Guy.’
So the order starts off relatively normal, two turkeys, one ham, one club, one melt. A little strange for one guy to want five footlongs after 10 PM, but whatever, my coworker and I are just trying to get the store closed up in an hour. Then we ask him what cheese he wants.
‘All of them.’
‘…ah, well, we have American, cheddar, pepper jack, provolone, and shredded, and each cheese after the first will cost extra, per sub that would-‘
‘I want all of them.’
‘…You got it!’
So we proceed to layer an ungodly amount of cheese on each of these sandwiches and toast them, and I honestly think they’d have turned out okay if he had stopped there. But this one man crazy train had no intention of stopping. He proceeded to add all the vegetables, all the seasonings, and at that point I was certain what monstrosities I was about to create, like watching a car wreck in slow motion…
‘Any sauces for these?’
‘All the sauces. Extra extra sauce.’
Oh, god.
I proceed to douse each of these already-packed subs in what can only be described as a swimming pool of each of the myriad sauces we had available, and some oil and vinegar on each for good measure. We knew something was wrong with him after cheeses, but jesus, we wrapped these and they were leaking out the ends in the bags.
So we finish up and just like that he pays for his five sauce bombs and leaves. Hah, just kidding, we get to the register and of course he’s shocked it comes in at over $60 because of the $6 of extra cheese on each sub. He argues for a bit, then says ‘I know what the problem is. Points to me. You’re just doing your job. It’s ‘you’. Points to shift lead.’
My shift lead nopes out of there, she doesn’t get paid enough to put up with this crap, but poor young naive little me thinks I can still placate him.
From that point on, he’s staring at me like he wants to drill holes in the back of my head with his heat vision, I’m trying to get him to pay and/or stall for time, my coworker is in the back calling the cops, and he starts yelling at the top of his lungs how we’re ripping him off and he’s going to come back with friends and get what he’s ‘owed.’ After five minutes, he jets, the cops show up, and we (thankfully) never saw him again. Ironically, he left his gross sandwiches on the counter, to be disposed of by me on my way out. I suppose it’s just as well, I don’t want to imagine what they tasted like.
And that, my friends, is the ballad of Crazy Cheese Guy.
At Least He Thought About His Cat
“I used to work for subway back in 2008-2010, and we had this dude that would come in 3 times a week. He rotated between 3 sandwich choices, each one truly grotesque.
-Foot long white Italian Bread. Triple meat Tuna. Triple American Cheese. Double foot long portion of bacon. Toasted. Tons of onions. Extra extra extra mayo. 1 scoop of tuna for his cat on the side.
-Foot long white Italian Bread. Triple meat meatball sub. Triple American Cheese. Not Toasted, with mayo and sweet onion teriyaki sauce. 1 scoop of tuna for his cat on the side.
-Foot long white Italian Bread. Triple meat Cold cut combo. Triple American Cheese. Not toasted. Load it up with tons olives and onions. Then extra extra extra mayo, sweet onion teriyaki, and honey mustard. 1 scoop of tuna for his cat on the side.
Closing his sandwiches was literally a daunting task, epecially the meatball one because it was so slimy. And they cost so much even though back then they were all 5 dollars each because he had triple everything on them. Though it was nice that he always got some tuna for his cat. The owner of the store wouldn’t charge him for it usually because he was such a frequent customer.”
“He Says Two Words That Shook Me To My Core”
“Ok, check it. Dude comes in like he’s never been to a Subway before. Ok, whatever, I’m ready to help, but he also acts like he has never even had nor heard of a sandwich before.
You see, he gets the honey oat footlong, and that is where the logic stops. This joker asks what’s good, and I tell him that I like the meatball marinara. He gets that (with extra marinara mind you) and before I can even ask him about his cheese choice, he points to the tuna and asks ‘eww, what’s that?’ I tell him what it is, he takes a good minute to think, and then he’s like ‘Ok, I’ll get that too.’ I pause for a second trying to process what he is asking me.
Let me tell you I take the title ‘sandwich artist’ seriously, and I did not feel like an artist while spreading pasty tuna on to a marinara soaked honey oat loaf. I felt dirty. So to follow this nutball’s train of logic, he has me double toast it without cheese, take it out, and he says two words that shook me to my core. ‘Honey mustard.’ I am an honest man, I like to think. A good man if I’m being generous, but I cannot think that any god that wouldn’t make me suffer for helping craft this abomination. I squeeze the bottle and give him three thick lines of that tangy sauce. He says ‘more.’ I give him more. I close it with an audible squelch emitting from the sub, I wrap it up, and when I look up to accept his money I see his face. I see the excitement of a child about to go on a roller coaster for the first time, the guy is giddy, practically electrified with glee. I give him his foot long effigy to sin incarnate, he leaves the store, and I go in the back to slice bell peppers and try to forget.”
They’ll Never Look At A BMT The Same Way Ever Again
“Now, as I’m sure you’re all aware, one of the most popular pre-made subway sandwiches is the BMT which stands for ‘Big. Meaty. Tasty.’ It normally consists of pepperoni, salami, and ham, with your choice of salads and condiments as usual.
Now, my friend works in an all-night Subway across the road from a nightclub (needless to say, they get PACKED on weekends) and just as the night was drawing to a close, around 5 am a customer came in, alone, and ordered a BMT. This guy is very obviously trashed, swaying back and forth, not able to focus on anything, speaking really loudly and, to top it all off, he was shirtless. My friend just handed over a BMT with a random selection of veggies and sauces because the wasted guy wasn’t paying attention anyway.
The guy took one bite out of the sandwich then said something to the effect of, ‘This isn’t what I ordered!’ (In reality it was probably far more slurred). My friend protested and told him that he asked for a BMT and what he had was a BMT, at this point just trying to get him out the shop.
The customer then replied with the most stupid, yet genius, comment:
‘I thought a BMT was meant to be Bacon, Meatballs and Tomatoes?’
The ‘Trashed BMT’ has since become a staple of our friendship group’s Subway diet, and it’s delicious. My personal recommendation is to try it with mayo.