Via Cucina Express

I either get their made to order sandwich (there is a slip that you check off the bread, meat, etc you want), pizza or pre made salads. All very good.

Ehhh, I’ll pass next time. I wanted to try something new in the downtown area and chose this cute little place over au bon pain (on the next block). All I have to say is… «DOH!»
Granted I only tried one thing here, but I am thoroughly unimpressed, I don’t really know if I’ll go back. I ordered the Napoli which is fresh mozzarella, tomatos, balsamic vinegar on a ciabatta roll. It had potential to be a simple yet yummy little sandwich. But instead the bread was extremely chewy, but not in a good way… way way too much balsamic vinegar that my bread was soggy and the sandwich was dripping and was overall just messy. And lastly… I think they used chopped tomatoes in the sandwich. ??? Who uses chopped tomatoes in a sandwich? I literally had a lot of the sandwich fall apart on me, due to the pieces of tomato and the excess amount of balsamic vinegar that couldn’t hold anything together between the bread.
I even got excited about the buy 8 sandwiches, get one free card at the register. Guess I’ll be tossing that in the trash can now. Oh yah, warning… CASH only place. No credit cards!

Muffins. Is it possible to cook only a top? A Seinfeld episode explained the phenomenon best. The muffins that you can dream about have crispy hard tops that you can just peel off and toss the bland bottoms. This Via Cucina Express had a Mocha muffin (which might as well have been a piece of chocolate cake) that had a muffin top that was twice the size of the bottom, a crispy flaky top that I picked off piece by piece on the way to my car and didn’t actually mind eating the bottom either.
The downside, as I was in a rush, was that I picked up a Sweet basil chicken salad which was not as good. Probably even bad on the scale of salads. Hence the three stars. Were it strictly a muffin shop, I would make the voyage back. Perhaps I’ll try the main restaurant in the future.