How about a sloppy goat sandwich?

Since the end of September, there has been a veritable food orgy set up outside my place of employment.  Literally steps from where I work, the Madison Square Park Conservancy has set up a month-long market, including “Food Square”: a dozen stalls (and wood-fired pizza oven!) featuring delicious food from some of the hippest restaurants in the area and the city at large.  Basically, I’ve been salivating ever since my first tour of the offerings at the square (actually, that would be kind of gross, but you get the idea.)  Besides contemplating what to eat, I’ve wondered whether it will be worth it to disrupt my PB&J and apple regimen, and actually start buying lunches in the city.  But as the food stall will only be around until October 23, I might as well splurge.

The first thing that caught my eye was the sloppy goat sandwich, from the restaurant Resto.  The first of the many meat-based sandwiches I aim to try, the sloppy goat turned out to be pretty good, and a larger meal than expected. 

the sloppy goat

The house-made kaiser roll was soft, yet it supported the mound of goat filling well.  And as for the filling, its orange sauce was spicy and sweet, with a tingling aftertaste.  The goat, finely ground, was lighter than a beef-based barbeque—with a certain goatiness escaping the sauce’s clutch.  I even noticed the inclusion of some onions and carrots in the mix.  However, this seemed a half-hearted attempt to accentuate the meat: I only counted one or two carrot cubes in the entire sandwich, which I would call underwhelming if only they didn’t seem so out of place to begin with.  The onions though, did fit with the sauce, and I would have liked to have seen (and tasted) more of it.  And I understand that it is a sloppy goat sandwich I’m talking about here, with meat as the primary focus, but I still would have liked a stronger vegetable presence.  A slaw of some kind?  Pickled cabbage or something?  While the sauce was complex, the sandwich remained simple—and I guess that was the key to its success after all.  Now, should chefs be doing these sorts of riffs on home-cooked standards, or featuring them on gourmet menus at all?  Who knows, but I’m sure the trend will continue, with delicious results.