Anthony Bourdain Was Mystified By This Japanese Sandwich's 'Inexplicable Deliciousness'

The beloved late chef and TV host Anthony Bourdain had an insatiable appetite for many foods, but there's one very simple snack he kept returning to: Japanese convenience store food, specifically, the tamago sando (egg salad sandwich) at Lawson. For his first episode of his first-ever travel show, "A Cook's Tour," Bourdain chose Tokyo, thereby beginning a love affair with the country for years. In his field notes for his later travel show, "Parts Unknown," he wrote: "If I had to eat only in one city for the rest of my life, Tokyo would be it."

Bourdain wasn't afraid to shout his love for the sammie from the rooftops. In a tweet on X, Bourdain posted a picture of the infamous packaged sandwich with the caption: "The Unnatural, Inexplicable Deliciousness of the Lawson's egg salad sandwich." That this revelation came not from a Michelin-starred restaurant but from a chain convenience store made it even better. Bourdain was a man of the people, and this sandwich wasn't a joke or a guilty pleasure. In Japan, convenience stores (called konbini) like Lawson, 7-Eleven, and FamilyMart are culinary treasure chests in their own right.

These Japanese egg salads are perfectly cooked, finely chopped, and mixed with extra yolks and Kewpie mayonnaise. Wrapped in soft, crustless milk bread, the sandwich was symbolic of something he deeply admired about Japan: its obsession with perfection, no matter how small.

If you're a sandwich lover, you know that the bread holding the aforementioned goodness all together is also key. Japanese white bread isn't like your standard Wonder Bread back home. Milk bread, also called Japanese shokupan, is renowned for its soft, slightly sweet bread. It's no wonder Bourdain called them "pillows of love." This type of enriched dough is also what makes cinnamon rolls, brioche, and challah bread so good. 

Lawson isn't the only store that makes this legendary sandwich. The Japanese 7-Eleven's egg salad sandwich is also a crowd-pleaser. These simple, yet refined, 24/7 one-stop shops also appealed to Bourdain's love of democratic food. Anyone could buy it. Whether it was a businesswoman on her hurried lunch break or a jet-lagged American stumbling through Tokyo at 2 a.m., anyone could get a quality treat at any time of day.

This kind of culinary democracy mattered to Bourdain. He hated most food trends with a passion, and distrusted any kind of restaurant that focused on exclusivity instead of quality. The fact that one of the best bites in Tokyo costs only a few hundred yen (around three U.S. dollars) positively delighted him. It's no wonder he once described Lawson as: "One thing I keep coming back to every time I come back to Japan."