Food shapes

a far from exhaustive study

An artsy rendering of cookie subs, by Subway

Should a chocolate chip cookie ever appear in the shape of a footlong sub? I thought about this as I stood at the bus stop in front of a Subway window decal displaying its latest 12-inch-long food addition. Dough is moldable after all, and we thrill at cookies formed into things like trees, cats and dildos. An oversized (round) cookie is a whimsical delight to behold, like a gargantuan pair of glasses or a huge hat. So how come I don’t feel the same when I look upon a ciabatta-shaped cookie the length of my forearm? Maybe because it seems like a lazier bit of manipulation, the dough-shaping equivalent of giving up.

I do like that a churro comes in a tube shape, which makes it portable, fun and easy to dip in warm chocolate. Each identical bite delivers maximum enjoyment—airy, crisp and sugar-dusted outside, melt in the mouth inside—till it’s gone in a flash.

I don’t mind when a bagel is twisted into a braid. It looks even more impressively handmade than the traditional ring shape, though still recognizably like bread, because, you know, challah. More importantly, one can still theoretically saw said bagel braid in half and smear each piece with cream cheese.

It’s cute when pizza is pinched into a heart shape for Valentine’s Day, or perhaps in the hilarious shape of a football field to indicate that it’s extra-large, as one of my favorite (bygone) tavern-style pizza joints used to do. Even better, we had to specifically request “stadium pizza” when we called to place the order, which had a powerful humbling effect.

I like when I order a side of rice at some Mexican-American restaurants and it’s tightly packed into a cup then overturned on the plate to retain a cylindrical shape. It’s a satisfying moment to hack into it with my fork and send rice kernels flying like a mini Godzilla flattening a rice building. Other times, I’ll go at it more daintily, scooping off a small corner to see how long I can keep the rice house intact.

I also enjoy little sculptures made out of butter: a flower, leaf or cheeky little cow. There might be nothing more soothing than watching an internet video of someone slicing into a tiny couch they made out of butter. I could say the same for sushi shaped into penguins, cabbage dogs, and rugby shirt soba noodles. (What would we do without @sibatable?)

!!!!!!! (by @sibatable)

I don’t love illusion cakes that resemble other prepared foods (read: BLT, Salisbury steak, baked potato, pecan pie). I do love the kind that look like fresh fruit and vegetables. I also love the kind that look like a human foot wearing a strappy shoe.

When I was in culinary school, I learned how to carve apples and tomatoes into swans. Unfortunately, I didn’t end up working on a cruise ship, nor did I have the foresight or discipline to start a carved produce Instagram account, so this tenuous skill quickly fell by the wayside.

Decorative whimsy aside, certain foods assume uncommon shapes for better functionality. Consider the cup-shaped tortilla chip for salsa scooping (which always cuts the roof of my mouth), or the meatloaf, which one slices into individually portioned slabs and serves with mashed potatoes. I can’t conjure any functional uses for a footlong cookie beyond portability (which cookies already are by nature) and easy, non-whimsical, sharing (which I did not test out on the bus that day because I didn’t buy one).

I guess it’s not all Subway’s fault that it’s best known for making things long and sub-shaped. Maybe it feels compelled to keep product line expansions consistent at the expense of creative satisfaction. After all, if the cookies aren’t a foot long, we might forget we’re at Subway.