345 W Main StCome here for authentic-ish panini, tramezzini (cold sammies without the crust), and crostini (toasted appetizer sandwiches you’ll want to order four of), courtesy of a couple of Durham natives who opened the paninoteca in 2008. The vibe is casual but the three-cheese panini with Grana Padano, asiago fresca, pecorino, and truffle oil will make you feel lavish. As lavish as a sandwich can make one feel, anyway.

If sandwiches are your jam, check out downtown’s Toast Paninoteca for a great panino with homemade soup or salad. Go ahead and order a bottle of the salad dressing to stock your fridge while you’re there and enjoy the downtown scenery at the outdoor tables on a nice day. A few doors down, Alimentari at Mothers & Sons serves authentic, satisfying Italian-American sandwiches and salads and has a deli case filled with cured meats, sauces and fresh pasta by the pound.

Toast at Five Points is a favored Italian sandwich shop in Durham. The sandwiches here feature meats that are cured in-house and fresh ingredients that are locally sourced from farmers and bakeries in the area. The menu is available for dine in or take-out and includes paninis, which are Italian hot grilled sandwiches, Tramezzini, cold sandwiches on crustless bread, Crostini toasts, soups, salads, and more.

There’s Toast (345 W Main St), a paninoteca (sandwiches!!); Dames Chicken and Waffles (317 W Main St), which does what it says on the tin; Dos Perros (200 N Mangum St), a Mexican restaurant that serves noms like vegan seven chile mole and sweet potato empanadas; and Rue Cler (401 E Chapel Hill St), where you can find beignets but also have brunch like a good queer.

Having won just about every local best-sandwich award for the past decade, Toast is a small sandwich shop nestled right in downtown Durham. Serving hot or cold, panini-style or open-faced, soup or salad, this restaurant has everything you could ask for. So go ahead and elevate your lunch routine with house-cured meats on Italian-style sandwiches.

If you’re after a cafe for breakfast or lunch, you should add these local faves to your list: Dulce Cafe for a delicious panini or Cuban sandwich, Toast for some of the best Italian sandwiches you’ve ever tasted, and Bull and Bean for balsamic burrata salad, turkey and brie sandwich, or a slice of peanut butter and banana toast.

An indecisive scan of Toast’s chalkboard menu, followed by a flood of memory of a Tar Heel point guard (Dante Calabria!) precipitated my first order of this deep, tomato-toned soup about which I knew nothing. Innumerable orders followed. Orange-hued oil beads against the surface with an elastic web of cheese on top.

One of downtown’s flagship restaurants and a Durham mainstay, Toast is a paninoteca, which means that it specializes in tasty grilled sandwiches. Located in Durham’s Five Points area downtown, Toast has outdoor seats aplenty and is the perfect place to sit back and take in the busy Bull City at its best.

Toast is an Italian sandwich shop that is located in downtown Durham and that was founded in 2008. The sandwich shop makes its sandwiches using farm-fresh produce from local farms, artisanal bread from local bakeries, and Italian meats and cheeses. All sandwiches are prepared from scratch every day.

Run by the Cotlers from my long-time favorite, Toast Paninoteca, online reviews for Dashi have been a bit all over the place. But over the last year or so, I’ve been able to drop in a couple of times and see what Dashi was serving up along with its Japanese food.

This is a cute, quaint spot where you can stop in for a sandwich, soup, salad, or combination of any two. Their salads are perfectly dressed and delicious. Their soups are so fresh – you can tell they’ve been made the same day.

Call ahead and pay with a card over the phone and pick up outside the door or your car. Online ordering is now available too. See Instagram for daily specials.