Concerned that my experience at Ricobene’s would set the bar unfairly high for whatever sandwich I next reviewed, so I wanted to go someplace I had eaten a few times before — not just so I could be certain my writeup would be fair, but also so I could recalibrate my own personal sandwich barometer, cast wildly off-kilter by the Windy City wonder.

Problem is, though I’ve been to Island Burgers and Shakes a bunch of times before, I’ve never gotten a firm handle on it. People keep telling me its amazing. When my wife — then girlfriend — and I were on a feverish search for the best burger in the city, magazines and websites kept hailing Island Burgers’ among the top.

But we were never overwhelmed. More on this to follow.

The sandwich: Duke’s Churasco from Island Burgers and Shakes, 51st and 9th in Manhattan.

The construction: A huge breast of blackened chicken with jack cheese and jalapenos on sliced sourdough bread.

I ordered mine with bacon even though bacon is not on the sandwich as the chef intended it. I figured, you know, why not? But when the sandwich showed up there was no bacon, and when I got the receipt I saw why. My waitress entered the sandwich into the computer and then hit the “without bacon” button instead of the “plus bacon” button, which shouldn’t have even applied in this situation since the sandwich doesn’t come with bacon, and probably just made some guy in the kitchen shrug and be all, “huh, guess this guy really doesn’t want bacon.” Oh, how wrong you are, some guy in the kitchen!

If I open a restaurant there won’t even be a “without bacon” button on the computer, since all we’ll be serving is big plates of bacon anyway. Also, if we only have one dish we probably don’t need a computer.

Important background information: I feel like Island Burgers and Shakes benefits from the Jeff Francoeur effect a bit. A lot of Mets fans accused the media of consciously protecting Francoeur because he’s a nice guy and a good quote, but I don’t think it was nearly that nefarious. When those things happen — and they happen all the time, everywhere — I don’t think people necessarily recognize what they’re doing. I think members of the media grow to really, genuinely like Francoeur because he’s a nice guy and a good quote, and so they look for all the ways in which he’s helping the team win because in their heads they want him to be helping the team win because they are subconsciously biased toward him. And so, it’s easy — he’s got an amazing arm, he’s athletic, he’s well-liked in the clubhouse, and on the rare occasion he gets a hold of one, whoa nelly.

The people at Island Burgers and Shakes are all exceptionally friendly. Plus they play great music, it’s clean and brightly decorated with surfer-themed memorabilia without feeling like it’s trying too hard, and it’s a Hell’s Kitchen staple. Oh, and you can smell their burgers from about a block away. This is a place that any reasonable burger and sandwich enthusiast would want very badly to excel in its art.

What it looks like:

How it tastes: Spicy.

Mostly just spicy. I like spicy, don’t get me wrong, and the Duke’s Churasco is a very pleasant variety of spicy — the blackened, Cajun brand that really clears out your nostrils.

And every element of this sandwich is good. The chicken breast was moist, well-seasoned and obviously fresh. The jalapenos, though spare, added more spice and some nice crunch. The sourdough was soft and tasty. The jack cheese added a creamy texture, though the flavor was a bit overpowered by the overwhelming spice from the chicken and jalapenos.

But I wanted something more. The Grub Street list I keep coming back to put this sandwich as 15th best in all of New York, and with that type of reputation I would hope for something a little less one-dimensional. There were pickles on the plate so I added those and some ketchup before plowing into the second half of the thing, and while they added some nice elements, by then I wasn’t tasting much anyway. A lot of spice on this thing, fellas.

What it’s worth: That’s the other thing. This sandwich cost $10.75. Throw in a soda and a tip and I wound up paying $18 for lunch. That’s three breaded steak sandwiches from Ricobene’s! Dammit, Ted, you promised you wouldn’t let it get to you. That’s why you came to this familiar place, remember? You’re back in Midtown now, and you’re going to pay more for sandwiches; that’s just how it is. You have to let Ricobene’s go or it will ruin you.

The rating: 74 out of 100. Calling this the Jeff Francoeur of sandwiches would be unfair; this sandwich is, despite its shortcomings, way above replacement-level and indeed still pretty good. That said, it is a bit overrated and overpriced, perhaps oversold due to some nebulous intangibles. I’m struggling to come up with a good baseball-player comp for this one. I want to say Ryan Howard but I think he’s better than a 74 in this weird, haphazard and totally arbitrary rating system. Like a poor man’s Ryan Howard of sandwiches, only spicier.