At the deli, when people would come in and ask for an Italian hero, I used to always be like, “Aww, I thought I was your Italian hero.” I don’t think anyone ever even thought it was funny including me, it just sort of became vaguely Pavlovian after a while. Plus every so often it would really confuse and/or alienate a customer, and that’s a pretty fun thing to do when you’re 21 and you’ve been standing behind a deli counter for most of the summer.

Then it turned out it’s actually funnier when people order sandwiches that don’t sound like they describe Giuseppe Garibaldi. “Aww, I thought I was your Roast Beef and Cheddar.” “Aww, I thought I was your honey-maple turkey with bacon and muenster cheese on pumpernickel.”

The sandwich: Ham cappy, salami, soppressata and fresh mozzarella on a kaiser roll with oil and vinegar, from Park Italian Gourmet on 45th between 5th and 6th in Manhattan.

The construction: All of the things in the name of the sandwich, which doesn’t really have a proper name — it’s just what I ordered.

Important background information: This part of Midtown, as I’ve certainly griped before, is something of a wasteland for interesting food options. Occasionally a good truck will come through the neighborhood and there are a few notable regular carts, plus a few of the food-courty options in the Rockefeller Center concourse are decent. But for the most part if you want to find a notable and inexpensive takeout lunch, you need to do some searching.

Park Italian Gourmet is an oasis of sorts. It does not at all look like it belongs in Midtown, a couple blocks south of Rockefeller Plaza. It’s an old-school, no-frills type of place with a wide variety of Italian meats and a small hot-food area for parmigiana and such. It is generally what I recommend to people in the area looking to avoid the bland corporate food bar places.

What it looks like:

How it tastes: Comforting, in a way. This certainly isn’t the most remarkable sandwich I’ve had or even the best sandwich I’ve had in Midtown, but it’s very solid. Tastes how a good Italian combo from a deli should taste: Delicious.

Soppressata, if you’re unfamiliar, is like a more coarsely ground salami. It’s maybe a tiny bit spicier and more peppery than its cousin, and equally salty. It’s one of my favorite lunchmeats, which is saying something.

In terms of the meats here, the ham cappy gets a bit overwhelmed by the stronger flavors of the salami and soppressata, so it mostly serves to add meaty bulk to offset the cheese — a valuable sandwich commodity, no doubt.

As with many good Italian sandwiches, the star is the mozzarella cheese. Fresh and creamy with its subtle milky taste, it is the perfect complement to the powerful meats. It’s weird; the meats are obviously more flavorful than the cheese, but somehow the cheese still feels like the focus of the sandwich. This is why people wrap mozzarella with pepperoni or prosciutto and serve it as an appetizer, I suppose.

Also, the deli-man at Park Italian Gourmet did me the favor of putting the mozzarella in the center of the sandwich, sandwiched itself by the meats. It meant every bite had a nice blend of meat, cheese and bread; there were no bread-and-cheese bites followed by meat-and-bread bites.

If I were making the sandwich myself I might have gone a tiny bit heavier on the oil and vinegar. The salami and soppressata are greasy enough to ensure that the sandwich could not be dry, but the tang from the vinegar really adds a nice kick whenever it’s present. I’m not sure what type of vinegar is standard at Park Italian Gourmet — I probably should’ve specified if I’m going to be so picky about it — but I would have preferred balsamic, a bit more pungent than whatever is here.

What it’s worth: $6.50. For a good lunch in Midtown that’s an absolute steal.

How it rates: Hmm. 81 out of 100. A really good sandwich but not a mind-blowing one.