If you’ve not tried a Japanese sando before, where have you been? Served on soft and fluffy Japanese milk bread – called shokupan – filled with anything from katsu chicken to egg salad. The sando is soft, and moreish and will have you skipping Britain’s iconic supermarket sandwich from lunchtime from now on.
Unfortunately, Birmingham has severely been lacking in this unique sandwich style since the closure of GupShup on Colmore Row last year. But fans of the sandwich shop will be pleased to hear it is set to relaunch this March. Rebranding under the name of the bread it serves, Shokupan will open on Grand Central.
While still serving as a dark kitchen on delivery apps, as GupShup Central, we’ve been desperate for the return of a brick-and-mortar location. Soon Shokupan will give us Brummies a second chance at trying their cloud-like sandwiches in person, and a lunch-break meal like no other. Shokupan won’t limit itself to just simple Japanese flavours, however, as sandwiches come packed with unique, often spicy, fillings.
We expect much of the old menu to return under the new name. With fan favourites such as the classic katsu chicken, with harissa slaw for a spicy twist, and the cheese and picklennasie sandos guaranteed to make an impact to your day. During these colder months you might want to check out one of their so-called ‘Hotties’.
Using the same freshly backed milk bread, these toasted sandwiches will take your experience to new explosive flavour heights. The rich and creamy, truffle and wild mushroom cheese toastie is the lunch sandwich vegetarians dream of. While the Sloppy Bushra is the spicy Shokupan-twist on the American classic Sloppy Joe. We now have an official opening date for Shokupan too, October 5. Fans of Secret Birmingham know we’ve been waiting a long time for this, so we’re super excited!
“In a galaxy far far far away in a time long long ago stuff happened. Meanwhile in Brum, a small independent food business opened its car boot to offer people Japanese Shokupan Sandos. Eh? What?” the sandwich shop said on Instagram. “We made our sandos into hotties and things really took off. So much so, we said goodbye to Ladypool Road…
“After only 15 months we outgrew our fab spot on Colmore Row, we had to find a bigger boat (pop culture reference kids). Despite making so many awesome new friends and feeding most of Brum, we made the hard decision to move on or ‘Poked’ on (chalak neighbours)…12-months later and we have finally been given the keys to start building. At last, my beautiful silver fox hair has found a new home… And now we are 6 weeks away from our next chapter in our story.”
To follow updates about Shokupan head here, but to order a sandwich now head to the old website here. Time to learn what all the fuss is about.