Sandwich

Using roast chicken from the grocery store makes this recipe super-easy. Improv: Add sweet and crunchy accents by mixing a few chopped toasted pecans and some dried cranberries into the chicken salad. Instead of rolls, use crusty French bread or thick slices of sourdough bread.

Adding a flavorful mayonnaise to this pan bagnat — style sandwich gives new appeal to traditional French fare.

Goat cheese makes a lovely base for fresh herbs, carrying their flavor and punctuating their brightness with its gentle tang; in this spread, it tastes particularly mild because of the little bit of whipped cream folded in. Take the cheese out to soften before heading for the farmers market, and by the time you get back, it will be ready to mix with whatever herbs you've found there.

Juicy pork replaces the traditional lamb in these sandwiches. Tomato and capers are a lively addition to the yogurt sauce.

Favas lend a fresh note here. For the most robust flavor, use tuna packed in olive oil rather than water.

Roasting the chickens and using both dark and white meat results in chicken salad with deep flavor. (Buying rotisserie chickens will cut down on the timing, but be sure to choose minimally seasoned birds.) Fennel, standing in for the usual celery, along with fennel seed and fresh basil, adds an unexpected note of sophistication.

Modern-day Reuben sandwiches are often open-faced and broiled, which dries out the corned beef and makes the cheese rubbery. Or, under the misguided belief that more is better, they are overstuffed. The main things to remember for a great Reuben are to keep the filling under control and in balance, so when you bite into it you get a harmonious and succulent mouthful; and to grill the sandwich slowly and under some pressure, so the bread gets toasty brown and buttery crisp, the meat gets warmed through, and the cheese is just melted enough to be oozy.

Improv: Substitute lemon peel for the orange peel, and cinnamon for the cardamom.

Up the nutritional ante of the traditional BLT by trading white bread for whole-wheat to add fiber, subbing leaner bacon to shave calories and fat and topping it with romaine lettuce instead of iceberg for a dose of vitamin A. Don't worry — you won't miss the mayo when you taste this zingy avocado spread.

Round out your lunch: Add half a mango or papaya.

Morning rush hour fix: For a low-cal breakfast on the run, it's hard to top Weight Watchers SmartOnes (210 calories, 5 grams fat). How did this supermarket standby beat Self's own recipe? Not everything in one lowfat egg patty comes from the henhouse. It also has cornstarch, xanthan gum, and artificial flavoring. Our homemade recipe uses 100 percent egg, which is naturally higher in fat.

Sunday lunch. From Lake Austin Spa Resort in Austin, Texas. Chef Terry Conlan calls this hearty sandwich "a two-fisted meal," and it's a healthful one, too: The fat is almost exclusively the good, monounsaturated kind (from olives and olive oil), and the peppers and tomatoes deliver vitamin C and beta-carotene — both known to boost the immune system. The unusual addition of fig preserves gives the sandwich a Mediterranean flair.

Wish you were here in Philadelphia, eating a cheese steak. No doubt about it, cheese steak is the quintessential Philly food. Too bad it can pack more than 60 grams of fat. To keep the greasy drippings from staining shirts, Philadelphians have learned the "Philly lean," a way of bending forward to the cheese steak rather than bringing it to the mouth. Self's "Philly lean" features a trimmer cut of meat, less cheese and more peppers so it has about half the calories and a third of the fat of the original — and provides 60 percent of your daily vitamin C needs.

Welcome to Baltimore, where crab cakes rule. This seafood fave has nutritional potential: Crab provides calcium, B vitamins, and iron. But the traditional version, made with mayo and fried in lots of oil, is too fatty to qualify as healthy fare. We cut the fat by more than half and lost 130 calories per serving with simple changes: using egg whites instead of whole eggs; subbing light mayo for the full-fat version; and going easy on oil.

The decked-out deli sandwich Who knew tuna on rye could be so sophisticated? "I go for the big taste," says Taylor Alonso, chef of the Bellport, a comfortably chic restaurant in Bellport, Long Island, that's a favorite summer haunt of New Yorkers. Alonso went for big nutrition, too, when he created this elegant and delicious tuna-steak sandwich for Self. Fresh tuna supplies lots of omega-3s, and goat cheese offers more calcium (with less fat and cholesterol) than most cheeses.

Turkey's tryptophan spurs your brain to produce feel-good serotonin. Have this burger with a chocolate shake (chocolate has stress-relieving polyphenols). You can whip up an easy lowfat chocolate shake with frozen yogurt, skim milk, and a few vigorous squirts of chocolate syrup. Wrap any unused burgers in plastic wrap and freeze for your next stress attack!

Thanksgiving on a roll Here's a pilgrim's dinner you can make in minutes and enjoy year-round, not only on turkey Thursday. Straight from the menu of New York City's Chat 'n Chew Diner, this sandwich has all the flavors of a Thanksgiving meal without stuffing you full of calories. Use turkey leftovers this month or buy sliced turkey breast from the deli. Consider the result comfort food for the time-pressed.