Considering Jacksonville’s widely acknowledged sandwich preeminence, it’s no surprise that it’s home to a standout chicken salad on sliced bread. But unlike most of the city’s celebrated sandwiches, this local favorite isn’t served at a restaurant. It’s only available at Wolfson Children’s Hospital.

“You can’t just throw some stuff together and expect it to work,” said a Bridges Café staffer responsible for assembling the popular salad. While he declined to divulge his name or the recipe, he confirmed that the scrupulously made sandwich has legion fans in the healthcare sector. When it appears on the lunch menu, he knows to anticipate a longer-than-usual line at the deli station.

Cashier Kathy Clawson concurred.

“Everybody loves it, and I love it too,” she said before reaching for the proper superlative: “It’s the chicken salad of chicken salads.” 

And it’s not alone among the city’s celebrated sandwiches.

In July, Southern food chronicler John T. Edge singled out Jacksonville’s Russ-Doe’s Sandwich Shop’s Breakfast in a Sack for inclusion on his list of “10 Must-Try Southern sandwiches” for Garden & Gun magazine, name checking it alongside the likes of egg-olive salad at Trowbridge’s in Florence, Alabama, and lemon pepper wet chicken at Atlanta’s How Crispy Express. Describing Russ-Doe’s pita pockets as “perfect morning takeaways,” he concluded his praise with a near-coronation.

“You could make a case for Jacksonville as the South’s second-best sandwich city after New Orleans,” he ruled.

Article continues below

More from Jax Today

Florida may allow bear hunting for first time in a decade

First Coast Hispanic chamber to recognize business leaders

Redevelopment plans emerge for Regency Square Mall

Jacksonville Today thanks our sponsors. Become one.

Asked to elaborate on his decree—which he revealed will feature prominently in an upcoming episode of TrueSouth, the food-and-culture show he hosts on ESPN’s SEC Network—Edge spoke highly of the Worcestershire sauce-soaked steak on homemade bread at Jacksonville’s much-revered Blue Boy Sandwich Shop and the proudly baroque camel rider compiled and dressed at All American Hot Dog & Sandwiches.

Edge has also scribbled laudatory notes about the banana pepper-forward rider at Cleo’s Sandwich Shop, as well as assorted handheld takes on fried chicken and barbecue, ranging from Callahan to St. Augustine. But he confessed he wasn’t familiar with the chicken salad sandwich prepared at Wolfson, which contracts with Morrison Healthcare for foodservice.

Part of the reason for the sandwich’s obscurity outside of pediatric circles is nobody’s ever sure when it’s going to appear. It isn’t offered every other Tuesday or two days after ginger chicken shows up on the steam table. Rather, it’s as fluky as a rainbow. 

Jeff Aldrich, one fan who first sampled the sandwich in August and deemed it “damn good,” has struck out each time he’s returned to the cafeteria for a second go-round. Invariably, employees tell him it was just on offer a few days prior.

“I’m going to be monitoring if I have to stop by once a week,” Aldrich vowed.

He’s not the only parent of a one-time patient to feel the sandwich’s magnetic tug. According to Clawson, “People come and taste the chicken salad, and then they come back when they don’t have an appointment.”

I’ve encountered the same frustrating problem as Aldrich, which is why this story is short an illuminating description of the rave-worthy sandwich itself. Is the chicken salad distinguished by a touch of mustard powder? Sweetened by Vidalia onions? Textured by walnuts? Elevated by tarragon?

Morrison Healthcare isn’t saying. The Atlanta-based hospital food behemoth didn’t respond to messages from Jacksonville Today seeking chicken salad information. Consequently, it’s unclear whether Morrison serves the same chicken salad at all 1,000 hospitals where the company runs the kitchen.

There’s some online evidence that Morrison has had chicken salad successes elsewhere. For example, after morning DJ Chris “Gazelle” Arsenault returned to work at Fun 107 in Fairhaven, Massachusetts, following a mild heart attack, he told his co-hosts that “the little secret gem” at St. Luke’s—a Morrison Healthcare client—is the chicken salad sandwich.

As a patient, “You can get it anytime you want,” he said, adding that its constant availability made his hospital stay feel like a cruise vacation.

Similarly, a Northeastern food blogger who polled his grandmother and aunts for chicken salad wisdom was disappointed when “they all agreed [that] the best chicken salad was from the hospital in Greenville, Pennsylvania,” another Morrison Healthcare property.

Yet the sandwich maker at Wolfson rejected the suggestion that Morrison chicken salad is the same everywhere. Regardless of the recipe’s standardization, he said, “We all cook different”—particularly in a regional sandwich capital.