From calorie count to portion sizes, we wanted to find all the differences between Subway in the US and Australia. This is "Food Wars."
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00:00From calorie count to portion sizes, we wanted to find out the biggest differences between
00:04Subway in the U.S. and in Australia. This is Food Wars.
00:14Standard Subway sandwiches in Australia come in two sizes, a six inch and a foot long,
00:20which is a 12 inch. The subs in the U.S. also come in two sizes, six inch or foot long,
00:26which is 12 inches. In 2013, a Facebook post went viral after someone measured their foot long to be
00:31just 11 inches long. A lawsuit was filed but eventually dropped because the plaintiff's
00:36attorney learned that the breads arrive frozen and are stretched then baked in the store. So
00:41there is going to be some discrepancies in the size and shape of each sub. I guess we better check and
00:46see how long our foot long actually is. It's a foot long. I actually think this might be a little over
00:5312 inches. To me, it looks like it's 12 and a half to 12, maybe 0.7 inches long. The U.S. offers
01:02catering. If you order the easy order sandwich platter, you get five foot long sandwiches cut
01:07into threes for a total of 15 pieces. Australia also has a catering menu. Our platter is called
01:12the classic sub platter and it is the same as the U.S. So they weren't able to give us the party sub,
01:18which I am devastated about because I only realized that a party sub was actually six foot. I have an
01:24idea with my mind what six foot would look like, but I don't actually know. I'm going to say, I need
01:29to measure this because I need to see. That is how big this subway would be. Who has a big enough
01:36oven to cook this? The drink sizes in Australia are not quite straightforward. We've got two standard
01:42sizes for your soft drinks. There's a 390ml bottle and a 600ml bottle, but then the other drinks come
01:49in a range of sizes just depending on the manufacturer. We keep things a little simpler in the U.S. by
01:55having fountain drinks and they come in four sizes. You can get a small, a medium, a large, or the gallon.
02:02This is a gallon of lemonade. Subway does also sell bottle drinks and they come in a range of sizes.
02:08Here is everything that you can find in an Australian Subway that you can't find in the U.S.
02:17And here is everything you'll find on Subway's menu in the U.S. that you won't be able to find in
02:22Australia. One thing to know is that Subway lets you customize your sandwiches in whatever way you
02:26want. But for the purpose of this video, we're only going to be looking at the advertised menu items.
02:32Otherwise, we would be here all day. We have three types of bread in Australia. We have wheat bread,
02:37white bread, and malted rye. And the malted rye looks really, really nice. Look how squishy and soft
02:44that is. And now, do you want to eat me? The U.S. has four types of breads. Artisan Italian,
02:54artisan flatbread, hearty multigrain, and Italian herbs and cheese. Let's start with our subs.
02:59In Australia, every advertised sandwich flavor is also available as a rat or a salad.
03:07Wraps come in a white, gluten-free, or a multigrain.
03:16And our salads can be a small or a large. For the fillings of a sub wrap or salad, you can get
03:23a three pepper chicken tender. Ooh, there is a lot of mayo and that chicken is heavy. And we have our
03:33barbecue pool to pork. I didn't know what I was expecting, but that is a lot of barbecue sauce on
03:38that. And then we have our chicken and bacon ranch melt. So I know that you guys in America love your
03:48ranch dressing. Ranch isn't that popular here. I can't see any cheese, but I presume there would be
03:54cheese because if you're calling something a melt. Oh, there's bacon as well.
03:58This is so good. I don't know why we don't do much sandwiches or anything with ranch. I really like
04:05ranch. And then we have our chicken classic, which I presume just might be like a chicken
04:10schnitty. Chicken schnitty is chicken schnitzel, obviously abbreviated in Australia. It's just a nice
04:17piece of chicken, really simple. Just a good classic chicken schnitty sandwich, really. And now we have
04:25our chicken schnitzel, which is weird. I thought that was a chicken schnitzel. I swear that the chicken
04:29looks the same. What makes this a chicken schnitty and the other one just a classic chicken? Oh, I guess
04:35that's not crumbed, but it looked crumbed to me. This is more crumbed than that. So now we have the
04:41buffalo chicken and apparently over in America, you don't use the same sauce as we do. I'd like to know what sauce
04:48you guys use because this is looking like to me a bit more of a sweet chili sauce.
04:55A slight spice towards the end. Now we have our leg ham and then we have our pizza melt. God,
05:02they did not shy away from all that salami. Then we have our seafood sensation. What is a seafood
05:10sensation? I don't want the sea in my sandwich. Who's ordered this? Surely not. Like, surely not.
05:18So basically all that inside, that's crab. We call it here like crab stick, I guess,
05:23but it's like processed crab. I don't know how much crab is really in it. That's a crime. That's
05:28a criminal offense. And now we have our smashed falafel. So in Australia, we have a really large
05:34Middle Eastern culture that's influenced a lot of our foods. Oh, all my Middle Eastern friends would
05:40be so disappointed right now. I want to see how this compares to other falafels.
05:48And now we have our steak melt with a smoky chipotle sauce and then our veggie delight with avocado.
05:56Ton of veggies stacked on a multi-grain rye roll. My favorite one was a ranch. I love the ranch.
06:04Bring more ranch to Australia, please. Okay. So what do we got? This is the buffalo chicken. And then we
06:12have the cold cut combo. I kind of want to see what's in this one. I don't think I've ever tasted
06:17bologna in my entire life. Should I taste it?
06:24It tastes like a combination of ham and salami, but I'd rather just have ham or salami. It's a
06:29little salty because of all the meat in it, but bologna is just okay for me. This is the BLT,
06:35a grilled chicken, the steak. I don't, uh, I kind of just want to see what the vibe is with the steak.
06:42What does it mean to have steak at Subway? You know, it looks like to me the same beef that they
06:48use to make their Philly cheesesteak sandwiches, that like shredded beef.
06:54That's not that bad. Then we have the turkey and ham. We have roast beef, ham, rotisserie chicken.
07:00This is the pizza sub. It is like soaked through the paper. I think we need to try this one. I've
07:08never had the pizza sub before. It smells very like Italian herbs and spices, tomato. So it's
07:14not pizza sauce. It's marinara sauce with big pepperonis. There are also some green peppers and
07:21red onions in here with lettuce and some cheese. It's not as satisfying as just eating a pizza.
07:28I don't get it. This one's a miss for me. The pepperoni does taste really good though.
07:33We also have a veggie delight and a spicy Italian. Then we have the Subway Series subs. This is a
07:40collection of 12 sandwiches that was introduced back in 2022 and they've added three more options
07:46since then. If you don't know what the Subway Series sandwiches are, they're preset sub options.
07:51So instead of you going down the line and picking everything that goes into your sandwich, these are
07:55all like preset options. We have the Grand Slam ham and the Titan Turkey. Both of these contain 33%
08:01more meat. I don't really know why. I'm going to try to rapid fire go down the list of all of these
08:08sandwiches that are right in front of me. So, so please, please, please be nice. We have the garlic
08:16roast beef, the beast, the Philly, teriyaki blitz, the outlaw, the monster, the hot shot italiano,
08:20the ultimate BMT, supreme meats, the boss, all pro sweet onion teriyaki, the elite chicken and bacon
08:25ranch, the great garlic, the sliced avo Mexicali, pickleball club, the all-american club, the subway
08:30club, and the sliced avo turkey cali club. After a while, none of these names sound like English to
08:36my mouth or ears. I do want to see what the great garlic looks and tastes like. I love garlic. I don't
08:43think I've ever had much garlic on a sandwich now that I'm thinking about it. I definitely have.
08:47I'm just like blanking on what sandwich it was. It looks like it might be the grilled chicken pieces
08:53or the rotisserie chicken pieces. There's lettuce, red onion, tomato, definitely some probably garlic
09:00mayo or garlic aioli, and shredded cheese, which I feel like I haven't seen in a subway sandwich before.
09:06Aioli! Oh, that's a cute baby name. I never thought I would say this. I think it's too garlicky. The aioli
09:13is just a bit much. I feel like if they just dialed back how much they put in the sandwich,
09:18it wouldn't be so overwhelmingly garlicky where that's like all I can taste. But unfortunately,
09:23it's not bad though. It's just like too much sauce. I do want to try the pickleball. I love pickles,
09:29so I hope this is pickle heavy. If not, why the name? There's definitely pickles. In the pickleball,
09:35we have red onion, lettuce, tomato, honey mustard, ham, obviously pickles, and bacon.
09:43I don't know about this one. It feels like all the ingredients aren't necessarily working very well
09:47together. It mostly just tastes like red onion. I just feel like our quantities are a little off.
09:53And these two are actually online exclusives. This is the Champ and the Bella Matza, which if you
09:59recall, was the sandwich that I would be if I was a Subway sandwich. Because why wouldn't I want to be
10:04the prettiest sandwich? In 1975, Subway created its flagship sandwich, the Italian BMT. The acronym
10:12originally stood for Brooklyn Manhattan Transit System, but later was known as the biggest, meatiest,
10:19and tastiest. Both countries' version of this sub are a little different. In Australia, our Italian BMT
10:25contains salami, pepperoni, and leg ham. Let's try it, shall we? Is this the biggest, meatiest,
10:33and tastiest sub I've ever had? I'll find out. I would never personally ever think to go to Subway
10:40and get three different meats on a sub. I don't know, that thought just never crosses my mind.
10:46In the US, our Italian BMT contains Genoa salami, Black Forest ham, and pepperoni. This is such a meat
10:52heavy sandwich. It's so heavy. It's dented the bread so bad.
11:01I think that I would like this more if the ham just wasn't there. I feel like it's not really adding
11:06anything, but the salami and pepperoni do taste really good together. This is not bad. I really
11:11like it. I like whatever vinaigrette dressing that they have on it is really, really tasty.
11:15This is a pretty good sandwich. What's up with leg ham? It's the leg of ham. It's the leg of the pig.
11:23You're allowed up to 10 toppings when you customize a sub at Subway, and we actually noticed that there
11:28are a few exclusives that you can only get in the US, like American cheese, pepper jack cheese,
11:34provolone cheese, Monterey cheddar, banana peppers, and we also have some exclusive extras,
11:38like the belgiozio fresh mozzarella and capicola ham, also known as gabagool. I know Harry's gonna
11:44want me to say gabagool. What if we combined as many US-exclusive toppings as possible into one
11:50US-only sub? That's what this is. So the US-only sub is made up of the hearty multigrain bread,
11:56the cold-cut combo, which is ham, salami, and bologna, pepper jack cheese, the belgiozio fresh
12:03mozzarella, banana peppers, creamy sriracha, and yellow mustard. This sounds awful. It doesn't look
12:10any better, but I'm going to taste it. It's sub. The sauces are doing a lot of work right now in
12:21covering up all the weird flavors, but yeah, don't get this. It's not very good. We also have some
12:27exclusive toppings in Australia. We have our natural cheddar cheese, our mozzarella cheese,
12:34and our old English cheese. Oh, that looks really orange. And in some locations, you can even get
12:41beetroot and pineapple. Pineapple and beetroot are really, really popular in Australia. We love
12:48pineapple or beetroot on our burgers. It's not a surprise that Subway stocks pineapple and beetroot.
12:54I think it's really weird that it's not everywhere. Like, I would have assumed that it'd be at all
12:59Subway stores. Our exclusive extras are a double meat and smoky bacon and carrots, which is an outrage.
13:06I can't believe you don't have that in the US. What about an Australian-only sub? And here's one
13:11with malted rye, a chicken schnitzel, smoky bacon, old English cheese, and then we have thousand island
13:19dressing and blue cheese dressing. It was just, like, too many flavors, too many creamy
13:31textures, too many creamy sauces in it. Like, this is not a true representation of Australia.
13:37Subway also does breakfast, which I had no idea about. You can get any of the following in either a wrap
13:43or a flatbread. So we have the bacon, egg and cheese, the Black Forest ham, egg and cheese, and the steak
13:48egg and cheese. There's, like, a bunch of folded egg in here. Here are our exclusive breakfast items
13:54that come either as a sub or a wrap. Starting off, we have our bacon and egg sub, and then we have our
14:03ham, egg and cheese, and then we have our ham, tomato and cheese. Onto the sides. In the US, we have a lot of chips.
14:11It does vary depending on which subway you go to, but at our subway, we have Doritos, Classic Lays,
14:18Baked Lays, Harvest Cheddar Sun Chips, Miss Vicky's Jalapeno Chips, and we also have a Go-Go Squeeze,
14:25which is, like, a little applesauce pouch for babies. Or adults. I would enjoy one of these.
14:31And in Australia, these are our exclusive sides. We have an avocado toastie, which looks disgusting,
14:39and then we have our Cheesy Garlic Toasty, our Garlic and Herb Toasty, our Southern-Style Chicken
14:47Bites, and now we have our Meatball Moza pot with six pieces of little meatballs in there.
14:56That's yum. It's, like, the same meatball that they would put on yourself.
15:00And then we have our Chipotle Quesadilla, which just looks a little bit sad, really.
15:07It's just a bit of sauce and four pieces of onion.
15:14And our chips. So our chips come in our Smith's Crinkle Cut Original,
15:20our Smith's Crinkle Cut Salt and Vinegar,
15:24and a new and limited edition Smith's Meatball Sub Crinkle Cut.
15:31There's nothing meatball-y about this. You know what time it is.
15:37It's time for Sauce Talk!
15:39Sauce Talk.
15:41We have mustard, oil, red wine vinegar, creamy sriracha, buffalo sauce, sweet onion teriyaki,
15:49peppercorn ranch, and Baja Chipotle.
15:52I want to know what the sweet onion teriyaki tastes like.
15:55It looks very gelatinous.
15:59The flavor's not as strong as I'd like it to be.
16:02I feel like I'm mostly getting the oil.
16:04Peppercorn ranch.
16:06That is a really good ranch.
16:08I like how it's got a bit of acidity to it.
16:12It's like tart.
16:14More tart than a regular ranch is.
16:16That is really yummy, actually.
16:18Here are all the sauces that are exclusive to Australia.
16:21We have the habanero hot sauce,
16:23a blue cheese dressing,
16:25we have a smoky barbecue,
16:27a chipotle southwest,
16:30a sweet onion dressing,
16:32ranch dressing,
16:34tomato sauce,
16:35spicy mayonnaise,
16:36thousand island dressing,
16:38and sweet chili.
16:39I only have a plain chip,
16:41so that's what we're going to work with.
16:42I want to try the habanero hot sauce,
16:44because I do like a bit of spice.
16:47That is spicy,
16:48and I thought I played it too safe,
16:49because I didn't put too much on my chip,
16:50but oh my god,
16:52I want to try sweet onion.
16:58That's a nice sauce.
16:59We do have one exclusive cookie flavor here in the U.S.,
17:03and that is the oatmeal raisin cookie.
17:05I love oatmeal raisin cookies.
17:08They're underappreciated.
17:10I love Subway cookies,
17:11because they stay soft and chewy.
17:13It's really, really good.
17:15I could eat ten of these.
17:17And we have one exclusive cookie flavor in Australia,
17:19which is the chocolate chip rainbow cookie.
17:22So, I presume it's filled with M&Ms.
17:31That's yum.
17:32So, something amazing happened
17:34when we went to go pick up our huge Subway order.
17:37They actually had the footlong cookie.
17:41So, obviously, we got it.
17:42We have to try it.
17:43Look at this.
17:44They also had a footlong pretzel
17:47and a footlong churro.
17:48These two are collabs.
17:50The pretzel is a collab with Auntie Anne's,
17:52and the churro is a collab with Cinnabon.
17:54Two of my favorite mall spots.
17:56Come on.
17:57Oh!
17:58Oh!
18:03The texture is honestly not what I was expecting.
18:06It doesn't really taste like a normal chocolate chip cookie.
18:08It more so tastes like a cookie cake.
18:11Let's try the pretzel.
18:12I love a pretzel.
18:15It's a good pretzel.
18:17The churro.
18:19It's all right.
18:20And to finish off the exclusives,
18:22we have some drink options that you can only get in the U.S.
18:25We have regular coffee,
18:27chocolate milk,
18:28Diet Coke,
18:29Hubert's Lemonade,
18:30Subway Fresh Brewed Iced Tea,
18:31Sweetened or Unsweetened,
18:33Dasani Water,
18:34Gatorade Cool Blue,
18:35Honest Kids Super Fruit Punch,
18:37Simply Lemonade,
18:38Simply Orange,
18:38Simply Apple,
18:40Vitamin Water,
18:40Vitamin Water Power C,
18:421% Low Fat Milk,
18:44Monster Energy,
18:44Green and Monster Energy Zero Ultra.
18:47So sorry that you don't have Diet Coke in Australia,
18:50but I hear that you guys like Coke Zero more anyway.
18:52Here are our exclusive drinks.
18:55We have our Coca-Cola Vanilla,
18:57a Coca-Cola Vanilla Zero Sugar,
19:00our Raspberry Fanta,
19:02Mount Franklin,
19:03that's just spring water,
19:05our Powerade Mountain Blast,
19:07Powerade Flowberry,
19:09our Pump Water,
19:11our Pump Water Berry,
19:14our Cascade Lemon Lime and Bitters.
19:16Now,
19:17interesting story with Lemon Lime and Bitters.
19:19Lemon Lime and Bitters is a classic Australian drink.
19:22Over a hundred years ago,
19:23Lemon Lime and Bitters was invented by an Australian
19:26who basically found a way to cure seasickness.
19:30It's so popular in Australia,
19:32grabbing a Lemon Lime and Bitters drink.
19:34And I remember,
19:35I think every Aussie kid can definitely relate
19:37to the first time they had Lemon Lime and Bitters.
19:40And,
19:40you know,
19:41because Bitters has like a touch,
19:42like the ever so slightest bit of alcohol in it.
19:44So you'd have a sip and you'd be like,
19:46oh my God,
19:46I just had some alcohol.
19:48This is wild.
19:49And then we move on to our Lipton iced tea
19:51in a lemon flavor,
19:52Lipton iced tea in peach.
19:55And then we have our V Energy drink
19:57and our V Energy blue drink.
20:01V Energy drinks are very similar to a Red Bull.
20:03It's just an Australian energy drink.
20:05We have our Daily Orange juice
20:07and our Just Juice Apple.
20:09Subway was founded in 1965
20:15by Fred DeLuca and Peter Buck in Connecticut.
20:17Now it has the most stores
20:19out of any fast food chain in the entire world.
20:21Back in 2014,
20:22it was reported that Subway served
20:24about 7.6 million subs every day.
20:27Subway landed in Australia in 1988
20:30with a store in Perth.
20:32Now we have 1,215 stores
20:35and that's as of July, 2023,
20:38which is the largest number of stores
20:40outside the U.S.
20:42That still pales in comparison
20:43to the 20,000 in the U.S.
20:46Unfortunately,
20:47Subway's had to close over 200 stores
20:50in Australia since 2015
20:52as people's eating habits have changed
20:54and fast food became less popular
20:56and the pandemic took its toll.
20:58If you see Subway modernizing stores
21:01and streamlining the menu,
21:03it's part of an attempt to stop that trend.
21:05Until 2022,
21:06Subway had barely updated its menu.
21:09The Subway series
21:10that we showed you earlier
21:11is probably its biggest menu update
21:13in its 57-year history.
21:15Also as part of its PR drive,
21:17in July 2023,
21:18Subway was offering a lifetime of free subs
21:20if you legally changed your name to Subway.
21:23And according to the sandwich chain,
21:25nearly 10,000 people entered the competition.
21:28You guys,
21:29don't change your name to Subway.
21:30I wouldn't say that I go to Subway often.
21:34I would go to Subway
21:35if I am keen for something relatively healthy.
21:39I definitely do not go to Subway often.
21:42If ever,
21:43I used to go a lot in high school
21:45just for the cookies
21:46because that's honestly my favorite part.
21:48I actually really do like Subway.
21:50I love the maple sub as well.
21:52The maple,
21:53oh my gosh,
21:54the best thing to get
21:56when you are kind of being a bit cheeky
21:58is a maple sub
22:00with the Italian herbs and cheese.
22:03Oh,
22:03oh my God,
22:04unreal.
22:04I love it so much.
22:06I don't love Subway.
22:07There are so many good sandwich places around me
22:10that I've never felt the urge to
22:12and I don't think their sandwiches are that good.
22:15They're like passable.
22:16A good turkey sub from Subway does hit,
22:19but it's not something I find myself craving.
22:25Which country is getting the better deal on its subs?
22:27Let's compare a turkey footlong sub in both countries.
22:31In the US,
22:31one of these will cost you $11.49.
22:34In Australia,
22:35a turkey footlong sub will cost you $12.95.
22:39So it's actually cheaper in Australia.
22:41In the US,
22:42you can get a Subway meal
22:43that's kind of like a combo through their catering.
22:46This gets you a footlong,
22:48chips,
22:48and a cookie for $10.99.
22:50In Oz,
22:51we can get a similar deal called a sub box,
22:53which includes a footlong,
22:55two cookies,
22:56and a 600ml drink.
22:58This will cost you $23.60 AUD.
23:01Let's compare the classic turkey sub to see if there's any differences in calories.
23:08In the US,
23:09a turkey footlong sub contains 540 calories,
23:138 grams of total fat,
23:1480 grams of carbs,
23:1612 grams of sugar,
23:17and 1,680 milligrams of sodium.
23:20In Oz,
23:21a turkey footlong sub contains 526 calories.
23:24The most calorific item you'll find at Subway in the US is the beast.
23:30This is a footlong sub and it has 1,460 calories.
23:34The most calorific menu item in Australia is the three pepper chicken footlong sub,
23:39which has 1,002 calories.
23:45Over the years,
23:46Subway's come under fire for some of the ingredients they use in their sandwiches.
23:50So here's some of the claims that we thought we would talk about that we found interesting.
23:55The first controversy was the petition in 2014 for the removal of,
24:00a word that I cannot pronounce,
24:02but I'm going to attempt to anyway,
24:04azodicarbonamide,
24:06found in bread products in fast food chains such as Subway.
24:10What is azodicarbonamide, you ask?
24:14It's a chemical compound used in the food industry as an additive to conditioned dough and bleach flowers,
24:20predominantly in white bread and cereals.
24:23However,
24:23its other use is a blowing agent to make foamed plastics in products like yoga mats.
24:29The petition grew a lot of attention and just days later,
24:33Subway announced they were phasing out the ingredients.
24:36While Subway was targeted for its healthy food claims,
24:39other major fast food chains such as McDonald's and Starbucks were also subject to the use of the chemical.
24:44Secondly,
24:45Subway's bread was brought to the Supreme Court in Ireland after it was found to be too sugary to be classified as bread.
24:51It began when Bookbinders,
24:53an Irish franchise for Subway,
24:54didn't want to pay taxes on the bread,
24:56arguing that it should be classified as a staple food.
24:59However,
25:00the judges found that the bread was part of the confectionery category because of the ratio of sugar to flour
25:05was nearly five times too high to be classified as a food staple,
25:08according to Ireland's Value-Added Tax Act of 1972.
25:12The sugar in the bread can only contain 2% of its weight from the flour,
25:15whereas Subway's bread options contain 10%.
25:18Subway's response was to defend its ingredients,
25:21and a spokesperson for the chain said Subway's bread is, of course, bread.
25:24In the UK,
25:25the bread is still classified as bread, but with a higher sugar content,
25:28so it's just Ireland who will have to pay the higher tax.
25:31In 2021,
25:33a lawsuit was filed against Subway claiming the tuna in the sandwiches was anything but tuna.
25:40In response to the claim,
25:41Subway insisted the tuna was high quality and 100% real,
25:46and they even launched a website called subwaytunafacts.com.
25:50Following these claims,
25:52a reporter from the New York Times published a lengthy report where they sent samples of the tuna
25:57from Subway off to a lab to be tested.
26:00The lab concluded that either the meat was so processed that they could not detect tuna,
26:06or a different substance was being used.
26:08In 2023,
26:09the customer who filed the lawsuit asked to withdraw the claim,
26:12saying that she was pregnant and needed to focus on her health.
26:15The claim has been dismissed and cannot be brought again to court due to their agreement.
26:18Stop it.
26:20Subway would make you try and legally change your name so you would get free subs.
26:24I told the money you'd be saving.
26:26Does that mean you can get free subs in the entire world,
26:28or is it just strictly to the US?
26:30Do you want to do it?
26:34I'm considering it.