NY Yankees’ Aaron Judge’s Go-To Sandwich Is a Deli Classic

The 2024 World Series is well underway and while the Los Angeles Dodgers have taken an early lead, there’s still hope for the New York Yankees. And a lot of that hope rests on Aaron Judge’s shoulders. Going into the World Series, it appeared the series could be summed up by a head of Dodgers’ MVP Shohei Ohtani versus Yankees’ star, Aaron Judge. So with all of that pressure, what does his game day routine look like?

Of course, there are workouts and meditating, and more working out, but let’s be real—we’re here for the food. And in a recent interview, Aaron Judge admitted to one pregame meal we never saw coming.

Aaron Judge’s Favorite Foods Are NYC Staples

Judge may be a California native, but he’s all but converted to a New Yorker when it comes to food. After eight seasons with the Yankees, Judge’s culinary preferences lean heavily towards New York’s finest.

In a GQ interview, Judge said that his go-to cheat meal is pizza. “If we have a good night and, especially being here in the city, we’ll try different pizza places and load up.” His favorite pizza joint is none other than Lucali, a Brooklyn restaurant known to also be a favorite of Beyoncé, Jay-Z, and even Taylor Swift.

And despite keeping things fairly “bland and basic” during the season, Judge admitted that’s not always the case. In an interview last month with MLB’s “Over the Plate” series, Judge had a curious answer to the question, “What is something that you have to eat to be ‘The Judge’?”

“We’ve got some good chefs in New York and they’ve been cooking up some nice chopped cheeses, and that gets you…yeah,” Judge joked, adding, “I don’t know if I should be telling the kids that they should be eating a chopped cheese before the game.”

What Is a Chopped Cheese?

For the uninitiated, chopped cheese sandwiches are a staple in New York City’s culinary traditions. You can walk into any bodega (aka corner store) with a deli and get a piping hot, gooey chopped cheese, usually in under 5 minutes and for just a few bucks. While pizza and bagels may get all the love, a chopped cheese is the unsung hero of NYC food.

Chopped cheese (or chop cheese, as they’re sometimes called) sandwiches feature all the makings of a cheeseburger, reimagined in a sub sandwich. Think of the chopped cheese like the Philly cheesesteak’s cousin, with ground beef swapped in for sliced steak.

Essentially, it’s one or two ground beef burger patties fried on a flat-top griddle with onions, seasonings, and American cheese, all chopped up with a spatula so all the ingredients mingle and the cheese melts. The cheesy meat is piled high on a roll with traditional sub toppings like shredded lettuce and sliced tomato.

No matter where you get it, the chopped cheese is not the lightest fare, so I can see why Judge doesn’t recommend it to everyone as a pregame ritual. But for a professional athlete like Judge, it’s technically got a good mix of carbs and protein, right?

So even if Aaron Judge and his Yankees team don’t clinch the 2024 title, we will still consider him an honorary New Yorker with food opinions as strong as these. But Aaron, if you’re reading this—there’s a round of chopped cheeses on me in your future if you turn this thing around!