Let she who has never enjoyed an unusual sandwich cast the first stone.

Actually, a number of stones are being cast at the New York Times for sharing a recipe for a Peanut Butter and Pickle Sandwich that has garnered a reaction the likes of which we haven’t seen since … well, since the Times published that recipe for pea guacamole and the Internet lost its mind.

“Consider this less a recipe, more of a prod in a direction that you never considered,” the Times tweeted last week, linking to sandwich-assembly instructions first published in 2012.

“This sandwich does not necessarily need a recipe, given its simplicity. But it’s an unlikely pairing, is peanut butter and pickle, and sometimes that” — pushing you out of your comfort zone — “is what a recipe is for,” the paper asserted of what it said was NYT book critic Dwight Garner’s favorite sandwich. (He called “a thrifty and unacknowledged American classic.”)

“The vinegary snap of the pickles tempers the unctuousness of the peanut butter, and it’s an unusual pantry sandwich for when luncheon meats leave you cold,” according to the paper.

The response to the resurfaced recipe from the Twittersphere was swift and sustained.

Some commenters were super indignant: “Ewwww!!!!” “No way!!” “Imma take out a subscription just so I can cancel it.”

And then there was the one cheekily suggesting the PB&P sammy might pave the way to other sandwiches, like “Mayo & thumbtacks” or “Bacon, lettuce & crayons.”

But the sandwich’s doubters may just have been drowned out by its defenders. Turns out a lot of people grew up eating peanut butter and pickle sandwiches, and loving them.

Some have suggested adding mayo … or cheese … or both. Others advise swapping the bread-and-butter pickles for dill. One commenter said the key is to toast the bread, which “really makes it pop.”

So many ideas for improvement on this “classic.” Most of them seemingly quite earnest. Yet it’s hard to know what to make of one Twitter user’s suggestion to add both jelly and ketchup to the sandwich and that in so doing “it becomes AWESOME!”

To each his or her own when it comes to sandwiches, but that may be taking it a bit far.

What do you think? Would you try it? Do you think peanut butter and pickle sandwiches sound disgusting or dill-icious?

Photo: iStock