Sometime in the mid-eighteenth century, John Montagu wanted to gamble and/or do work1, and he asked for a lump of meat to be shoved between two slices of bread, and then he ate it, and, in so doing, created the sort of portable instameal that the world over has been happy to indulge upon ever since.
1 popular legend has it the former, one of his biographers, who admittedly would know what he’s talking about I guess, insists the latter. Although the dude gambled a hell of a lot so maybe it’s a little of both, who am I to say?
By 1909, in fact, the sandwich was two things: impossibly variegated, and also stodgy and old-fashioned. Thus, Eva Greene Fuller came along, to rescue the impossible old-fashioned reputation thereof and to convince America that the sandwich was a foodstuff more than worthy of their time and attention (I may be extrapolating as to the author’s goals here). To do so, she assembled the Up-to-Date Sandwich Book: 400 Ways to Make a Sandwich. The book is, as most old cookbooks are, a very interesting window into the way food was addressed in the past.
1909 is before the supermarket, before most refrigeration, several decades before the interstate system made it possible to haul food across the country in any kind of timely fashion (although not before the train, which did some of this also), before automobiles, before the widespread availability of electricity, before, in short, anything that made the process of sandwiching anything like it is now. As a result, many things were just bang out of the question.
The whole book is downright fascinating, a look at the many functions of sandwiches – some are portable meals (then as now), some are cocktail hors d’oeuvres, some appear to be cake-replacement style desserts. The book itself is divided into seven sections – Fish, Meat, Cheese, Nut, Sweet, Miscellaneous and Canapes2 – and seems, to me at least, to be alarmingly comprehensive.
2 canapes being a kind of cheat, as these aren’t really all “sandwiches” as currently recognized, but either the category was looser 109 years ago, or Ms. Fuller decided it was close enough since it’s still “stuff on bread”.
While the first three parts were mostly about how weird all of this are, we’re going for more positivity here at the end of 2022, and so we’re going to talk about the things that are, in fact, not out of the realm of possibility for actually being an edible sandwich that would bring joy to sandwich-eaters. Previous parts of this now-annual series can be found here, here, and here.
And here we go.
See? A totally normal fried-oyster sandwich. With, admittedly, a garnish.
I WOULD EAT THIS?: Fried oyster sandwiches are, you know, fine, but I’m really enamored of the orange full of chili sauce. I presume you dip the sandwich in it, and I bet it’s great. I might even try that sometime soon.
It’s a sandwich made of the inside bit of a bar appetizer.
I WOULD EAT THIS?: I would! In fact, since pimentos are generally (albeit not always) sold chopped, and neufchatel no longer comes in…uh…cakes, this would be considerable easier to make than it was 112 years ago, and I can see myself landing on it in all sorts of sandwich-necessary emergency situations.
I concede that, owing to the passage of time and the slight drift in the way that recipes are written and all that, the phrase “mashed to a pulp” in this recipe is somewhat alarming. Still and all: sardine salad, babyyyyy.
I WOULD EAT THIS?: It’s true that I’ve never mashed the ingredients involved to a pulp, but I sure have eaten a lot of sardines and cream cheese on english muffins. I used to do it quite regularly, actually.
It is now, on the eighty-fourth day of my thirty-ninth year, that I find it odd that we make egg salad with mayonnaise, which feels traife? I mean, it’s totally normal and won’t make anybody angry, but man, it’s kind of weird, right? Maybe it’s seeing the eggs treated wildly elaborately that makes me notice it. Maybe it’s that, once more, we’re back in the land of “mayonnaise dressing” which, again, must be different from mayonnaise, because Eva also just says regular mayonnaise when she means regular mayonnaise. That said, I am, four years into this, starting to have some questions about the single-authorship of this work.
I WOULD EAT THIS?: I would eat this, but I would never make this. So, you know.
Every year I write these things, and every year I wonder about the dipping the lettuce in the mayonnaise thing, and every year I forget to do it until the next year. Maybe if I also decide to tie a ribbon around my sandwich I’ll remember better. That’s what ribbons are for, after all. Rememberin’.
I WOULD EAT THIS?: Sure. It’s an egg, lettuce and mayonnaise sandwich. I wouldn’t eat the ribbon, but I’m charmed by it anyway. It seems so fancy. It’s nice to have fancy things sometimes.
I have somehow, despite this being my whole actual thing, never made a beet/vinegar/cream cheese sandwich, but like that’s a shock to me. It seems very much like something I would do!
I WOULD EAT THIS?: I mean it. I’m genuinely surprised. I’ve never done this. I love beets. I love sandwiches. This is a home-run.
Ok, so, I don’t know that I would think of a pickle and butter sandwich as something that I would choose for myself, but, if I should be presented with a pickle and butter sandwich, I sure would eat it.
I WOULD EAT THIS?: Again, I don’t think I’d make it, but I like pickled peppers. Of all of these, this is the one I’m wishy-washiest about, but, you know, they got me with “Diamond shape”. That’s very good. A diamond is totally different from a square rotated 45 degrees. Totally. Much fancier.
This is another totally-normal thing to eat. The thing that makes it noteworthy is that, for whatever reason, it’s in the “Salads” section of the book. That’s weird. It’s also worthy of note that one of the old-timiest things in this book is the use of butter as a sandwich-constant instead of cheese. Like, this would be the sort of sandwich I would expect to see a cheese on, and here it is not.
I WOULD EAT THIS?: It’s a chicken and pickle sandwich. Of course I would eat this.
It really feels like this is the bit of a sandwich you’d put around something else, but i’ve eaten plenty of cheese and lettuce sandwiches, so it’s not so weird. An underappreciated aspect of this book is how specific the bread choices are. It makes me laugh.
I WOULD EAT THIS?: I would! I’d probably do more than “sprinkle” it, but, you know, I’m not much of a one for decorum
Two things about this are noteworthy: one, this is a great idea. Two: boiled dressing! So: mayonnaise is temperamental and finicky and, besides which, requires that you have access to cooking oils (rather than animal fats), which were also tricky to come by in 1909, and thus, even if you had some, using some to make a temperamental, finicky dressing was difficult, and the first commercially-available mayonnaises weren’t coming down the pike for another few years. Enter: boiled dressing. Boiled dressing is not actually boiled. It’s milk, and then the set of seasonings you’d expect for mayonnaise (mustard, cayenne), fortified with flour and eggs and seasoned with vinegar and sugar. I love to see it in its natural habitat (a book of wacky sandwich recipes), and I’m happy to see it here.
I WOULD EAT THIS?: I would, but as I have no interest in boiled dressing, I would just make mayonnaise, so it would be more like the next sandwich.
Well, if nothing else let this stand as a pre-facto summary judgement on Fawlty Towers, because this isn’t the recipe that the American tourist gives to Basil Fawlty at all. It doesn’t have grapes or walnuts in it. It would probably be better with walnuts. Leaving out the grapes, though, might annoy American tourists, but is a rock-solid move, and this recipe for Waldorf salad is very, very close to my own.
I WOULD EAT THIS?: Dude, a Waldorf salad is one of the few traditionally-accepted savory uses of an apple, I would eat Waldorf salad every damn day.
It’s ham salad – you can see previous installments for the treatment of ham salad – but I love the part where you also grind up the pickles. I’ve not done it, but I love it
I WOULD EAT THIS?: I mean, probably, but mostly because I’ll have really enjoyed running pickles through my meat grinder and I’ll have to have done something with them.
I suppose this is as safe a place as any to say the following: I prefer Neufchatel to cream cheese in almost every instance. I mean, I’m a big fan of both, but if you put them side by side, I’m going with Neufchatel every time.
I WOULD EAT THIS?: Not only would I eat this but this, but I, in fact have eaten this. And not in the way that I’ve normally eaten the sandwiches that are here but by ordering it in a restaurant. Taggart’s, in Canton, Ohio (home of the phosphate!) serves a sandwich that is this, with cream cheese instead of Neufchatel. While it’s true that I would have preferred it the other way, it’s a dynamite sandwich anyway. Go to Taggart’s and get one.
It’s nice to close it out with a little whimsy, you know? I feel like this is a sandwich I could share with my friend, a particularly brave and kind-hearted mouse.
I WOULD EAT THIS?: Oh absolutely. I wouldn’t ever make one – I lack the patience to spread cream cheese over walnut halves, and I also have big hands, so it would just be a disaster – but my brave and kind-hearted mouse friend and I would like all of the dainty cheese sandwiches you have, please.
Ohio Needs a Train 