SANDWICHES AGAIN (AGAIN)

I’ve been thinking about Lee Miller’s prize-winning recipes for open-sandwiches.  I have my reasons.
          One of the most highly prized volumes in the Psychogourmet Archive is Open Sandwiches and Cold Lunches: An Introduction to Danish culinary art,  by Asta Bang and Edith Rode.

It contains a lot of the kind of food you’d expect – herring, shrimp, cheese, sausage, and some things that you wouldn’t, such as an open sandwich with lard and potato, and (and I quote) ‘What would you say to a piece of buttered white bread with slices of a slightly unripe apples (sic) covered with a slab of liverpaste?'  I’m still trying to come up with an answer.

But I think my favorite is the Sandwich Pie, seen below on the right, essentially a loaf of bread got up to look like an iced sponge cake, with mustard butter, mayo, and Dutch cheese instead of frosting.

You know, I often think that sandwich recipes are unnecessary.  You put some things you like between or on slices of bread, and there you have it.  But I don’t think many of us would have come up with that sandwich pie.

And I’m not sure how many of us would have come up with Mrs. Beeton’s notorious ‘toast sandwich’ – two slices of bread with a slice of toast between them.  

I suppose it all depends on the bread, but as you see, Mrs. B does also suggest putting some meat in there, and also that it’s food for invalids.

Every bit as intriguing is the recipe that immediately precedes it: Toast and Water.

She admits it’s ‘exceedingly disagreeable’ drunk tepid or lukewarm, but I’m really not sure how great it would be at any temperature.  Also, when you strain it, what exactly gets strained out?  The bread I suppose, so you’ve just got some vaguely bready water.  It was a different age, obviously.