I think starting from the bottom of the list, and working up to my very favouritest sandwich 99 posts later, is perhaps the best way to curate this project. You’ll experience an almost palpable sense of tension as that coveted #1 spot gets closer! There’ll be surprises galore on the way – and contentious inclusions/exclusions should prove fodder for much robust debate!
Let’s get this historically important and authoritative list started with my Least Favourite Sandwich Of All Time!
#100 Marmite And Strawberry Jam On Retrieved Toast
Ingredients:
2x slices of week-old burnt toast retrieved from bottom of pedal bin
Marmite (pref with traces of marge) (Can’t be Vegemite as Vegemite doesn’t have the cojones to fight strawberry jam)
Off-brand Strawberry Jam (fruit count no higher than 30%, sugar higher than 50%)
Off-brand Margarine (or similar bright yellow spread, rock hard straight from the fridge)
Preparation:
– Shake off graveyard lettuce, coffee grounds etc. from toast (or not)
– Hack at Yellow Spread with wrong knife (or fork) and smear shards across toast, picking up carbon deposits
– 1x heaped teaspoon of Marmite dribbled, scraped, and mashed into carbonised Yellow Spread. Wipe off spoon with corner of toast
– Using same spoon (or fork), add too much strawberry jam and attempt to seal leakage by mashing second slice of toast on top
Serve with reheated (but only just) instant coffee and une nuage du lait pourri. Voila!
So are #99 to #90 going to be variations…. Marmite and “insert name of fruit here” jam on reheated toast?
Also. Have you done much research into the type of bread that works best as the retrieved toast – are we talking off brand supermarket white, Hovis finest, wholemeal or artisan sourdough ?
Chorleywood surely would be the only option.
Mornington Crescent!
Playing Afterword rules, you have to go via Abbey Road.
“So are #99 to #90 going to be variations…. Marmite and “insert name of fruit here” jam on reheated toast?” No – the toast is *retrieved*, not reheated. Unless we can appreciate the subtle yet crucial distinctions between ingredients we might as well call the whole thing off.
“The type of bread that works best as the retrieved toast” – if done right, it should be impossible to tell the type of bread used. This method of preparation – burning to a blackened crisp then leaving in a bin bag for several days – is akin to the fermentation and ageing of a fine Armagnac, where the source vine has transmuted into a sublime “otherness”.
You say retrieved, I would prefer rescued.
Or ‘curated’?
No, that’s eggs
Bravo! – a joke that’s good in all its parts.
Sandwiches are serious stuff.
You just cannot beat the trusty cheddar cheese and tomato sarnie.
Whatever kind of bread you choose to put it in.
Obviously, the better the cheddar, tomato, spread and bread, the better the experience.
A current one that I’m partial to is kipper and tomato ketchup. No real need to butter the bread for this one.
It’s some unearthly time in the morning here and I’m awake which is rather not be. I’ll think of sandwiches later, but as it’s National Croissant Day where do you stand on croissants?
Waits patiently for reply.
I can only assume vegemite won’t get a look in as most of you heathens would put marmite ahead of vegemite.
In a desperate attempt to shore up the illusory superiority of Vegemite the Aussies have also come up with Mighty Mite, Promite, and Sanitarium Marmite, which sounds like something you might apply to your piles.
The only true yeast spread is amusingly called Our Mate over here, and is made in NZ, since the product called Marmite is apparently restricted to medical applications.
Vegemite jars are terrific for putting herbs and spices in, however, whereas Marmite jars aren’t.
It was always my understanding that while good old British Marmite was made of yeast extract, its inferior Australian simulacrum was
cobbered together from yeast infections
Vegemite was developed during some sort of shortage during one of the wars I think. Out of necessity superiority is born.
Mrs Wells prefers Promite. It’s a worry.
@junior-wells “Vegemite was developed during some sort of shortage during one of the wars” – actually two shortages; taste, and food.
I have researched this further .It was supply shortages post WW1. Both are made from the dregs of the beer making process so I guess it comes down to the “secret herbs and spices”.
😏
Vegemite and lettuce.
Vegemite and cheddar cheese
Vegemite, cheddar cheese and lettuce.
Dunno how the marmite equivalent would go.
Substitute Marmite for Vegemite?
Yes, but I am unsure of the subtleties of marmite or, indeed the unsubtleties of marmite, so I can’t say with certainty that these sandwich masterpieces would be equally so if marmite were to be substituted for vegemite.
Memo: do NOT apply yeast and salt preparations to piles. He was joking.
I think.
Whoops!
Actually, I have an interesting story about chalfonts. I have a very mild affliction thereof, and so hied myself to the pharmacy to obtain relief in the form of a soothing unguent. Not speaking Thai, I essayed to demonstrate by hand gestures and facial expressions the nature of my complaint, with little success. I tried writing out haemmmorrrhhoiddds (a Welsh word, by the way) and speaking the word into what I believe is called an “app” on a telephone, to no avail. The nice lady suggested some entirely inappropriate treatments in the form of acne cream and scar repair cream, until her son, and English speaker, came through from the back room and we all had a good larf.
I imagine it would do a better job than Vegemite.*
* joke
Vegemite as a treatment for chalfonts? This makes more sense than anything I ever read on the internet. If someone can post me a sample I’ll give it the old college try.
You’re the Pro from Dover, Saucey!
Pros from Dover are very busy these days, what with trucks marooned on the M20 for hours on end. It said so in the local ‘paper’.
Back in about 1996, one of my team took a long holiday and ventured to the antipodes for almost a month. Knowing my morning penchant for a couple of rounds of buttered wholemeal toast with a smear of Marmite from the canteen, he kindly returned with a jar of Vegemite that he’d picked up especially for me. Luckily, the 100ml jobsworth fascist confiscatory ‘security’ principle had not yet, in those elysian, pre-Twin Towers days, been introduced. I was touched by his thoughtfulness.
Over a quarter of a century later, the little jar remains in my larder, unopened. So protective am I of my unalloyed love for original Marmite, that in all these years I have not dared to open the Vegemite jar lest it prove itself in any way superior to my beloved yeast based spread. I’m sure that the little present from Oz will remain unopened for the rest of my days.
The tangy legend of Burton Upon Trent remains unsullied in my personal lexicon of deliciousness to this day, alongside a pint of draught Bass, from whence its origins sprang.
We have been deluded into comparing Marmite with Vegemite by a bunch of bitterly envious and ignorant Australians. It is more futile than comparing apples with oranges. Marmite and Vegemite are entirely different things; one is a nutritious and zesty foodstuff, the other is Vegemite. The Australians have no national dish or foodstuff (unlike the Welsh!), and seek to compensate by gaslighting the civilised world into accepting Vegemite.
Not sure this is quite the zinger they think it is. Anybody know what Australia tastes like?
“Tastes like a cobber’s armpit after a day dipping sheep”
I too have an unopened jar of yon Vegemite I think the vintage may be similar to yours. I shall hie myself to my display cabinet and check.
That’s the second time you’ve said “hie”.
Hie, why, when?
Ask Jaygee, he’s a bright young chap with a keen grasp on recondite A’word in-jokes.
Well unless that jar is opened and on your toast Foxy, dont expect a visa anytime soon.
Although not of the same vintage as Foxy’s I am hoping my next of kin will be able to get it valued on the antiques roadshow.
That must be AI-generated. I don’t see grit listed as the first ingredient.
I believe vegemite, unopened or uncontaminated by other stuff like crumbs or butter has no expiry date
That may not be the case with your pussy marmite.
Pussy Marmite – TMFTL
Must we fling this filth at our pop kids?
At last a use for Vegemite.
I’m sure I’m not alone in having issues parsing this image.
I’m afraid AI isn’t up to flinging Marmite especially Pussy Marmite. This is the best it can come up with.
Sorry.
It’s almost like AI struggles with the basic functionality of the trebuchet.
@hubert-rawlinson The croissant, for all its fine qualities, can never be rightly thought of as a sandwich, and therefore falls outside the remit of this thread. Those who insist on slicing it and inserting a filling are clearly not using a real croissant, but some kind of doughy simulacrum twisted to resemble a croissant. A true croissant does not react kindly to being sliced and filled, a demeaning and invasive process to which it is unsuited.
That’s twice you’ve used simulacrum.
Credit where credit is due, J!
In an ironic twist on the AW StephenKinggate incident of a few years back, it was me who used the word the first time
Credit where credit is due, J!
In an ironic twist on the AW StephenKinggate incident of a few years back, it was me who used the word the first time
I think you will find that it was Plato who first used the word. Or Aristotle. One of the two. A very long time ago.
A demeaning and invasive process to which it is unsuited.
Hmmm
If only one slice is retrievable can I continue as above and present the open sandwich?
And stick an artisanal toothpick through a bit of strawberry and charge you an additional 50%?
The Swedes get a lot of snob credit for “inventing” the “open” sandwich, and for having a word for it that is untranslatable (except by “butteredbreadtable”). NOTE TO SWEDEN: This is not a fucking “open” sandwich. It is not even an unfinished sandwich, or an unpickuppable sandwich. It is no sandwich at all. It’s a stupid idea you should be ashamed of, and the reason the word is “untranslatable” is because nobody thinks it’s worth a name of its own.
This is all completely correct, as long as you change the word “Swedes” to “Danes”, and change the phrase “NOTE TO SWEDEN” to “NOTE TO DENMARK”.
Thank you. The Swedes have the fjords as compensation.
I thought they had Volvos?
That’s the Finns.
I thought they had ABBA?
That was shelf units called SMEGMÅ.
Driving up and down the UK motorways. Lunch at Service Station. Try to find an in-date egg & cress sandwich. Fail. Ah well, a few days doesn’t matter. Can of coke and a packet of cheese and onion. Mmm, these trousers are surprisingly tight, best move the steering wheel back a bit more. Happy days.
There are a hundred sandwiches? Where does one queue?
I am agog at what is to be disgorged. Meanwhile I shall describe my own favourite.
– 2 slices of the cheapest, whitest, supermarket own brandedest bread
– 1 (or 2) processed cheese slice(s). The more orange in colour the better
– Prawn cocktail flavour crisps
-Heinz salad cream
Fashion all of the above into the established ‘sandwich’ form and place in cakehole.
It is, genuinely, rather lovely.
… and so are you, Beezer, in a strange and elusive way.
Aw. *fist bump*
(How very important that last ‘p’ in bump is)
… as indeed we found out, that unforgettable weekend at Gary’s romantic hideaway cottage.
I prefer his The Stumble cottage. Him and his Freddie King instrumental themed holidays.
What’s he like, eh?
*wink emoji*
The secret here is in the crush. You’ve got to gently depress from the top to break the crisps. Too light and it’s shards in the mouth. Too heavy and it’s mush. I use my elbow.
All of you. Listen to this man.
Great review, my only criticism is that it could be 500 words longer.
He’s just learning his trade, a pupil at Bingo’s knees
@Alias
No thanks, it was already all filler and no killer
We have another 99 to go, sandwich enthusiasts! Every time Bing posts another album, or tune or whatever it is, I’ll post another sandwich!
But given that Bingo is already at #91, if you only post every time Bingo posts, then there will only be another 90 to go…….
That’s a blessing, isn’t it?
I still have a strange, atavistic hankering after sandwich spread sandwiches (the clue is in the name). Anybody else?
I’m also partial to Marmite and mayonnaise. Should I seek help?
Between the age of five and fifteen my lunch consisted solely of sliced pan smothered in sandwich spread. Tried it again about ten years ago – so sweet! ( which probably explains why I loved it so)
Said it before and will say it again, SS is vomit a jar
There’s precision in that projectile.
Sliced pan sounds like it might be tough to chew…
Sliced plain is tougher…denser…crustier…
A Pan Loaf: delicious, white spongy plastic ( there may have been flour in there but I very much doubt it – perfect for bacon sarnie)
A Plain Loaf: designed for lorne sausage.
Always assumed the Aberdeen use of “pan” for sliced white came from some French bloke who by a simple twist of fate (drink may well have been involved) ended up in The Silver City By The Golden Sands….
I’m being followed by a lorne sausage
Lorne sausage, lorne sausage
The woman behind me in the queue at Sainsbury’s today had two – two! – jars of sandwich spread in her trolley. Was going to say something, but she might have thought I was a bit weird.
That’s two jars too many.
I have a question relating to wordage in the original post. HP takes issue with @Chrisf in the first reply for using reheated instead of retrieved.
For something to be reheated it must have been heated in the first place however if the toast is to be retrieved then at some point it must have been trieved. I don’t believe such a word exists.
Well, it does now! (cue: footy TV theme)
Trieve, v.: to jettison, to cast aside; to hie. So what HP really means to say here is ‘Detrieved’ toast.
The Young People Of Today have their own word for it – “yeet”.
Which is of course derived from ‘yeast’ and ‘wheat’
What of the antonym, to “yoink”?
‘Wheesht’
Careful, international man of mystery “Ray X” will be along shortly to say he’s won this game in two.
It’s a cult.
Surely salad cream* sarnies will be at or near the top of this list
*not mayonnaise
Salad cream is best to keep in the bottle as it can then be thrown straight into the bin.
Unlike sandwich spread which is thrown up straight into the jar and then placed
on supermarket shelves
Sandwich Spread – I may be the only person in Britain who still buys it
They have at least one customer over here RD
James May is a big advocate for saladCREAMnotmayonnaise. Watching him make a sandwich was a disturbing experience. His choice of bread (basic crustless white) was sound, but he’d only butter *one* of the slices, which is just daft. Your yellow spread acts as a useful sealant for watery fillings such as salad, and prevents the bread from getting soggy. Also, he didn’t trim the overflow (lettuce, mostly), resulting in a sandwich that looked like his hair.
What? Grey?
I’m fairly sure as a student I would have mustard sandwiches, or mustard on toast, something like that (when there wasn’t much else in the fridge/ on the windowsill). Certainly cleared the sinuses.
Mint sauce sandwiches, white bread obvs, are very nice.
*Checks cupboard*
As long as the sandwich has Fish Fingers in too
When I saw the title of this thread, I was greatly afeared that it’d be like Kid Dynamite’s 100 favourite albums thread in that I would never have heard of hardly any of the top 90. Much to my relief, your very first choice was one I’d heard of. Well, I’d obviously heard of Marmite and strawberry jam and was able to recognise the concept of “retrieved” toast through reading your informative gumpf. A surprisingly pleasant start. Have you mentioned any others yet?
I don’t know, Gar. I’m afraid to look.
@Gary
It’s not inconceivable that Burnt Weenie Sandwich might be served up on both lists
This list promises to be a culinary odyssey that would make even Homer feel peckish. I’m already wondering whether Danish open sandwiches will make it on to the list,
Passim, as Private Eye would add, in brackets.
HP thought he could start a thread that was KFD-proof… He was wrong. Wrong!
I think of KFD as basically the old preacher bloke from Poltergeist II. An unearthly fixed grin, demanding entrance, unleashing eldritch horror wherever he is admitted
@kaisfatdad
Dearie me, Brooklyn Beckham seems to have let himself go a bit doesn’t he?
He’s that Salem’s Lot window scene. Tap tap… tap tap… I haaaave…. yooooo…. toooobe
Are you sure that wasn’t Greta Garbo?
Yikes! I post a delicious Danish sarnie recipe and suddenly I’m “the old preacher bloke from Poltergeist II!!!”
But…Shucks! Having watched the clip I’m rather flattered.
Reverend Kane reminds me of Barry McKenzie: a thoroughly dinkum geezer who helps youngsters when they get lost in a shopping centre. There might be some venomous reptiles lurking in the plumbing system. That wee Sheila must be delighted that the Rev is there to help her!
I visualise KFD as a kindly Uncle Fester.
That’s a very nice thing to say, H.P. And a little spooky too.
As DuCo will be happy to confirm, I am a dead ringer for Fester. No kidding! We could be twin brothers!
I’ve always visualised you in terms of household furniture rather than film characters,
I see you very much as an overstuffed chaise longue upholstered in buttoned taffeta with a ruched valance, Gar. Duco as an Ikea flatpack with parts missing. Chiz as an electric chair. Beezer as a stained bean bag repaired with gaffer tape. Tigger as a sagging couch with knitted cushions and patches on the arm rests. Moose as a rest home commode, on casters. LoW as a weak-jointed and comfortless rustic bench. MIke Thep as a gem-studded Merovingian throne. Bingo Little as a knock-off Mies van der Rohe chair. Jaygee as a punctured waterbed. Hubes as a pre-war school desk with inkwell and integral hinged seat.
I think of your good self as one of those surprisingly robust fishing chairs. Perhaps it’s your proximity to water. Or perhaps because you come across as surprisingly robust. Either way, I suspect you’d be just as useful on a patio or at a local fête as you would to a piscator.
MCEscher as a Big Furniture Warehouse office desk chair in baby-poo brown vinyl. Dai as a narrow church pew. Retropath as a concrete mushroom garden seat with chipped paint. Fentonsteve as … as … a kitchen chair, chrome frame, vinly stapled to hardboard seat and back. Salwarpe as a dentist’s waiting room seat.
Is it safe?
Hardly!
“a dentist’s waiting room seat”
I can see that – unnoticed, barely comfortable, temporary and role is far less significant than (but sometimes mistaken for) the multifunctional device at the core of operations.
This last image is from a catalogue for very dedicated but suicidal Elvis impersonators.
Sadly, how both my grandfathers died.
I am sadface, Gar.
I haven’t watched this but I’m assuming the key is not to put another slice of bread on top?
Ett voyla
Sandwich:
insert or squeeze (someone or something) between two other people or things, typically in a restricted space
So an OPEN sandwich ain’t a sandwich
It’s like saying that a quiche is a pie. Monstrous, not least because it promises an amount of pastry which it does not deliver.
In contrast, Shepherd’s Pie is food of the gods, yet has no pastry at all.
Yeah, Shepherd’s Pie, right enough – answer THAT and stay fashionable, Moosey!
It also contains no shepherds, as I discovered when my cafe was closed down.
Have you tried cottage pie? Not in the same league.
What about pizza? No pastry at all, basically a hot open sandwich, but classed as pie in some quarters.
“Pizza” literally means “pie”, which of course you pretend not to know.
And I have addressed the issue of the “open” “sandwich” above. I am disappoint that KFD has clearly not read all the comments, or if he has, takes a cavalier attitude to my authority in the matter.
However if you take two open sandwiches and ‘sandwich’ them together, fillings on the inside bread to the outer. Hey presto a sandwich🥪 .
Impress your friends by peeling apart their sandwiches to make stylish Swedish-style “open” “sandwiches”.
..then eating one of them and saying, “What? You’ve still got a sandwich, haven’t you?”
In addition to the top 100, I would also be fascinated to know which sandwiches didn’t meet the standard reached by Marmite And Strawberry Jam On Retrieved Toast
They will be catalogued in a follow-up thread – much like the bonus CD of demos and instrumental versions in a box set.
Fascinated?
Where’s my hamper?
There y’ go.
Direct from Chernobyl?
Normal green mould doesn’t glow like that.
Why have normal when you can have supernormal.
Why, this is the best hamper a guy could have! *snurfle*!
In the interests of global wellness, I’d like to donate my second hamper to poor wee malnourished snaggletoothed Moosey.
How kind, not least because later I will get to play with the basket.
You can pretend it’s a house! Except that where you live it could actually be a house. Under a bridge or somewhere, with your pants draped over it to dry.
Some of us stay here at the coalface day after day after effing day. We engage in harmless banter and start a thread which, if we’re lucky, garners a dozen comments: some of us even expose charlatans who use false identities to cheat at Wordle. Hampers for us are an impossible dream, some even posit these hampers are imaginary.
Then along comes HP. You remember him, pops in for a few days, walks off with a hamper or three and then says “It’s crap here, not like the old days when me, Archie and Ian ran the show”? Off he goes to his Island of Foam where he spouts nonsense about how good The Monkees were and “Did I tell you I sat next to Peter Gabriel when Bruce tore the house down?”
Makes me sick.
No 97. God Save The Queen by The Sex Pistols. Restored my faith in pop music. It’s really good.
They knew a thing or two about making a sandwich with a creamy filling.
Oh @Lodestone of Wrongness!! I feel your pain! And the pain of so many other craftspeople in the Tower of Song. Or in this case, The Tower of Bread.
Some work diligently, month after month, to create sarnies that will delight and astonish. And then suddenly up pops a Young Turk. An innovator who throws away the rulebook and goes his own way.
Anjovis in the UK!
Sloshed in the Supermarket
New Rosé
And they are suddenly Top of the Sandwich Pops!
Some of us even rashly poke the sleeping shape-shifting giant, thereby risking mayhem and general chaos.
@henpetsgi – I have not posted anything on my blog for six of your Brexit-style months. Before that I was trying to walk away for at least as many. But a small group of sad and lonely individuals (much like The Bus Queue In The Rain) like to continue commenting there, so I am pleased to give them the opportunity.
My annual Living In The Wellness Moment retreat course is starting soon here at the lamasery – Richard Geere and Gwyneth Paltrow are guest speakers (smörgasbörd brunch included – some tickets are left but hurry!). Before my duties as spiritual guide draw me away I’d like to tiresomely point out, not that it’ll make any damn difference to anything or anybody (it is the internet, after all) that I never said “The Monkees are better than The Beetles.” What I maintained was that Monkees RECORDS (not them as a group of personalities and PLEASE think about this before reading the rest of this sentence) are as good as and in some cases better than Beetles RECORDS. This is a subtle distinction and I fully understand your inability to make it. You’re a comely chap with a hoydenish charm about you, but like all blondes you’re a little hamstrung in the thinking muscles. I bet you didn’t even know John Martyn played bass for Eddie And The Hotrods before duco told you.
For a moment I thought you were going to say “before duco told him to stop.”
*lol*
Since when did I ever let facts get in the way of my jealous rants, eh?
I for one miss your island essays on why the B-sides of Iron Butterfly are hidden gems. (They are not and neither are the Monkees’ records better than the Beatles).
I remember watching Old Stumpy, aka John Martyn, play one of John Peel’s In Concert. He took a tiny boom box thingie on stage which then filled the small theatre with amazing sounds. We had seen the future but unfortunately were too stoned to realise it.
No.96 Red Dirt Girl by Emmylou Harris. Should really be my Number 1. It’s really good.
Two ‘I’s in Iain.
Cheddar cheese, beefy Wotsits and marmite in white bread.
Never beaten and never available again as beefy Wotsits seem to no longer exist.
It’s a blessing, really.
My Dad was a man of simple tastes. His top 2.
1. Tomato sauce sandwich. That’s it just tomato sauce.
2. Beetroot sandwich, slices from a tin.
What are the chances of this? Those are my #s 99 and 98!
We can move on to #97 as soon as Bing gives us the go-ahead by posting another of his favourite LPs.
I like a tinned beetroot sandwich myself, although being a pommie poofdah I like to add artisan goat’s cheese, pickled ginger and hard-boiled egg..
#97 sorted.
@h-p-saucecraft
Simply writing down “#97 sorted” is hardly the literary smorgasbord
you promised us when setting out your sandwich stall at the top of
the page, HP.
I surely cannot be the only AWer who is hungry for appetizing tidbits
about the history of each sandwich variant – how it came to be, how you
chanced upon it and your – if any – unique take on said comestible’s preparation
and consumption.
For the first time in many a long year, sandwiches in the form of Brooklyn Beckham’s
“Nanny Pegg’s Breakfast Sandwich” are currently filling the inside of many red top papers.
Bearting this high profile in mind, perhaps you might share with us your views on whether
Beckham Jr can claim such a creation – essentially some bacon, sausage and fried egg between
two slices of bread as a family heirloom. If so, where might its cumbersome crusts feature in
your top 100
“Bearting”?
Loving your line breaks, though but! Very Liverpool Poets! Takes me back!
She was a fine
girl
in her
duffel coat
but she was up
the duff
Typical!
Like your sandwiches, your answers are all bread and no filling
So.
Farewell then.
Hmm is it still a beetroot sandwich?Potential philosophy thesis topic.
Well it’s the hero ingredient…
But what if you are, principally, an egg man or etc etc
Well, the goat’s cheese does get caught in the whiskers.
Hero? Beetroot is the jackbooted dictator of the salad plate (or, god help us, the sandwich). It overpowers everything through sheer obnoxious strength of taste and colour. It rolls over the supine France of the fragrant lettuce leaf, obliterates the Poland of the potato in its monomaniacal will to power. I will have none of its gaudy bullying. Leave it to rot in the ground.
What was that fictional book that was all about beets and their exalted status ?
@junior-wells
Think you may be getting confused with the Mahavisnu Orchestra album Beetween Nothingness and Eternity
A favourite Vish album, Trilogy , Sister Andrea.etc But no, I don’t read a lot of books but I remember this one. I was travelling around Africa so that has it in 1983/84. Well written and quite amusing it was.
*bitterly* Probably not Stephen KIng, then.
Lance has something he wishes to say.
Beetroot’s aggressive annexation of the palate pales into insignificance compared to the anchovy, a tiny yet vindictive sea monster which when present in even homeopathic doses causes widespread devastation across any plate it touches. Not for nothing is it called the Napalm of The Sea.
Do you prefer snails or oysters?
Chiz, as is well known, knows nowt. Leg of lamb with anchovies inserted. Slow roast for many hours to achieve Umami heaven (and not a trace of “fish”).
I can’t quite decide whether you are talking in euphemisms or not.
LOW thinks a euphemism is a medical complaint but isn’t quite sure.
Ima deffo trick a anchovy/beetroot sub.
Adrift in a Ship of Fools on A Cruel Sea, that’s me.
Adrift in a sea of beetroot and anchovies.
Is that what beetroots look like? I’ve only ever seen them peeled, cut and either on a plate or in the bin.
Isn’t that Endless River by The Pink Floyd?
From wikipedia’s review:
Endless River is themed around dreaming, as the exquisite cover design may suggest to you. The music is a mostly suggestive of the dream state, mostly peaceful, and if you nod out to it that’s a good thing – although there’s a lot of granular editing, overdubbing, and effects happening to keep it a long way from health spa muzak.
It is a very carefully assembled sound collage, with no one song source exceeding a couple of minutes, often being edited to a few seconds. It is NOT a playlist, neither are they remixes. They’re mood pieces to pass half an hour (the ideal length of a dedicated listen for me) in pleasant reverie.
Granular. We’re back to that sandwich.
Other colours of beetroot are available.
These are disco earrings, from Gary’s collection.
These amusing threads about life’s trivialities are all very well, and amusing, I suppose, but it’s not what the forum is for, really, is it? Can’t we go back to threads about the Beatles? I had an idea of one listing their LP’s in order of diameter size. And perhaps someone could add three youtube videos of someone unboxing one from Brazil?
Personally, speaking for myself (and I am unanimous in that) I would far rather the forum / blog was chock full of amusing threads about inedible sandwiches instead of boring old guff about which was someone’s favouritest song ever, whether the Beatles were half as good as ABBA, or who can boast about guessing a five letter word more quickly than someone else.
*jumping up and down and clapping like a girl* Ooh! I know this! I know this! SMEGMA!
What? Oh.
If only someone would start an amusing thread about inedible sandwiches.
What brave hero will step forward from the huddled masses to take on this task?
Or a thread about smegma? Surely more interesting than Wordle. Come on HP.
@mc-escher Well the popular culture seems to be mould, so entirely appropriate I’d say.
A question for you @Gary.
As a well-travelled gourmet, I wonder: Have you ever tasted casu mazu (rotten cheese)from Sardinia?
Now there’s a cheese sandwich to remember!
I stumbled across that while looking for a clip showing Norwegian Gammalost (Old Cheese). It’s 40 years since I tasted it but the memory lingers on.
Beetroots and anchovies? Mild-mannered, low-profile tastes compared to this tastebud tyrant.
It smells of old socks and has a sour, tangy flavour. Enough to bring on an attack of turophobia!
https://thecheeseatlas.com/cheese-profiles/gamalost/#:~:text=Surprisingly%2C%20Gamalost%20has%20a%20distinct,that%20can%20be%20quite%20pungent.
I have indeed! With live maggots. Coincidentally, I was chatting about this very subject with the town drunk just a couple of days ago. One of my neighbours, called Cesare, is very much an agricultural type – is “peasant” offensive? Even if he is one? – and he makes it himself. I’ve only tried it the once. It didn’t make me vomit as I had expected, though that’s an admittedly low bar to judge food by.
Town drunk. How quaint. Over here we have a Town Sober. People come from miles around to see him walk in a straight line, stay awake during conversations and drive up to 200 yards without killing anybody.
@Mooose-the-Mooche
I see from today’s papers there’s been another Ronnie Pickering-type incident in Hull of late.
What it is it about ‘Umbersarders and thur merbiliteh scooters?
What is *adjusts reading spectacles* an “Umbersarder”?
How did he serve his Knob Cheese, Gar?
You vulgar, vulgar man. You’re obsessed with smegma and knob cheese today. Such vulgarity ill becomes you.
And anyway, he was circumcised.
Before, after, or during?
That kinda reminds me a bit of that joke about the guy at the doctor’s.
Doctor: I’m afraid you’re going to have to stop masturbating.
Bloke: Why???
Doctor: Because I’m trying to examine you.
I know it’s an old joke and everyone’s heard it a thousand times, but I was reminded of it by your question, plus the idea that you’re probably having a quickie yourself this morning, what with all your vulgar talk and everything. Do please excuse me if I’m mistaken.
Hélas! A quick one off the wrist has to be booked well in advance these days. I’ve penciled one in for next Thursday – not this Thursday – perhaps you’d like to check back then?
Very much so.
May I recommend Malmö’s favourite museum, the Museum of Disgusting Food. With a tasting counter as you leave, replete with a convenient bucket on the floor, Hughie!
Strange place for a wank, but hey ho. Each to his own, so to speak
For a terrible moment I thought this was a comment on the commode picture. Thankfully it’s far more tasteful than that.
A tad low!
Good question about “peasant”. I’d say it is offensive as there’s an implicit value judgement, Collins gives the meaning as “a poor person of low social status who works on the land”. It’s a word used sneeringly by a townie about a rural worker.
Does the Italian word “contadino” have the same condescending sense about it?
Nope, not at all. It has the same neutral non-offensiveness as “farmer.” In fact, it’s very difficult for me to tell the peasants from the farmers here.
Even the melon farmers?
Ahoy there, Sandwich Enthusiasts! I’m relying on A’worders to tell me when Bingo has posted his latest Top Ten Hit encomium, and then we can “get our teeth into” the next “sarnie”!
I’ve been described as many things and a Stained Bean Bag is one of them.
Rest Home Commode is my new band name. I’m astonished it’s never occurred to anyone else.
I notice the subject of when one should each a sandwich has not yet been broached. Like most of us I suspect, I grew up having sandwiches in my school lunch box*, lovingly crafted** by my dear mother. So sandwiches are for LUNCH, right? Except that recently I have had to arrive early at my occasional place of work, and therefore buy breakfast, where an appealing option has been an egg and lettuce concoction in a lovely white bread sandwich. It is delicious but feels a bit – well, wrong…
*Actually I didn’t have a lunch box. My lunch was in a brown paper bag
**Sometimes actually rather hastily crafted. Last night’s stew in a sandwich anyone?
Your sarnies were in a brown paper bag? You was ‘ard, mate! But not as ‘ard as the boys I truly envied, who brought theirs in the wax paper Wonderloaf bag. I had to surreptitiously eat mine from the Tupperware box hidden inside my school bag. Mums mean well but are sometimes responsible for terrible life-long trauma.
Sandwiches for breakfast are just … unsettling. They put the day strangely out of kilter.
Your traditional breakfast for your well-‘ard ocker is an egg and bacon roll. How does the curator feel about rolls for brekkie (or as it’s sometimes irritatingly spelt, breaky)? There’s a certain tension involved in biting into one, because you never know if the egg is going to explode all over your chin or is fried to a crisp.
Rolls for brekkie are acceptable if you’re not sitting down. Walking, standing, yer roll is the ideal one-stop breakfast solution. But eating one sitting down is just sad.
Having been a suit for many years I can attest that the breakfast staple of our tribe is and was the ham and cheese toastie … sandwich.
I have a feeling HPS would struggle in Oz. No doubt his sandwich strictures are followed to the letter in Thailand, but he’d be a voice crying in the wilderness here as a nation tucks into its sangas. Wait till he finds you can’t have a burger without beetroot in it.
Damn right. Essential to any self respecting Aussie burger.
I see you have jumped the sanger /sarnie divide Thep. Your citizenship is assured.
A kanga with a sanger (should that be sanga?)
Destined to end up in a kanga banga sanga.
Amazingly, Sandwiches in Ireland are still widely referred to as “sambos”
https://www.independent.ie/life/food-drink/christmas-sandwich-taste-test-where-to-get-the-best-seasonal-sambos/a896583971.html
A ham and cheese toasted sandwich for breakfast! And then a beetroot sandwich for lunch! Not for nothing is Australia famed for its cuisine!
Having sorted out (maybe) what to put in a sandwich, and when to eat it (possibly), has anyone given thought whether it is best to cut it or not. There’s the ‘manly’ way of eating it uncut with the encumbent risk of losing content , or cutting it in half to make two rectangles. There’s also (shudder) the option of fey triangles which, imho, is merely the start of a giddy descent into depravity and/or madness and should be avoided.
Talking of losing content, I once worked with a Danish chap who, for lunch, used to tuck into a so-called open sandwich consisting of dark brown bread, a dead fish or two and a topping of sliced radish or whatever. Unless held perfectly horizontal, the contents invariably landed on his desk or lap and left a faint whiff around the office for a while. And don’t get me started on triple deckers, which seem to be sandwiches with a bread filling plus other bits….
It’s best to cut sandwiches into a tangram then you can play with your food.
Square sandwiches are best cut on a subtle but telling diagonal, not straight across, which lends a lumpen war-time utilitarian look, and certainly not into triangles as noted above, like Gary does. Simply angle the knife so it rests half way between the brutish and the fey – hey presto! That rakish cut has the bohemian look of a slanted beret, or Bogart’s Fedora! Why not try this simple yet oh-so-stylish serving suggestion when unexpected guests drop in! If you can’t work up the bottle to tell them to fuck right off.
A genius solution, if I may say so! It’s my turn to make lunch tomorrow and so I will try this most subtle of cuts. However, if the memsahib doesn’t take too kindly to this modern, radical approach I will undoubtedly find half a peanut butter, banana and Marmite sandwich shoved somewhere that will make me walk a bit funny for a while.
I think you and “the little woman” will be “pleased as punch” with this simple and elegant Sandwich solution! I will go so far as to say that once tried, Sandwiches cut in the ordinary way seem drab and unappetising! Experiment with angles until you find the one that’s “right for you”!
Where do you stand on crusts, HP?
Thanks to retropath2 for raising this timely and maybe even a tad controversial subject! I am of the opinion – an opinion held by a wide body of clear-thinking people of every political stripe across this great land of ours – that crusts – and hear me out! – crusts should above all have some crunch to them. A quality of brittle yet oh-so-toothsome crispness. Either baked-in and still present when served at the table, or judiciously created during the process of toasting. Further – and here my views diverge with many well-meaning sandwich enthusiasts, no bad thing in itself, for we are nothing if not a broad church – I maintain that a soft crust is a thing of horror. The limp “pseudocrust” is little more than a cynical trick played on a gullible and uneducated populace. Having the texture of a knee scab and the pigmentation of spray tan, the “pseudocrust” is a travesty of the noble tradition of bread bakery and has no place – NO PLACE I SAY SIR – in the Modern Sandwich.
Questions? You sir, waving the croissant at the back of the hall?
Crusts – once again, Scottish plain loaf for the win!
Crusts that you can chew for hours after the sandwich is finished.
Crusts that give you “curly hair” – not necessarily the best inducement to eat them…
Bing seems to have updated his Top Ten Greatest Albums You Must Hear Before You Die, so here’s #97, Sandwich Enthusiasts!
#97 Sprout n’ Strawberry on Artisanal Sourdough With Fennel Seeds And Potato Eye Garnish
A menu favourite wherever ageing hipsters foregather to worry if they’re still hip or not, the Sprout n’ Strawberry on Artisanal Sourdough With Fennel Seeds And Potato Eye Garnish sandwich offers a medley of competing and contradictory flavours! Raw shade-grown sustainable sprout leaves the size of a baby’s hand cradle slices of green strawberry on a jaw-challenging and indigestible slab of roughage with a specific gravity greater than the planet Neptune, shot through with denture-snapping seeds of indeterminate benefit and topped with a sprinkle of moist potato eyes, served on a rusty garden trowel.
Twenty-three Brexit -style pounds plus tip, payable by app only no cash.
(HUBES – please don’t forget the trowel. A white plate would be just wrong.)
Sorry forgot the strawberries.
Is this done with a Spirograph?
Etch-a-Sketch
A rare Apple Macintosh Etch-a-Sketch!
Only the best.
#96
Fans of Gwyneth Paltrow (or “Pallies” as they call themselves) will remember with fondness her THIS SMELLS LIKE MY VAGINA candle, but few know she also marketed a “THIS TASTES LIKE MY VAGINA” sandwich at the same time. A slippery filling, said to contain tuna, anchovy, and oyster, oozed from two slices of white bread. It was a commercial disaster, and soon withdrawn. Sealed packages command high prices from collectors.
I think I’ve still got a tub of Vagemite in a cupboard somewhere
Old men making fun of women’s private bits….
H.P. was absolutely obsessed with my neighbour Cesare’s private parts the other day, so I don’t think it’s just confined to women. And he certainly wouldn’t be obsessed with Cesare’s private parts had he ever seen the man, so it’s not an age (or aesthetic) thing either. I think we’re talking about a fixation with suppressed primitive carnal urges here. And sandwiches.
My mind is a raging torrent, flooded with rivulets of thought cascading into a waterfall of creative alternatives.
Flooded with filth you mean.
I, for one, am here to defend Gwyneth and all her… hold on, maybe I need some further thought on this. I will revert asap
I’m still trying to un-see Vagemite. This may be chiz’s greatest comment (i.e. contribution) to the Afterword, like, ever. You can quit now, chiz. Your work is done.
Why thank you Saucy. Being the collaborative and supportive poster I am, I’ve held back a full five days since the mention of ‘pussy Marmite’ on this thread to give you all the opportunity to come up with this gag yourselves. But none of you saw it. Disappointing, really.
It comes from the land down under.
This
⬆️
Is funny
Just when we thought it couldn’t get any funnier, the big man from Hull effortlessly tops chiz’s joke! This place, eh?
(It’s a blessing that Hubes hasn’t reached for his AI crayons for this one.)
There y’go HP.
Advanced, forthright, signifficant.
#96 Outraged by the Swedish annexation of the “open” “sandwich”, the plucky Danes fought back with their “fraværafbrødsmørrebrød”, yet another foreign word too subtle for an English translation (c.f. schadenfreude; gloating, hygge; cosy), but meaning “breadless sandwich”.
Let’s let Øyvind Ølaf Øyvindølafsson talk us through its preparation:
“Ja, denne sandwich er en dansk specialitet og meget populær blandt de mennesker, der lider af glutenintolerance. Den laves ganske enkelt ved at hælde ingredienserne – valget er op til den enkelte, men kogler er en traditionel favorit – på et groft træfad og serveret efter at gæsterne er blevet pisket i det frosne vand i en dybsort sø skjult af grantræer.”
Sounds like fun there does seem to be a shortage of bread however (even gluten free)
It’s all Greek to me, Hubes.
It’s your 96th favourite sandwich and you don’t know what’s in it?
I’ve searched and searched fraværafbrødsmørrebrød and Øyvind Ølaf Øyvindølafsson and the preperation instructions on my computer’s internet and can find no trace of any of it. I was keen to make it myself, it being at #96 and everything, but now I’m beginning to fear he’s making everything up as he goes along and has no real knowledge of the supposed delights he recommends. No better than a heroin pusher who doesn’t use.
Trust me I’ve found it, it’s inedible or possibly indelible.
How opportune it’s Greek language day today.
Ναι, αυτό το σάντουιτς είναι μια δανέζικη σπεσιαλιτέ και πολύ δημοφιλές σε άτομα που υποφέρουν από δυσανεξία στη γλουτένη.
Φτιάχνεται απλά ρίχνοντας τα υλικά – η επιλογή εξαρτάται από το άτομο, αλλά τα κουκουνάρια είναι το παραδοσιακό αγαπημένο – σε μια τραχιά ξύλινη πιατέλα και σερβίρεται αφού οι καλεσμένοι έχουν κτυπηθεί στο παγωμένο νερό μιας βαθιάς μαύρης λίμνης κρυμμένης από έλατο δέντρα.”