“Today’s MA legislature is brought to you by Fluffernutters and the number 6.”

At the heart of Massachusetts legislative issues today: the Fluffernutter sandwich, and its potential to become the official sandwich of the Commonwealth. Also up for state status this day: Charleston Chew, an elephant, and the number six. If these bills sound like an episode of Sesame Street, or at least the work of a tenacious group of youngsters, that’s because Massachusetts middle school students have been flooding the state legislature with their alarmingly specific, sometimes random, but generally well-researched petitions.

A major day for state legislators. And sandwiches.

The least random demand made by the local gang of schoolchildren is of course for the Fluffernutter sandwich to be crowned with the distinguished state status. Marshmallow Fluff is evidently the pride of Massachusetts middle school students, who seem to enjoy the sticky combination of Fluff and peanut butter just as much as the generations upon generations of hungry students past. The thin marshmallow spread was invented in Somerville, MA, and has been produced in Lynn, MA for eighty years. This year’s attempt to elevate the already sacred status of the Fluffernutter sandwich comes just three years after a former state senator, Jarrett Barrios, attempted to limit the availability of the sandwich in school lunch programs. Today’s bill marks the second attempt by a state lawmaker to grant the sandwich official status.

Hometown sandwich makes it big. Maybe.

That middle school students should work so hard to honor the sweet, gooey sandwich should come as no surprise. Their willingness to push for state legislation seems to indicate, at the very least, fierce loyalty for a food they probably eat multiple times a week. That, or Massachusetts middle school students have become domineering and power-hungry beyond their years. Just like its slightly more traditional cousin peanut butter and jelly, the Fluffernutter is a sandwich made popular by its accessibility. In the 1920s, with the advent of pre-sliced bread, sandwich-making became a simple and safe occupation for hungry kids (no need for the little ones to start swinging a big bread knife around). Easy spreads like peanut butter and Fluff made for especially user-friendly assembly. In 1986, the Great American Food Almanac stated that the average American student consumed over 1,500 peanut butter and jelly sandwiches before high school graduation. One would guess that in Massachusetts, the figures for Fluffernutter consumption are not far off.

The idea of a state sandwich has sparked an enthusiastic debate among sandwich proponents nationwide. At least, this is what is suggested by recent activity in the food blog community. The ultra-cool Serious Eats posted a brief article about the Fluffernutter campaign, and was very soon bombarded with reader-comments suggesting official sandwiches for many states. Conflict and regional food prejudice abound. Some suggestions are far less contentious than others, but some popular pairings include the French Dip for California, the Hot Brown for Kentucky, and a classic deli hot pastrami sandwich with mustard for New York. Sandwich lore is brimming with regional disputes about recipe origins, and about who does a Cheesesteak best, and so on.

Not sure how the elephant will fare in the vote for state animal. Fingers crossed.

And so, local schoolchildren and the sandwiching community at large await the results of the Fluffernutter legislative action as the factory in Lynn keeps pumping out jars of Marshmallow Fluff. If the sandwich makes the cut, it will join five other classic snacks that have been granted this coveted status: the corn muffin, the baked navy bean, the chocolate chip cookie, and the obvious Boston cream pie and doughnut.

Good luck Fluffernutter. We’re all counting on you.

Check out the Boston Globe article about today’s legislative matters here

and read up on the state sandwich debate at Serious Eats here.

 

Lunchtime Crime

While sandwiches aren’t something we necessarily associate with instances of violence and crime, recent news blurbs seem to suggest that tempers flair during lunchtime. Additionally, a recent lunchtime crime perpetrated in my own break room has prompted me to look closer at what can only be described as a rash of disturbingly sandwich-centric trespasses.

In December 2008, a Florida man was accused of throwing a sandwich at his girlfriend during an argument. According to the girlfriend, she was preparing the man’s lunch when he picked up the sandwich and hurled it toward her face. The contents of the sandwich were not specified in the news coverage.

A June 18th, 2009 report from the Associated Press tells the seemingly more random story of Roger Hamilton of Oklahoma City, who was beaten and then robbed of his bologna and cheese sandwich as he prepared to spread it with mayonnaise.  The attacker delivered a punch to Hamilton’s mouth before running off with his sandwich, and has yet to be found by police. The AP report, though brief, paints a vivid picture of the crime:

Police said Hamilton has a swollen lip and his face was covered in blood. The police report listed the value of the sandwich at 76 cents.

I found Roger Hamilton’s story in a local paper during a lunch break at my place of employment. The short article was featured in a sidebar reserved for offbeat news stories. I cut it out and saved the clipping with the headline “Man attacked in Oklahoma City for bologna sandwich.” Little did I know that I too would find myself at the center of a lunchtime crime–the theft of my wallet and phone from my own lunch bag as it sat minding its own business in the break room one afternoon. Gone were my identification cards, my discount cards, my library cards. A seemingly determined police officer failed to turn up even the slightest clue about the theft.

Was bologna to blame?

Two months later, an envelope bearing no return address, adorned only with a name and driver number, arrived bearing my school ID. With it, a note from a truck driver who found my ID in the parking lot of–what else?–a Subway sandwich restaurant in Glens Falls, NY, some twenty miles from where it was taken from my lunch bag, right out from underneath my peanut butter and jelly on 12 grain.

Keep your friends close and your sandwiches closer.

Goodnight and good lunch.

 

Elvis, King of Sandwiches

In September 2005, Gourmet published a recipe for “Elvis Presley’s Hot Peanut Butter and Banana Sandwich.” The recipe was accompanied by a photograph of a tidy toasted number sitting in a stylish cast iron skillet. Calling for modest amounts of the sandwich’s principal ingredients (peanut butter, ripe banana, and butter), the recipe presented a nostalgic, relatively heart-healthier version of Elvis’s favorite sandwich. Popular legend has it that The King would scarf down close to a dozen of these monster sandwiches in one sitting, and after adopting the sandwich as one of my own staples, I can see why.

Elvis enjoys a sandwich.

Many Elvis historians maintain that the original recipe called for the sandwich (constructed from white bread, smooth peanut butter, and a very ripe mashed banana) to be fried in an entire stick of butter. While I don’t doubt the flavor-based and textural benefits of this amount of butter, I have yet to make the sandwich that way. Two tablespoons of butter, as listed in the Gourmet recipe, has worked just fine so far.

A simple sandwich.

The fried peanut butter and banana sandwich may fail as a health food, probably obliterating most of the banana’s nutritional offerings with the sandwich’s fat content, but as a comfort food, it may be one of the best sandwiches out there. It’s crunchy, salty, sweet, gooey, and warm. The sandwich’s narrative content, or the unique historical character the sandwich carries with it, places it among the most legendary of sandwich favorites, among such storied ensembles as the Reuben or a towering Dagwood. According to David Adler’s book The Life and Cuisine of Elvis Presley, eating the sandwich was something of a ritual for Elvis: “Elvis enjoyed eating picnic style. However, he fastidiously used a knife and fork to eat his peanut butter and banana sandwiches.” Probably not a bad call: it’s one of the messier sandwiches you’ll find.

The key is the mashed banana.

Perhaps less well known than the peanut butter and banana combo, another of Elvis’s favorite sandwiches, the Fool’s Gold Loaf, follows a similar recipe, though with kicked up portions and flavor combos. The Fool’s Gold Loaf is made by coating an entire uncut loaf of bread in butter, then toasting it in the oven until browned. Then, the loaf is halved lengthwise and hollowed out. An entire jar of Skippy peanut butter, an entire jar of Smucker’s grape jelly, and one pound of cooked bacon later, and the Fool’s Gold Loaf is the mother of all peanut butter and jelly sandwiches.

You can read Gourmet’s take on fried peanut butter and banana here

and learn about David Adler’s excellent book here.

 

Sandwich Excursion #3: Chacarero

There a few ways of knowing that you’re in Boston’s financial district. It might be the austere office buildings or the Banks of America at every turn. Men and women with briefcases are good giveaways, too. Still, perhaps the greatest identifying factor of the Financial District/Downtown Crossing area is the sheer number of sandwiches per city block.

In order to support a sprawling population of hungry professionals and power lunchers, the Financial District has become a city of sandwiches in itself, with deli-type storefronts seemingly every few feet. While the traditional lunchtime offerings certainly have their loyal customers (and with such fine ingredients as Boar’s Head cold cuts, why shouldn’t they?) the bustling lunch break culture of Boston’s professional district seems rather taken with boldness of the flavorful Chilean import, the chacarero.

Chacarero.

Named for the circular sandwich which has brought it fame, Chacarero is a Downtown Crossing storefront open Monday through Friday to serve up a variety of chacareros made to customer specifications. The traditional chacarero is made with either grilled chicken or grilled steak, each available in a barbecue flavor as well. Additionally, each sandwich, which is served on a round, soft bread baked daily, is stacked with Muenster cheese and fresh tomato slices. The fresh bread is adorned with avocado spread and a secret hot sauce, which can be applied to various effects. The key characteristic of a chacarero is the addition of steamed green beans. Yes, that classic vegetable side, on a sandwich.

The careful layering process.

While the green beans add a unique textural dimension, the highlight of the sandwich is the bread, which is soft, light, and yet a reliable vessel for the volume and consistency of the sandwich’s fillings. Despite the slippery green beans, the sandwich stays together to the last bite, and the bread, rather than acting solely as a means to keep some fillings together, contributes its own rich flavor to the sandwich as a whole.

Sandwiches at Chacarero are available in two sizes, small and large. I ordered a large vegetarian sandwich, which substituted roasted red peppers for chicken or steak. The sandwich, light yet satisfying, with a pleasant lingering aftertaste, is the perfect prelude for, quite simply, another chacarero. They’re that good.

Classic sandwich cross-section.

Lunchtime sandwiches did not always enjoy the popularity they do today. In fact, the sandwich as a lunchtime staple did not emerge until the 19th century, when people began moving into cities in large numbers to find work. Working men began bringing hearty, portable sandwiches to work to sustain them throughout the working day. Women, looking for alternatives to men’s saloons as gathering places,  began convening in tea shops to snack on dainty canapes.

Chacarero storefront.

Check out Chacarero here

and stay tuned for more installments in sandwich history. And a lot more sandwich eating.

 

Sandwich Excursion #2: High Rock

Saratoga Springs, NY is known for a lot of things: their natural springs, their race track, their sparkling water in the big blue bottles. Even in the history of the American sandwich, Saratoga Springs represents something of  a landmark, thanks in large part to the myth that the club sandwich may have had its origins there, alongside some early versions of the potato chip. While popular legends about the club sandwich and a crunchy potato sidekick prove difficult to verify, the city today remains a high-quality sandwich destination.

Putnam Market, at 435 Broadway, is home to perhaps the best turkey sandwich of all time. I speak from experience–I’ve been ordering that turkey sandwich since junior high school.

The High Rock is one of many specialty sandwiches named for local landmarks available at Putnam Market. It is comprised of house-roasted free range turkey breast, New York cheddar, cranberry mayonnaise, and fresh lettuce and tomato. While it can be assembled on any number of breads, it is best housed between the two halves of a fresh baguette.

The High Rock on a sunny day during which eager patrons are forced to the outdoor tables by the crowd inside.

For the sandwich crafters of Putnam Market, all trained in the practiced assembly of their sandwiches, a good sandwich with good mouthfeel and superior taste is all about the quality of the ingredients. Breads are delivered fresh from nearby Albany’s Bountiful Bread, tomatoes are sliced fresh, and lettuce arrives in whole heads, not bags. It’s all, as co-owner Catharine Hamilton says, “real food.”

Customers can taste the difference in the roasted free range turkey, and are disappointed when that juicy filling runs out and must be temporarily supplanted by ordinary cold cuts. The other secret to Putnam’s sandwiches, says Hamilton, is Hellmann’s Mayonnaise, combined with any number of flavorful additions, such as cranberry sauce, herbs, and pesto.

The High Rock is named for Saratoga’s High Rock Avenue, in turn named for the famous High Rock Spring. According to New York: A Guide to the Empire State (a product of the Writer’s Program of the Works Projects Administration during the 1940s) the spring and its medicinal benefits attracted many important figures to the area, mainly by way of exploitative business opportunities. The book points specifically to one instance in 1783 when George Washington attempted to buy the High Rock and several adjacent springs.

New York: A Guide to the Empire State (Sixth Printing, 1955). A research copy in Bates Hall, BPL.

One hundred years later, the springs continued to attract those who were “health-bent,” while a blossoming “pleasure-bent” industry sprang up in the city around the nearby Canfield Casino, the very same casino where it is said that alongside the high-stakes gambling and flirtatious nightlife, the club sandwich was invented.

Check out Putnam Market here

and Albany’s Bountiful Bread here.

 

Everything’s Coming Up Sandwiches

Sandwiches are in right now, and sandwich buzz abounds. One might say that my research simply has me more tuned in to all happenings on sliced bread than the average person, but I think it’s something more. We’re in the midst of a sandwich Renaissance, and my timing is just that good. Still, I would direct anyone who doubts this resurgence in sandwich mania to daytime television, where our nation’s eminent talk show hosts are ringing in the new year of the sandwich with unequaled fervor and elegance.

On Tuesday, March 24th, The Martha Stewart Show aired an all-sandwich episode as part of Martha’s “Pack Your Own Lunch Week.”  “The Sandwich Show”  kicked off with Martha demonstrating how to make her own favorite sandwich, a ham and cheese baguette–”the very best boiled ham,” Jarlsberg cheese (“not Swiss cheese, but Jarlsberg”), and unsalted butter. A relatively plain sandwich, but oh-so-elegant in that unmistakably Martha Stewart way. The show went on to feature three prominent New York City sandwich crafters, who showcased everything from a Muffaletta, to a bagel sandwich, to a ground beef Banh Mi called a “Sloppy Bao.”

An elegant Jarlsberg.

“Pack Your Own Lunch Week” was part of an ongoing trend of consumers going back to basics, finding simple everyday ways to cut costs in these difficult financial times. The sandwiches featured on The Martha Stewart Show were meant to inspire viewers at home to create their own homemade lunches. However, Martha’s chosen sandwiches seemed to require a fairly high level of preparation and a wide range of necessary equipment (sandwich presses, food processors, a good serrated Wusthof knife). Also, the necessity for really fine French boiled ham seems to undermine the ultimate goal of cutting costs, but the sandwiches did look pretty great.

That same week, on Friday the 27th, Ellen DeGeneres hosted celebrity chef and Food Network personality Bobby Flay on her daytime talk show. Lacking the elegance of Martha’s boiled ham and Jarlsberg, this show featured Bobby Flay running onstage to Duran Duran’s “Hungry Like the Wolf” to perform shameless plugs for Hellmann’s Mayonnaise.

Also drawing on the trend of eating in and cutting costs, Flay announced that he has teamed up with Hellmann’s to teach Americans how to build a better sandwich, in this case a grilled eggplant sandwich with diced tomatoes and basil mayo. At buildtheperfectsandwich.com, Flay appears in numerous short videos about preparing nutritious and satisfying sandwiches held together with various applications of Hellmann’s jarred mayo. The site includes a collection of sandwich recipes and the Sandwich Recommender, a sandwich personality test which can tell you what your ideal sandwich is. My test results typically point to anything with eggplant, tomatoes, or mushrooms on it.

Hellmann's: Bring out the Bobby Flay.

Deli owner Richard Hellmann developed the formula we know and love as Hellmann’s jarred mayonnaise in 1903, though he did not market it until 1912. The Hellmann’s name and know-how were later acquired by Best Foods, Inc. of California. Now owned by CPC International, the mayo is sold under “Hellmann’s” east of the Rocky Mountains, but is known under the “Best Foods” label west of the landmark mountain range. According to the third edition of John F. Mariani’s Encyclopedia of American Food and Drink (1999), Hellmann’s and Best Foods account for approximately 43 percent of all the jarred mayo sold in the U.S. For further information on all things mayonnaise, I recommend the website for the Association for Dressings and Sauces, including their “Treatise on Mayonnaise.” Click here.

To achieve sandwich perfection with Bobby Flay, click here.

And as always, stay tuned for all things sandwiches. Until then, enjoy some television magic from Ellen DeGeneres and Bobby Flay.

 

Sandwich Excursion #1: Bánh Mì

In addition to racking up library hours, the second prong of my two-pronged approach to serious sandwich research involves me eating a lot of sandwiches. Lucky for me, Boston is home to both a wealth of libraries and a trove of notable sandwiches. If it were permissible to eat sandwiches in the library, then I would certainly do that, but rules are rules, and alas, I am ever en route between a sandwich and a musty reference tome. Such is the sandwich life, lived between two slices. No complaints.

My first properly documented hands-on sandwich excursion took place on Friday, when I took advantage of an unexpectedly open afternoon to commit a specific sandwich to record via my stomach and a few notes and snapshots.

New Saigon Sandwich, despite its diminutive storefront in the shadow of the Chinatown McDonald’s, feeds customers from a menu of impressive size and variety, though the restaurant is probably best known and most frequented for its “French Style Sub,” or Banh Mi. The banh mi is an excellent example of the kind of historical and cultural mapping required of culinary research, especially sandwich research.

New Saigon Sandwich in Chinatown.

Banh mi is a synthesis of tastes resulting from the French colonial influence in Vietnam. Served on a slitted loaf of French bread, the sandwich can be stuffed with any number of typically “meaty” fillings, from cold cuts to shredded pork to vegetarian tofu. Anointed with mayo and soy sauce, the sandwich is then garnished with a variety of pungent vegetable components.

At New Saigon Sandwich, every banh mi comes dressed with mayo, cucumber, pickled carrot, onion, chile pepper, and a generous clipping of cilnatro. I ordered a tofu sandwich with all the traditional garnishes.

My sandwich.

Perhaps the best way to describe my sandwich is to say that it certainly left its mark. The piling up of unmistakable flavors (onion, cilantro, fresh chiles) made for an impactful first bite and a persistent, though not unpleasant aftertaste. The bread, stacked up in a big plastic bin behind the sandwich counter, was incredibly crispy and flaky on the outside, and appropriately chewy on the inside. In my eagerness, I did cut the roof of my mouth on the crispy bread. I’m not saying this to suggest that the crispiness of the bread was anything but perfect–that’s just how excited I was to eat it. If it had been a pizza, I would have burned that part of my mouth.

Fillings revealed.

The tofu was spicy, and the vegetables pungent and crisp. I think the sign of a really good sandwich is the eater’s inability to decide whether she should scarf or savor. I tried both. In the end, all I knew was that I wanted another sandwich. All the sandwiches at New Saigon are priced at $3.00, regardless of how they are filled.

An outgrowth of Vietnamese and French culinary sensibilities, the banh mi has carved its own unique space in the culinary exploits of American eaters. I first learned about the sandwich through David Kamp and Marion Rosenfeld in their snarky, informative text The Food Snob’s Dictionary: An Essential Lexicon of Gastronomical Knowledge. Part of the book’s entry for banh mi reads:

Long an unremarkable if satisfying staple of ASIAN STREET FOOD, the banh mi has recently emerged as a fetish object for Caucasian Sandwich Snobs, first on the West Coast, where Vietnamese immigrants popularized it, and then in the Northeast, where competitive food journalists trip over each other to declare this storefront’s or that pushcart’s  as “the best damned banh mi in the city.”

(The capitalization of “Asian street food” indicates that the topic is covered in a separate entry listed elsewhere in the book. This kind of cross-referencing makes for an extremely useful culinary resource. The book’s entry for Asian street food names Anthony Bourdain as a notable enthusiast.)

Check out the book here

New Saigon Sandwich is located at 696 Washington Street in Boston. It is more than worth the trip.

Open seven days a week. That's a sandwich everyday.

Stay tuned for further installments in my “Sandwich Excursion” series, not to mention only the most intriguing of sandwich-related discoveries.

 

Where to Begin.

The problem of sandwich genealogy is manifold. Each new look at the project provides another starting point, an additional approach to a sprawling undertaking, and a staggering new narrative to be noted and duly pursued. Culinary history seems as a whole to be marked by this amplitude of angles–the sandwich’s history is itself embroiled in questions of culture, science, politics, sociology, economics, and perhaps most satisfyingly, the study of happy stomachs.

Charged with telling the saga of the American sandwich, there is but one place to turn for the solace of unity through organization and categorization, and that is the library. One of the main reasons I undertook a historical project was for the chance to spend a considerable amount of time conducting archival research–dredging classic cookbooks and magazine back issues for clues in the sandwich saga.

The public library is always a sure starting point. Excepting the hassles and disappointments of Book Delivery at the Boston Public Library, the collection of culinary reference materials in the public library was extremely useful in providing me with the information necessary to start stocking my own personal reference well by gathering basic facts and dates on which to build as more specific data files in.

The more exciting, more specific information comes from the more archival resources, the original cookbooks, commercial pamphlets, and other assorted writings that shaped the sandwich’s history. I am lucky, as any culinary historian or enthusiast is lucky, to have access to the Schlesinger Library, part of Harvard University’s Radcliffe Institute for Advanced Study. Schlesinger, dedicated to women’s history, houses about 15,000 titles pertaining to the culinary arts. A search of the online catalog turns up several pages of sandwich sources, some dating as far back as the late 1800s.

The Schlesinger Library.

The Schlesinger Library is truly something to behold. Housed as it is in iconic “Harvard-looking” buildings, the library is welcoming and encouraging for researchers. The librarians are knowledgeable and helpful. They even provide pencils if you forget to bring your own. I however, went prepared.

I’m not ashamed to say that I took great pleasure in gathering provisions for my first trip to Schlesinger. The only objects allowed into the reading room are pencils, loose leaf paper, and laptops. I outfitted myself with four pristine, pre-sharpened Dixon Ticonderogas, and, in keeping with the spirit of culinary research, a thick stack of loose leaf paper made from sugar cane waste. Once I settled into the reading room, dressed in my most collegiate-looking sweater, I noticed that I was the only researcher not tapping out citations on a MacBook.

The necessary equipment.

My books arrived in pristine condition, some in tight-fitting plastic covers, or sturdy folders, or, my personal favorite, a secret compartment-type outfit with the outward appearance of a medium sized book. Folding back four manila flaps revealed a pocket-sized “cookery manual” about bread baking so well-preserved that it seemed no one had used it since its publication in 1883. It was like unearthing a treasure or watching an egg hatch–very exciting to a very specific party, in this case, someone with a pretty severe library habit.

I am considering moving my personal belongings into the Schlesinger Library and taking up permanent residence.

Check it outhere..