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Harlequin Sandwiches
Spread a bit of brownbread with butter and French mustard, and a bit of white bread, cut to fit the former, with butter and cheese creamed together. Finish as usual.
A two-tone tea sandwich that assumes you already know the house method for finishing sandwiches. The whole point is the contrast between the dark slice and the pale one, so cut cleanly and keep the layers even.
- "Finish as usual"The phrase points back to general sandwich directions given earlier in the book, which this page does not repeat; in books of this type that typically means trimming the crusts, pressing the closed sandwich lightly, and cutting it into fingers, triangles or rounds, and keeping the cut sandwiches covered until serving so the edges do not dry.
- Brown breadAlmost certainly a firm graham or wholemeal loaf rather than the steamed Boston kind, which crumbles and will not slice square. Cut thin, so the two slices can be trimmed to match.
- French mustardA smooth, mild, vinegar-based prepared mustard — Dijon is the closest modern equivalent. Hot English mustard powder mixed with water is a different thing entirely and will overwhelm the cheese.
- Butter and cheese creamed togetherSoftened butter beaten with finely grated dry cheese until it spreads without tearing the bread; the recipe gives no proportions. A sharp aged cheddar or a hard grating cheese works; anything soft or moist makes the bread sodden.
- Temperature matters more than techniqueBoth spreads must be at cool room temperature. Cold butter drags the crumb of thin-cut bread and the sandwich will not close flat.
Harlequin, in late-Victorian and Edwardian cookery, was a common label for dishes built on visible contrast -- harlequin ices, harlequin jellies, harlequin cakes -- the name borrowed from the parti-coloured diamonds of the pantomime character's costume. The sandwich chapters of turn-of-the-century books like this one carry a good many such conceits, suited to afternoon tea, card parties and receptions, where something small, cold, handled without a fork and pretty on a plate was wanted. Recipes of the period often end, as this one does, with a phrase like "finish as usual," assuming the reader has already absorbed general directions given earlier in the section.