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Sliced Ham Sandwiches
Slice cold boiled ham as thinly as possible. Put between thin slices of buttered bread prepared as for Bread and Butter Folds.
Two sentences, one of which points elsewhere in the book. The whole technique lives in that cross-reference and in how thin you can get the ham.
- Bread and Butter FoldsFarmer's method turns on buttering the cut face of the loaf before slicing, so the thin slice does not tear; the slice is then folded over. That order of operations is the part worth keeping.
- The bread must not be freshA loaf baked that morning drags and compresses under the knife. One day old, or briefly chilled, slices cleanly and thinly.
- Softened, not melted, butterIt should spread in a thin unbroken film, which also keeps the bread from going damp against the ham. Take it out of the refrigerator an hour ahead rather than warming it.
- Cold boiled hamIn Farmer's day this generally meant a whole ham simmered at home, cooled, and sliced as wanted. Deli-counter cooked ham is the direct equivalent; ask for it shaved. Dry-cured country ham or prosciutto is a different, much saltier animal and will overwhelm the bread.
- Ham fully chilled before slicingWarm boiled ham shreds. Cold and firm, it takes a near-translucent slice, and several thin layers eat far better than one thick one.
- YieldThe recipe gives no quantities. If you are scaling it, work from the loaf: each pair of slices makes one sandwich, cut into small pieces for tea.
- Holding and servingBest made shortly before serving. Cover with a barely damp towel and refrigerate no more than a couple of hours; longer and the edges curl.
- If you want mustardThe recipe is plain as written. A thin scrape of mustard butter — butter creamed with prepared mustard — does not wet the bread the way mustard alone will.
Sliced-ham sandwiches sit in the Boston Cooking-School Cook Book's sandwich chapter alongside a long run of variations built on the same base of "Bread and Butter Folds," and their brevity is striking: by 1896 the sandwich had become a standard household form rather than a novelty, and Fannie Farmer gives little more than the filling before referring back to the technique. The chapter is usually read as belonging to the era of the afternoon tea and the packed luncheon basket, when thin bread, trimmed crusts and small cut shapes were said to mark a sandwich as company food rather than a laborer's dinner. Cold boiled ham was a natural filling in a kitchen that simmered a whole ham and then worked through it cold for days — a habit often described as one of thrift, and one that produced, incidentally, one of the most durable sandwiches there is.