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Chicken Sandwiches
2 egg-yolks
Salt
1 teaspoon melted butter
Pepper
1 teaspoon lemon-juice
1 teaspoon stock
1 cup chicken
Cook the eggs thirty to forty-five minutes, in water just below boiling-point, take out the yolks, and mash as fine as possible. Add to these the melted butter and lemon-juice, the finely chopped chicken, salt, pepper and stock. Mix all well together. A paste will be the result and with this very delicate sandwiches may be made.
A cooked-yolk paste rather than a mayonnaise-bound salad, which is why it spreads thin and slices cleanly. A few points of translation.
- The long egg cooking"Water just below boiling-point" for thirty to forty-five minutes is a slow-cooked egg rather than a hard boil; period books recommended it for a softer, more crumbly yolk. Water held somewhere below a simmer, roughly 180-190F, matches the instruction, though the book gives no figure. The whites are not used here, so save them for something else.
- The chicken must be cookedThe cup of chicken is understood to be leftover roast or boiled fowl, finely chopped. Nothing in this recipe cooks it, so start from meat that is already fully cooked.
- "Stock"A teaspoon of stock, unspecified, used to loosen the paste. Add it a few drops at a time; the quantity is small enough that a thin stock will not do much harm either way.
- Chop, do not processA food processor turns this into a smooth pate and loses the point of it. Chop the chicken by hand until it is nearly minced, then mash it into the yolks with a fork.
- Season more than you thinkThe salt and pepper are given without quantities, as was usual in books of this period. Season to taste, allowing for how the bird was cooked: plainly boiled fowl will need more than well-seasoned roast.
- YieldSomething over a cup of filling, going by the cup of chicken alone; enough for several rounds of sandwiches cut into fingers or triangles.
- Bread and holdingThin white bread, crusts off, buttered to the edge so the paste does not soak in. Made ahead, cover with a damp cloth and refrigerate; let them lose the chill before serving.
Sandwich fillings of this kind belong to the era when afternoon tea, receptions and card parties created steady demand for something delicate that could be made in the morning and cut at four o'clock. The binding here is hard-cooked yolk rather than mayonnaise. The sandwich chapter reflects a period when a hostess was expected to produce several distinct fillings from whatever cold meat the previous day's dinner had left behind.