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Ham Sandwiches
Mrs. W. Butterfield.
Chop fine some cold boiled ham, a little fat with the lean add tongue and chicken also chopped fine; make a dressing of one-half a pound of butter, three tablespoons of salad oil, three of mustard, the yolk of one egg, and a little salt; mix well together and spread over the meat smoothly on thin slices of bread. Very nice.
A potted-meat spread rather than a stacked sandwich: the meat is chopped to a paste-like fineness and bound with a rich mustard butter. The proportions are generous with fat, which is what keeps it spreadable and stops it drying out.
- The hinge: chop, don't grindThe meat should be chopped fine enough to hold together under the butter but still have some texture. A food processor works if you pulse in short bursts; run it continuously and you get a smooth pink paste with no character.
- What kind of mustard"Three of mustard" is ambiguous. Three tablespoons of dry English mustard powder against half a pound of butter is aggressive but plausible for the period; three tablespoons of prepared mustard is milder and more likely what most cooks would want today. Start with prepared and taste.
- Salad oilIn the 1870s this meant olive oil, or sometimes a bland refined oil sold under that name. Either a light olive oil or a neutral oil will do; the three tablespoons are there to loosen the butter, not to flavour it.
- Half a pound of butterThat is two sticks, or 225 g. The recipe does not say how to treat it, but it is best creamed soft rather than melted: melted butter will separate from the oil and egg yolk and the dressing will break.
- TongueBeef tongue, boiled and peeled, sold cured or fresh at good butchers and many delis. It is not essential — the ham and chicken carry the sandwich — but it adds the slightly gelatinous depth the recipe is after.
- The raw yolkThe egg yolk is never cooked. If you are serving anyone elderly, pregnant or immune-compromised, use a pasteurized yolk; otherwise treat it as you would a homemade mayonnaise and keep the finished spread refrigerated.
- Quantities and yieldNo meat weight is given. Roughly a pound of mixed cooked meats to the full quantity of dressing gives a spread that holds; that is enough for about 20 to 24 small tea sandwiches. Halve the dressing if you want the meat to lead.
- ServingUse a close-crumbed white loaf sliced thin, spread edge to edge, press the sandwiches under a board for a few minutes, then trim the crusts and cut into fingers or triangles. Made a few hours ahead and kept covered and cold, they cut far more cleanly.
The Home Cook Book belongs to the first great wave of North American charity cookbooks — compiled from contributions by named local women, sold to raise money for a hospital or church, and read as much for the roll-call of neighbours as for the cooking. The dish itself sits in a long line of potted and minced meats: before refrigeration, cold roast and boiled meat was often chopped, worked with butter and mustard, and sealed or spread to keep it a little longer. By the 1870s that thrift could also be read as gentility, and sandwiches of chopped meats were common fare for afternoon tea, railway journeys and picnics, where thin bread and a well-seasoned filling could be eaten with the fingers and no fuss.