Apple Sandwich
Between thin slices of buttered white bread place thin slices of tart apples, which have been steeped for an hour in a mixture of lemon juice and sugar.
A two-line recipe with one real variable: the apple. Everything else is assembly.
- Choose the apple for firmness, not just tartnessA Granny Smith, Braeburn, or Newtown Pippin holds its shape in slices thin enough to see through. Softer tart apples are likelier to slump and tear after an hour in the lemon syrup.
- The steeping mixtureNo proportions are given. Juice of one lemon to two tablespoons sugar is enough to coat two sliced apples; toss so every slice is wetted, since the point of the lemon is as much to stop browning as to flavour.
- Slice thin, and mechanically if you canA mandoline or the slicing side of a box grater gives the near-translucent slices this sandwich depends on. Thick slices push the bread apart and the whole thing falls open when cut.
- Drain before buildingAn hour of steeping draws out juice. Lift the slices onto a towel or a rack for a minute or the syrup soaks straight through the crumb and the sandwich goes limp.
- Butter is structuralButter the bread right to the edges and use it at soft room temperature. The film of fat is what keeps the bread from absorbing apple juice, so a thin scrape of it defeats the purpose.
- BreadA close-crumbed white sandwich loaf, sliced thin, suits it, though the recipe specifies only thin white bread. Trim the crusts and cut into fingers or triangles if serving at tea.
- Yield and timingTwo apples and eight slices of bread make four sandwiches, or about sixteen tea-sized pieces. Assemble within a half hour of serving; these do not hold well, even covered.
Sandwich books proliferated in the first decades of the twentieth century, when the sandwich had moved from a chophouse snack to what is often said to have been a mainstay of the ladies' luncheon, the afternoon tea and the picnic hamper. The sweet chapters in these collections are the most alien to modern taste: they treat sandwiches as a vehicle for fruit, nuts, jam, marshmallow and whipped cream, and they lean heavily on thin white bread and generously buttered crustless fingers. An apple sandwich belongs to that world, and its logic is sound enough for a period without refrigeration on hand at every table: the lemon-and-sugar steep both seasons the fruit and keeps cut apple from browning while the plate sits out. The technique of macerating sliced apple in acidulated sugar is much older than this book.