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Country.club Sandwich
Use three slices of white bread thinly cut and lightly buttered; place a lettuce leaf that has been dipped in mayonnaise dressing on lower slice, and on top of that place slices of cold boiled chicken; then put another slice of bread and a lettuce leaf followed by thin slices of veal loaf, topped by another slice of bread with thinly sliced pickles on top.
A three-decker built cold, with no toasting and no bacon — the club sandwich in its earlier, plainer form. The only real technique here is stacking it so it holds together long enough to be eaten.
- Veal loafA cold pressed loaf of ground veal, typically bound with egg and crumbs, baked in a mould, then chilled and sliced — a cold-larder item of the period and hard to buy now. Any firm cold cooked meat that slices thinly works in its place: ham, tongue, a good pâté de campagne, or thinly carved cold roast pork.
- Cold boiled chickenPoached rather than roasted, which is why the slices are pale and moist. Simmer a whole bird gently with an onion and a bay leaf until it reaches 165F internal, let it cool in its own liquid, then chill; it slices more cleanly than roast chicken. Supermarket poached or rotisserie breast is the shortcut.
- Dipping the lettuceCoating the leaf in mayonnaise rather than spreading dressing on the bread may have helped keep the crumb dry, though the light buttering does that work too. Use whole crisp leaves of romaine or iceberg, shaken dry first, or the dressing slides off.
- BreadThin-cut white sandwich bread is what is meant; a firm loaf holds the stack better than an airy modern one. Nothing here is toasted, though toasted versions of the club were also current.
- MayonnaisePeriod mayonnaise dressing was made to order with raw yolk and oil. Commercial jarred mayonnaise is made with pasteurised egg and is the safer choice for a sandwich that may sit out; if you make your own, use pasteurised eggs and keep the finished sandwich refrigerated.
- Pickles on topThin slices of pickle laid on the upper crust, not inside — a garnish, and it will fall off the moment the sandwich is lifted. Tucking them under the top slice with the veal loaf keeps them in place.
- Cutting and servingPress the finished stack gently, pin the corners with cocktail picks, and cut on the diagonal into quarters. One sandwich makes a single substantial lunch portion or four pieces for a tea tray.
The club sandwich appears in American cookery in the 1890s, its name generally traced to men's social clubs and to the club cars of passenger trains, though no single origin is documented and several New York and Saratoga clubs have been claimed for it. This version is a double-decker — two fillings kept apart by a middle slice of bread — and shows the form before bacon and tomato became compulsory. The pairing of cold boiled fowl with a slice of veal loaf suggests how such a sandwich might be assembled in a period kitchen: from what was already cooked and cold in the larder. Titles like this one multiplied in the first decade of the twentieth century, when afternoon bridge, luncheon clubs and the chafing-dish craze created steady demand for food that could be made in advance and eaten with the fingers.