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Dainty Ribbon Sandwich
Cut the crust from a loaf of white and of brown bread. Cut three slices one-half inch thick from each loaf. Spread with butter and orange marmalade. Put six slices together and press firmly. Trim the edges evenly, then with a sharp knife cut into slices about three-quarters of an inch thick. Place the sandwich on a lace paper doily. Serve as soon as made.
A tea sandwich built as a striped block and cut across the layers, so the geometry matters more than the flavour. Everything hinges on getting six even slices that stack flat.
- The hinge: even slicesThe stripes only read cleanly if all six slices are the same half-inch thickness. Use a day-old unsliced loaf and a long serrated knife, or ask a bakery to slice both loaves to the same setting.
- "Brown bread"Here this most likely means a wholemeal or graham sandwich loaf rather than the steamed Boston brown bread of the New England baked-bean table, which will not give crusted half-inch slices to stack. Any dense wholewheat sandwich loaf gives the contrast intended.
- Alternate the coloursThe recipe assumes it without saying so: stack white, brown, white, brown, white, brown, otherwise there is no ribbon.
- ButterCream the butter to a soft, spreadable paste first. Cold butter tears half-inch fresh bread and the layers will not sit flush. The butter also seals the crumb against the marmalade's moisture.
- MarmaladeA thin-cut or jelly-style orange marmalade spreads more evenly than a chunky one and will not force the layers apart under pressure. Spread it sparingly over the butter.
- PressingWrap the stack in waxed paper or cling film, set a board and a light weight on top and chill for 30 minutes to an hour. The block trims and cuts far more cleanly cold, though the sandwiches should come back to cool room temperature before serving.
- YieldA stack six slices high, trimmed and cut into three-quarter-inch slices, gives roughly four to six ribbon sandwiches depending on the width of the loaf.
- Serve as soon as madeSound advice: cut faces of half-inch bread stale quickly. If there is a gap, keep them under a barely damp cloth in a covered tin, and skip the doily until they go to the table.
Ribbon and checkerboard sandwiches belong to the era when afternoon tea was a competitive domestic display, and books like this one existed to supply hostesses with an inexhaustible list of variations on buttered bread. The appeal is entirely visual: two loaves of contrasting colour, bonded with butter and cut across the grain of the stack so the stripes face the plate. Cutting six matched half-inch slices by hand was itself the mark of a capable kitchen. The lace paper doily is part of the recipe rather than an afterthought.