But no, recently I was invited by Warburtons to an afternoon at a creative sandwich lunch along with food bloggers. The event was hosted by James Ramsden.
Photograph by Warburtons.
The afternoon was broken into three parts.
SESSION ONE:
Flavour pairings – Discussion on which sandwich classics work and why steering away from just sandwiches and thinking about more general flavour pairings and how they might be incorporated into a sandwich.
SESSION TWO:
British with a twist – Discussion on British and retro flavours which are very much on-trend at the moment.
SESSION THREE:
International sandwiches – Taking elements from international dishes and applying them to a sandwich.
We had a huge selection of fillings, condiments and sauces to tickle our taste buds as well as using some of the new Warburtons Sandwich Range.
This included pitta, thins and wraps – particularly liked the Thins as they were most obviously thinner and the bread taste didn’t dominate the sandwich.
But I suppose unlike other thinner options these held together well and made for a good sandwich. I have now road-tested these at home with the kids packed lunch and got the thumbs up.
Yes, the huge selection of fillings also included Spam….
So for the first session, I made a sandwich based on a great salad that I had made from Olive magazine. The salad was salted cucumber, Halloumi and Chilli. First, you've got to salt the cucumber which normally this takes about 30 minutes.
I could have done with slicing it thinner to speed up the process – salting helps draw out the water from the cucumber which concentrates the delicate flavour. It also makes sure the other components of salad don’t get all soggy.
Next fry slices of halloumi in sesame oil and near the end I added sliced garlic and chilli.
So now to the build.
Using the Warburtons sandwich thins I spread houmous on the bottom slice top with baby spinach leaves then the golden-brown slices of halloumi together the garlic and chilli. On top, the dried(ish) cucumber.
Not bad for a first attempt but I think to win anything I needed to push the boat out.
Round two the Retro British:
For me nothing beats bacon; it has been credited to enhance the flavour of nearly everything and is a well-known cure for vegetarianism. So bacon it is, but how to make it with a twist? I happened to have my Flavour Thesaurus and by chance, it fell open at the page for bacon.
Okay well, I cheated and brought it with me. On the second page for bacon, I found that well-known combination Chocolate.
It’s a risk but had to be done - a Bacon Sarni with a Chocolate and Chilli Sauce.
Yummy I hear you say. Well, unfortunately, the idea was better than the result proving wrong the theory that everything tastes better with either bacon or chocolate.
Now it was a last-ditch attempt in round three:
The International round, I had to deliver something special to win, I couldn’t mess up.
I went for a courgette chip butty. The courgette was sliced into chip shapes and then dipped in a batter of flour, sparkling water, egg and salt.
Then into the deep fat fryer. This time I decided to serve it in a wrap with rocket on the bottom and hot chips on top. I made a special sauce for this out of cream cheese, lemon juice, mayonnaise, fresh thyme leaves, parsley and black pepper.
However, I wasn’t wearing my glasses so I put in garam masala instead of pepper. Remarkably this mistake actually made the sandwich and I won third prize.
To sum it up, I'm not sure many of the creations concocted that day will make it to the shelves of the local Pret but it did open my eyes to what we can be done when we think outside of the slice.
The sandwich could be, and should be, so much more when given the opportunity. So embrace those slices, fill them with your favourite fare and enjoy.
Many thanks to Warburtons for an enjoyable day.
Post by Jonathan Foster Kenny from CookSomething.
No comments
Post a Comment
I love to hear from everyone so thanks for taking the time to comment. Please note comments containing links will NOT be published.
Cheers
Jan