Gratitude

Thank You to Sandwiches

From lunch boxes and brown bags to restaurants and bars

Sometimes I feel a little silly about the fact that I can vividly remember sandwiches I’ve eaten. No, not every sandwich! But I remember specific sandwiches and where I ate them and who else was there.

As I reflect on my sandwich memories more intentionally (they usually just pop into my mind when I’m eating another sandwich), I’m realizing that my key sandwich memories involve other people.

When I was a kid, almost every sandwich I ate had some kind of meat on it. I especially liked ham and cheese. I liked peanut butter and jam or jelly on toast, but not PB&J sandwiches.

Every day, my mom packed a ham and cheese sandwich on thick white bread into my metal Muppet Show lunchbox, then later into nondescript brown paper sacks. I never bought school lunch; I ate my sandwich, chips, fruit, and cookie. There wasn’t much variation— maybe some carrot and celery sticks, or maybe a small piece of cake instead of a cookie — and I liked it that way.

When I was in high school, my dad worked the night shift, and he would pack our lunches when he got home from work before he went to bed. He liked to throw in extras, something for a little snack like neatly cut squares of cheese. And always the same ham and cheese sandwiches for me.

I ate lunch with my best friend Debra. I can’t remember what she ate, but she had a yellow plastic Garfield lunchbox, and I don’t remember anyone ever giving her a hard time about carrying a lunchbox at age 15, but then I never saw anyone give her a hard time except her mom, but her mom gave it to me, too, and anyone who dared to enter her living room.

As I got older, I grew to love clubhouse sandwiches, and I could make a list of places I ate clubs, especially places that also served hand-cut fries. I liked variations on clubs, too, like one I had at the Hopvine Pub after a poetry reading where the chef used apple chutney instead of lettuce and tomato.

Sometimes I’d order a BLT if a place didn’t have freshly roasted turkey, like at the casino where my friend Jackpot Jackie would get a glass of wine, and I’d get a pint of beer and a sandwich, and we’d play the slot machines when we had a day off from our jobs at the library where we worked. They even had screens built into the bar so people could eat and continue to play, but the ones set into the bar never paid out too well, so we’d just chat a little while I finished my sandwich.

Once in a great while, I had a sandwich that varied widely from my norms, like the time I had a Reuben at Nana’s Irish Pub on the Oregon coast. I never much liked corned beef or rye bread for that matter, but the pub advertised their Reuben as award-winning, and I saw one go out to a table nearby, so I gave it a try. Now here it is on my list of memorably delicious sandwiches, from one of my favorite vacation spots.

When I stopped eating meat in my early 40s, I missed my sandwich classics. I’d always thought sweets were my go-to comfort foods, but I realized how much I loved going to a restaurant and having a sandwich with a layer stacked upon a salty layer.

I found tasty alternatives, stuff that could be made at home like chickpea salad sandwiches, and BLTs with smoky tempeh instead of bacon. But now and then, I missed the old days of the clubhouse.

Finally, I discovered a piled-high vegan club at the Wayward Vegan Cafe in Seattle. My former girlfriend and I had gone vegan together, and WVC was our treat when we craved diner-style food. WVC did a club with stacks of bread, lettuce, tomato, tempeh, a vegan ham alternative, and vegan mayo. It wasn’t quite the same, but it addressed my sandwich nostalgia.

On my birthday last year, I was surprised to find a vegetarian version of a Reuben in a cafe on our way to Port Ludlow. I hadn’t eaten a Reuben since the one at the Oregon coast, years before. This birthday Reuben had sliced, roasted portobello mushrooms instead of meat. Well, I’m still talking about that sandwich to anyone who wants to listen, and I’ve been thinking of buying some sauerkraut and bakery-fresh rye and trying to replicate it at home.

Most recently, my girlfriend made us tuna melts on sourdough a few weekends ago. As I’ve written before, I grew up eating tuna sandwiches almost every Sunday, but we never had tuna melts, and I never had one as an adult. It had a time machine quality to it, like being in the past and present at the same moment.

There’s something lovely and comforting about someone cooking for you, and these sandwiches also connected us both to our families, as my girlfriend had grown up learning to make perfectly grilled sandwiches from her dad.

Another time, on a cold night in November when we’d been out running errands, she made us grilled cheese and tomato soup. She cut the sandwiches into triangles, perfect for dipping.

We met during the pandemic, and cooking for each other has built our relationship as we’ve shared more meals and time together. Food meant so much to my family, and sharing simple, comforting foods helps me feel grounded in my life.

What foods have been sustaining in this way to you? And what are your favorite sandwiches?

P.S. Did you grow up saying “grilled cheese” or “toasted cheese”? I think “grilled” is more common, but my family always said “toasted” — or sometimes even “toasty cheese” (and this was before Quiznos had the whole “mmm toasty” ad campaign).

P.P.S. Because I sometimes post about vegan foods, I want to say that while many of my meals are vegan, these days I follow a mostly — but not strictly — vegetarian diet. I don’t want to make excuses for my less-than vegan diet, but I wanted to explain the presence of tuna and cheese in the sandwiches above.

Thanks to Trista Signe Ainsworth and Sharing Randomly for the prompt about gratitude and memories about favorite foods.