Here's a business idea for anyone with a few million quid burning a hole in your pocket. Give me your dosh and I'll set up the perfect pub chain for you. Now I won't give you all of my ideas here, you'll have to pay for those, but I will explain a key aspect of the menu. The sandwiches that will be on sale. Now I'm someone who has been going into pubs for a very long time. In that time, I've had a lot of sandwiches and what amazes me is that the quality has simply got worse every year year for about 40 years. I suspect that the pinnacle of pub sandwiches on London was probably around 1985. This is a purely subjetive view, based on the pubs I frequented, but all of the best sandwiches I had were made then.
So lets start with a few rules. A decent sandwich has to be made on the spot, with fresh bread. If it is unsliced bread, even better. In our family, we called such sandwiches doorstops. They were never cut into triangles. The bread was white and crusty and delicious. The next element is the butter. This must be proper butter. I like Lurpack unsalted personallty, but there are plenty of other brands that are good, or at least acceptible. Any pub that went to the trouble of getting that right, rarely went wrong. The next element is the filling. I loath gunge in a sandwich, which makes it soggy. I far prefer sandwiches that do not have mayonaise on them. So what is acceptable?
Mature cheddar cheese, I can accept it with pickle, but if the cheese is proper it doesn't need it.
Thick cut ham with English or at a stretch Dijon Mustard. Thin, watery supermarket ham is not acceptable.
Sausage. This can be served with HP sauce or Dijon Mustard. The sausage must be freshly cut and hot.
Bacon. I don't think a good bacon sandwich needs anything. It must be hot bacon.
Falafel with tomato, onion and garlic sauce. The falafels must be hot and I will break my no gunge rule.
Smoked Salmon, with a dash of lemon and pepper.
That is really it. I am not a fan of wraps. Why put good food in something that tastes like cardboard? As for french sticks, generally I find them to be a bit stale. The Three Horseshoes in Letchmore Heath used to do amazing sausages in French bread back in the 1980's. We went their specially for them. They were massive Cumberlands that sat in a sausage oven staring at you. They also had all of the above options, apart from the Falafels, which I only had once at a pub in town. It was the best sandwich I had there. It was delicious, but it went when the Landlord went.
I don't really like garnish with sandwiches. Just a plate with the sarnie on it. The modern trend is to put masses of different fillings in, which generally don't compliment each other. If you use good ingredients, you don't need lots of other stuff in there.
I think that a pub that sold proper, decent, filling, fresh sandwiches would do well, especially at lunch times. If I am in a rush, I want a tasty, filling meal that I don't have to mess around with. A good sandwich goes very well with a pint, but for reasons I don't understand, the numpties that run pubs simply don't get this. Our local pubs in Mill Hill don't even seem capable of making a basic sandwich. What is wrong with them?
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