"To the Romans, a slice of onion between two slices of bread was a good breakfast. To the British poor, a cheese-and-onion sandwich was basic sustenance. Ernest Hemingway, who grew up eating onion sandwiches in suburban Chicago, of wild-onion fame, liked onions on bread with peanut butter. In his novel Islands in the Stream, the sandwich is referred to as the “Mount Everest Special” because it is “one of the highest points in the sandwich-maker’s art.”In Ireland, where egg-and-onion sandwiches are popular, the standard version is an egg-salad sandwich with thinly sliced green onions. Back in the United States, President Calvin Coolidge liked his egg-and-onion sandwich made with egg salad, too. His was reportedly a kind of oniony egg salad sandwich on rye bread, with one chopped sweet onion mixed with three hard-boiled eggs, mayonnaise, a little dry mustard powder, salt, and pepper.In other cases, an onion sandwich is the simplest of concoctions. The writer Joseph Mitchell said of the proprietor of McSorley’s Old Ale House, the venerable Irish saloon in New York City, “He liked to fit a whole onion into the hollowed-out heel of a loaf of French bread and eat it as if it were an apple.” You have to choose from among the great ideas of others."
From a reading at Harper's Magazine, which in turn is excerpted from The Core of an Onion, which was published in November by Bloomsbury
I read Islands in the Stream 30 years ago, which is why I probably don't remember the Mount Everest Special. However, I do remember that Robert Jordan ate slices of raw onion in For Whom the Bell Tolls. I wonder if there are other appearances of raw onions in his novels that I've forgotten about...
ReplyDelete"the standard version is an egg-salad sandwich with thinly sliced green onions." - that was the standard sandwich my mother made for long road trips. Delicious, and only made for those trips.
ReplyDeleteThe author of that book also wrote "Salt", "Cod", "Milk", "Paper", etc.
ReplyDeleteJoseph Mitchell is a terrific writer. I'd recommend Up in the Old Hotel if you're interested in old New York of the immigrant era.
ReplyDeleteI would expect this to be published in the Onion.
ReplyDeleteMy mil loved onion sandwhiches and would eat them every so often. Me, not so much, raw onion is "unkind" to my digestive system even though I like them on burgers. Hadn't thought about her eating them in years, lol.
ReplyDeleteI think Harper's / Kurlansky must have been polling Ireland, Indiana for their info about onion sandwiches. In Ireland, Ireland the GoTo is the [Cheese and Onion] Crisp Sandwich [https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=ClbrojAVH9E]. Be sure to try one on St Crispin's Day 24 October: you'll be in good company:
ReplyDeleteRather proclaim it, Westmoreland, through my host,
That he which hath no stomach to this snack,
Let him depart; his sandwich shall be made
with toaster grill if that be his desire:
We would not dine in that man’s company
That fears his fellowship to dine with crisps.
(act 4, scene 3)
DeleteThat video for the "ultimate Irish crisp sandwich" - buttered white bread filled with onion flavor potato chips? How unimaginative.
DeleteI rather suspect it was filmed with the figurative tongue firmly in the figurative cheek, to mix a metaphor.
DeleteA few years ago on a rewatch of Harvey (with Jimmy Stewart) his sister runs off with the handyman, if i recall correctly. She enticed him with egg-and-onion sandwiches. His unbridled excitement for what sounded like a rather pedestrian meal had me googling to find he probably just meant egg-salad sandwich.
ReplyDeleteI looked on YouTube and found a video about making an egg and onion sandwiche, called the "Harvey sanwich"
Deletehttps://www.youtube.com/watch?v=ZDb42LL6EGs
Joseph Mitchell also wrote that the man at McSorley's kept a coal shovel by the fireplace and would heat it in the fire at closing time and fry a nice steak on the shovel. I have always wanted to try this.
ReplyDelete