Sunday, December 22, 2013

Plastic and Tea Sandwiches

Plastics were a big, huge deal in the 40s.  Due to the scarcity of resources coupled with the great needs of the troops, scientists turned to plastics research to fill the gaps.  Plastics production increased some odd 2000+% during the war, 85% of which was used for war efforts.  Plastic was made better and cheaper. During and after the war plastics were everywhere. Our world was forever changed. I cringe to imagine a world where shampoo is in a glass bottle. Say what you will about Monsanto, but in 1945 they surely saved a lot of feet from broken glass.

During the plastics boom of the 40s they made just about anything from this exciting, new material. There were plastic hats (ooohh.. fancy), plastic clutch bags, and even plastic bras (which sounds silly, but was designed as safety equipment for factory workers).

Here is a film from the 1940s which explains about the history of plastic, it's uses during the war, and it's destiny to change the world at home.



Of course, now we know we may have overdone it a little bit, but there is no doubting that plastic was a game changer.

Okay, on to our recipe which has nothing to do whatsoever with plastic. I'm on vacation, so working out an easy segue just isn't my thing right now.

Due to baking burnout, and the fact that tomorrow I will transform my little kitchen into a Christmas cookie factory, this week's recipe is easy-peasy. I've made tea sandwiches.

My sister and her husband came by for a visit and I thought the "attractive sandwiches" would work well because I wasn't certain whether they would be arriving hungry.

I made two kinds. The first of which were egg sandwiches. They are super easy, simply slice up hard boiled eggs and lay slices of egg onto slices of lightly buttered bread. Season with salt, pepper, and paprika.

yum

The second kind were chicken sandwiches, which is just a really basic chicken salad. These are made by chopping 1 cup chicken meat until it is very fine (or buying canned and attacking it with a fork), mix into a paste by combining with 1/4 cup mayonnaise. Spread the paste onto slices of bread.

you had me at paste

In order to make these boring, but delicious creatures into amusing and delicate tea sandwiches, the crusts must be removed and the remaining sandwich cut into shapes. After cutting a few with cookie cutters, I decided that I would quickly run out of bread and made the remaining sandwiches into squares. At the very end, I got creative and realized that triangles are also a thing. The whole endeavor was an enormous waste of bread.

This is an awful lot of food waste, even without wartime rationing

The resultant sandwiches are super-cute and very tasty though. If I didn't hate the thought of throwing away so much bread I would definitely consider making a wider variety of these for parties, perhaps with different breads and some garnishes. They were a hit.

Take that Subway! Who's the sandwich artist now?



2 comments:

  1. I loved them..... tasty!!! And plastic is good as well..... speaking as someone who did cut his foot on a broken glass jar as a kid.

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  2. Thanks!
    Stepping on broken glass is the worst! Ouch!

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