Which is ‘Wich?

By Sean McVeigh

I’ve been told my last few columns have been a little too serious. I hear you. That is not why you’re reading this column. If you wanted that kind of content, you’d be watching some silly cable news show. I hope you come here for a break from the heavy stuff and a couple of chuckles. So, with that said, let’s talk about the United States Department of Agriculture.

I’m not sure if you caught the “Facts You Probably Don’t Need” section in last week’s paper. (If you didn’t, what the heck were you doing?) It contained this gem: “According to the United States Department of Agriculture (USDA), a closed sandwich must contain at least 35% cooked meat and no more than 50% bread, while an open sandwich must contain at least 50% cooked meat.” All week, this fact has been sitting with me … and not in a good way.

In Malcolm Gladwell’s classic book “Outliers,” he stresses his rule for expertise: the “10,000-Hour Rule.” If you’ve spent 10,000 hours practicing something, you can claim to be an expert. That said, I declare myself an expert sandwich eater. If there is anything I know in this strange world, it’s when I am eating a sandwich and when I am not.

That being said, let me tell you, the USDA’s definition of a sandwich is pure balderdash. It’s insulting that someone wrote that down, was happy with it, and others just nodded along. (I have no idea if that’s how it went down, but in my mind, it certainly is.) There are many ways I could dismantle this ridiculous definition, but I’ll keep it simple: Is a peanut butter and jelly sandwich not a sandwich?

The USDA is not the only branch of government to wade into this culinary quagmire. Believe it or not, this topic has surfaced multiple times in courtrooms across several states, including our own. New York and California — unsurprisingly — grappled with this for tax purposes. Massachusetts even had to settle a lease dispute over the question.

Let’s stick close to home. According to New York Tax Bulletin ST-835, a sandwich: “include(s) cold and hot sandwiches of every kind that are prepared and ready to be eaten, whether made on bread, bagels, rolls, pitas, wraps, or otherwise, and regardless of the filling or number of layers. A sandwich can be as simple as a buttered bagel or roll, or as elaborate as a six-foot, toasted submarine sandwich.” They even list numerous examples, covering just about every controversial take on this extremely controversial topic. According to New York, a hotdog, a burrito and gyro are all sandwiches.

Although people have been using bread as a conduit for their food for millennia, the term “sandwich”, as we know it today, comes from the Earl of Sandwich in England — specifically, John Montagu, the 4th Earl of Sandwich. Montagu was something of a gambler, and as everyone knows, playing cards can work up quite the appetite. Instead of having to leave the table for a meal, the inventive earl had his servants bring him some roast beef stuffed between two pieces of bread. And just like that, the sandwich was born … or so the story goes.

The Right Honourable Montagu seems like he was a simple man. If he were around today, I think he’d have some strong thoughts on all this fuss over his namesake. I like to imagine him saying, in an extremely proper British accent, “Stop being a bunch of whiny wallys! If you can’t tell what is and what isn’t a sandwich, you deserve to be locked up in the Tower of London. Bloody hell.” Or something along those lines.

You know a sandwich when you see it. A hotdog is not a sandwich. A burrito is certainly not a sandwich. A sandwich is a sandwich, and if you have a problem with that, take it up with John Montagu.