Making the Lettuce Sandwich Delicious

According to the Wikipedia List of Sandwiches from which we draw our inspiration here at the Tribunal, the lettuce sandwich consists of “lettuce and mayonnaise.” The Wikipedia article about lettuce sandwiches goes into more detail, calling it a “metaphor to represent things like mundanity, weakness, and poverty.” (It also brings up the lettuce wrap, a favorite of low-carb and gluten-free diners everywhere, but not of mine.)

I’ll be honest. It doesn’t sound very good. Here at the Tribunal, we’ve dealt with sandwiches before that were mostly metaphorical, or out-of-date cultural references. They usually don’t turn out to be very tasty. Generally speaking, I prefer sandwiches that are good over sandwiches that are not good.

So how would one go about making a good lettuce sandwich? Or at least one that’s better than the subsistence-level watery vegetable, basic condiment, and (presumably) limp bread summed up in that phrase “lettuce and mayonnaise?”

I start by asking myself, as I have asked myself before, “What is an actual good sandwich?”

And I answer myself, as I have before…

Surely that would be cheating though. Yes, a BLT has lettuce in it, but the lettuce is not the star, not the main attraction. It may get equal billing with the Bacon and the Tomato, but everybody knows the Lettuce is just a bit player in that particular scenario, the Asta to their Nick and Nora (but without the scene-stealing turns), the Getz to their Riggs and Murtaugh (but without the iconic “they fuck you at the drive-through” rant), the Donny to their Dude and Walter (but without, um, Steve Buscemi?)

So obviously I can’t just add bacon and tomato to this and still call it a lettuce sandwich. The lettuce has to be the primary component of the sandwich. To be honest, I can’t even really add something as simple as cheese; that would make it a cheese sandwich with lettuce, rather than the other way around. The only thing that will really fly here is a condiment or two. But what condiments? And how do I stick with the BLT thing?

Legend tells of an impossible condiment that combines the smoothness of mayonnaise with the salty smokiness of bacon. I have searched the store shelves far and wide looking for this elusive “baconnaise” but thus far it has eluded me.

Amazon’s got my back, though.

As for the tomato, this one is a gimme. Let’s make some tomato jam.

Savory Tomato Jam

• 1 28oz can Italian plum tomatoes
• 1/2 medium yellow onion, finely diced
• 2 cloves garlic, minced
• 1 tsp kosher salt
• 2 tbsp sugar
• 1/2 tsp oregano
• 1 package low-sugar pectin

1. Sweat the onions for a few minutes in a dry pan. Spritz with a little water now and then to keep them from sticking
2. Add the garlic and cook a minute or two longer
3. Add the canned tomatoes, salt, sugar and oregano. I used the edge of a wooden spoon to smash the tomatoes a bit, but they’ll disintegrate during cooking regardless.
4. Bring the mixture to a simmer. Whisk in the pectin.
5. Cook over low to medium heat until the entire mixture has reduced by about 1/2.
6. Can in two 8oz jars if intending to keep, or just chill in a bowl.

So let’s give this a shot. Starting with the simple oat bran bread that is my go-to, lightly toasted, I spread some baconnaise on one slice and some tomato jam on the other.

Then I add a section of a head of iceberg lettuce. Remember, we need the lettuce to be the star, so we’re using a lot of it.

And that’s it! Let’s put this sandwich together.

Cards on the table time: I wasn’t a big fan of the baconnaise when I tasted a tiny bit of it straight out of the jar. In the context of the sandwich, it works better. In fact, the sandwich as a whole works fairly well. It clicks. It’s just not the revelation I was looking for. It’s good. Quite good in fact. I don’t know if we’ve quite gotten to “delicious” though.

What would work better than the baconnaise though? Bacon jam?

Bacon jam.

Is bacon jam going to overwhelm the lettuce? Does it step beyond the bounds of condiments only? Is adding bacon jam to a lettuce sandwich, in essence, going to turn it into a bacon jam sandwich?

There’s only one way to find out.

I like this recipe for bacon jam from Serious Eats, though I add about a half teaspoon of red pepper flakes when cooking the onions and garlic. My house smells deliciously of bacon and bourbon while it’s cooking. Delicious, bacon, and bourbon are three descriptors frequently associated with my house though. Six hours later and…

Once again, we toast some basic bread, spread the tomato jam on one slice and the bacon jam on the other

Since we’re using a more assertive pair of spreads this time, I want to use a more assertive lettuce as well. Romaine is a favorite of mine. It’s still got a nice crunch like the iceberg lettuce but with quite a bit more flavor.

I put the two halves together and…

Did we achieve delicious? Yes, I’d say definitely. The tomato jam is still intensely savory, and the bacon jam is sweet, sour, a touch spicy, and has that magical salty/smoky bacon flavor in spades. The slightly bitter crunch of romaine lettuce is able to cut through these two and make its presence known. However…

Is it still a lettuce sandwich? To be honest, I don’t think so. The lettuce, though present, is once again relegated to being the quirky sidekick to the strong flavors of the tomato and bacon jams. It’s a damn good sandwich to be sure, and it consists only of lettuce and condiments. It technically meets the guidelines I set for myself. But making a couple of really intense-tasting jams and calling them condiments just feels like cheating.

So can we make a lettuce sandwich delicious? I don’t know. We could certainly make a lettuce wrap delicious just by adding this bacon jam and tomato jam and, I don’t know, maybe a little plain old mayonnaise. But the lettuce sandwich?

I suppose I could just try eating the regular lettuce sandwich as described, with lettuce and mayonnaise and plain old bread. Maybe it’s one of those situations where the whole is greater than the sum of its parts. I’ll never know unless I try. But the month of April is over, and next month we’ll be on to new sandwiches. Farewell, lettuce sandwich. I doubt we’ll meet again.