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Speed and deliciousness. It’s two things a sandwich has had sorted for centuries. Put the perfect filling between a couple of slices and - hey presto - lunch, sorted.

There's a bit more to some of our favourite butties than just the filling though. Here, ����ý Bitesize presents some of the fascinating stories behind the sarnies and sangers that are just what we need when the hunger pangs hit.

The very first sandwich - or was it?

There is a rich history of noted figures giving their names to different foods and the sandwich appears to be one such delicacy.

The legend goes that John Montagu, the fourth Earl of Sandwich, was unwilling to step away from a game of cards one evening in 1762, despite being hungry. Instead, he ordered a servant to bring him some meat placed between two slices of bread for him to munch as the game continued. Apparently, his fellow guests were so taken by the dish that arrived, they asked for some too, calling it a sandwich after the man who made the initial request.

While it’s not an event that has been officially recorded, it seems the aftermath of that momentous naming was. Edward Gibbon, the scholar who wrote The History of the Decline and Fall of the Roman Empire, noted in a 1762 journal entry how he had enjoyed an evening “supping at little tables covered with a napkin, in the middle of a coffee-room, upon a bit of cold meat, or a sandwich, and drinking a glass of punch.” In 1772, the French writer Pierre-Jean Grosley also noted the rise in popularity of the sandwich during his time in England.

It’s worth remembering that the concept of the sandwich dates back far earlier than John Montagu lending his name to it. The man himself had visited the eastern area of the Mediterranean, where it was traditional for breads to be served with various fillings - perhaps this inspired his request on that notable evening?

What is the most famous sandwich in the USA?

The USA is the birthplace of more than one enduring sandwich filling. One with a special place in popular culture (they even eat it on Sesame Street) is the peanut butter and jelly - or PB&J.

What makes a peanut butter and jelly (the US name for jam) sandwich so interesting is the coming together of at least two convenience foods. In this case, it’s sliced bread and the aforementioned peanut butter. Pre-sliced bread became readily available in the 1920s.

Around 30 years earlier, a peanut paste was created by the physician Dr Ambrose Straub, to help older patients who had difficulty swallowing. Cereal pioneer Dr John Harvey Kellogg also mastered (and patented) a process for making peanut butter, introduced at the Chicago World Fair in 1893. The following year, Dr Straub took his version to the St Louis World Fair, where it caught the eye of store owners, who began ordering it.

Initially, peanut butter was a delicacy, served up in the most sophisticated New York City venues. In 1901, the (deep breath) Boston Cooking School Magazine of Culinary Science and Domestic Economics featured a recipe for peanut butter and jelly sandwiches. Julia Davis Chandler provided the details, suggesting currant or crab-apple jelly to accompany the peanut butter.

However, that wasn’t the moment PB&J became a nationally adored sandwich. Its popularity soared during World War Two, when peanut butter and jelly, along with sliced bread, were in the rations of the US Military. Putting the three together became a popular item in soldiers’ diets and when they came home from the conflict after 1945, that popularity spread around the country. With all three ingredients relatively affordable, a peanut butter and jelly sandwich fast became a staple for families, and particularly students living on a budget.

What is a ploughman's sandwich?

Although not strictly a sandwich, this combination of bread and specific ingredients can’t be ignored due to its popularity across the UK. We’re talking about a ploughman’s lunch. All it’s lacking is the ‘lid’ of another slice of bread - and let's not forget that a ploughman's sandwich is also available in supermarkets up and down the land.

The name 'ploughman' might suggest a traditional packed lunch a farm worker would take with them into the fields to tuck into on their break in the midday sun (or sheltering from the rain and snow). The phrase did turn up in print in the early 19th Century, but the ploughman’s as we know it; bread, butter, a generous chunk of cheese, pickle and other additions such as a pork pie, hard-boiled egg or pate, may have a far more recent history.

The UK’s Milk Marketing Board is more likely behind the 20th Century version of the ploughman’s lunch, originally in the 1950s and then more popularly in the 1960s, in a drive to boost sales of cheese. It’s perhaps become better known as a dish served in country pubs.

The tuna sandwich and independent women

By the end of the 19th Century, any American household that served up fish dishes for dinner would likely have used trout or salmon among its ingredients, but not tuna. Its introduction to the USA’s tastebuds, via a sandwich, was a combination of advancing food technology and also the changing face of women’s role in society, according to the historian Megan Elias of Boston University in an article for the Smithsonian Magazine.

This was a time when waste was particularly frowned upon. Leftovers tended not to go in the bin, they would be mixed together, usually with mayonnaise, and served up as salad for lunch.

Around the turn of the 20th Century, middle-class women in America began socialising more, attending cultural events such as museum lectures. Venues began to open where women could eat during these trips - separate to the rowdier places where men would meet. The menus reflected what was served at home, such as fish salads.

These restaurants and takeaways remained as women began to make up more of the workforce, in retail and office jobs. The only difference was lunch hours on a working day weren’t as leisurely as the meals on a social trip, although there were still efforts to have dishes such as fish salad on the menu.

In a column for Taste magazine, the journalist Mari Uyehara wrote how, in 1903, a sudden lack of sardines saw canning companies look for something else to replace them in their tins, or risk going under. Albert P Halfill of the Southern California Fish Company saw potential in the previously neglected tuna, abundant off state shores. With a hard-fought marketing campaign, the public's love for tuna took off.

Elias wrote in her Smithsonian article how the lunchtime takeaways put this newly introduced canned tuna was used in fish dishes - they didn’t require cooking in advance. Making things even faster was putting this tuna between two slices of bread as a sandwich to eat on the go. The tuna sandwich - and a customer base - was born. Its continuing popularity led to the fish coming close to extinction - although a 2021 report found that conservation efforts had seen numbers rising again.

The sandwich that is part of Passover

Sandwiches and their fillings can represent many different cultures. One which does just that is the korech - a food item part of the Jewish festival of Passover.

An important part of the festival is the Seder, a meal eaten to remember the biblical story of the enslaved Jewish people in Egypt who were led to freedom by Moses in an event known as the Exodus.

At the centre of the table during this meal is the Seder plate. It is separated into sections, a different one for each of the symbolic foods placed on it. This usually includes lamb, hard-boiled eggs or bitter herbs, among other foods. The herbs represent the bitterness of a life in slavery and it is during korech, a stage in the Seder, that the herbs are placed between two slices of matzo - a flat, unleavened bread that is another Passover tradition - and eaten, like a sandwich.

When modern Hebrew was under development, korech was the inspiration for karich - the word used for sandwich.

This article was first published in September 2022.