Friday, June 21, 2024

Halloumi with lettuce and tomato, spiced lamb burgers and the Scuttlebutt

It's time to make, and eat, some seriously good sandwiches.
Cooking

June 21, 2024

A halloumi, arugula and tomato sandwich is shown on toasted bread.
Jake Marsiglia and Costa Damaskos's halloumi, arugula and tomato sandwiches, adapted by Alexa Weibel and Christina Morales. Nico Schinco for The New York Times. Food Stylist: Barrett Washburne.

Time to eat some seriously good sandwiches

Good morning. What's your favorite store-bought sandwich? In New York, I'm partial to the hot roast beef from Defonte's in Brooklyn, the Carmine's Special at Del Fiore's in Patchogue and the Reuben with coleslaw at the Country Store in Orient.

I've gone straight from the airport in New Orleans to Parkway for a fried oyster po' boy, and from LAX to Langer's for pastrami. You ever had the bánh mì at Saigon Sandwich House, in Lowell, Mass.? Or the turkey sub at Urban Greens in Anchorage? You should put those on your list.

Sandwiches tell stories of the delicious, stories we should hear and repeat. This week my colleagues assembled a table full of them — 57 sandwiches that define New York City — and this weekend I want to make a few at home.

First up, the halloumi, arugula and tomato sandwich (above) from Baby Blues Luncheonette in Williamsburg, Brooklyn. It's Jake Marsiglia's Grecian ode to the B.L.T., with the bacon swapped out for cheese, and the iceberg for a lemony arugula salad cut through with red onions.

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Halloumi, Arugula and Tomato Sandwiches

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That's lunch on Saturday, to be followed with a home-built version of the spicy cumin lamb burger from Xi'an Famous Foods for dinner, on an English muffin. Then, after a fine breakfast of pancakes and berries with cream on Sunday morning, I'll put together a Scuttlebutt sandwich for lunch, off the instructions of Caroline Fidanza, who served it at her restaurant Saltie for years: hard-boiled egg, pickled beets and carrots, capers, herbs, feta and pimentón-spiked mayonnaise on focaccia. Oh, wow.

And for dinner on Sunday night? Not another sandwich. Instead, I'll deconstruct one, with a freestyle meal of BBQ shrimp and a loaf of bread to tear apart and drag through the sauce, alongside a mound of cold shredded iceberg lettuce dressed ever so slightly with oil and red wine vinegar. That's excellent eating, particularly if you don't peel the shrimp but cook them whole and ask your guests to eat with their fingers, voraciously, over a tablecloth of newspaper.

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And should you find yourself crosswise with the technology? Sing out for help. We're at cookingcare@nytimes.com. Someone will get back to you. Or, if you'd like to speak to a manager, you can write to me: foodeditor@nytimes.com. I can't respond to every letter. But I read every one I get.

Now, it's nothing to do with panini or grilled cheese, but I'm just starting Ann Powers's biography of Joni Mitchell, "Traveling," and I think maybe you ought to join me.

Glass eels in Maine. That's a big money fishery and a hell of a story for Paige Williams in The New Yorker this week.

Gill Partington has a fascinating review of a book about large-scale literary forgery in The London Review of Books, "a propulsive if unlikely thriller, whose plot hinges on typographical minutiae and sherry parties." Read that!

Finally, here's a new Jelly Roll track, "I Am Not Okay." Still: "We're all gonna be alright." Listen to that while you're sandwiching and I will see you on Sunday.

IN THIS NEWSLETTER

Article Image

Nico Schinco for The New York Times. Food Stylist: Barrett Washburne.

Spicy Cumin Lamb Burgers

Recipe from Jason Wang and David Shi

Adapted by Christina Morales and Alexa Weibel

40 minutes (or about 2 hours if making the bread)

Makes 4 sandwiches

Article Image

Andrew Scrivani for The New York Times

Everyday Pancakes

By Mark Bittman

20 minutes

Makes 4 to 6 servings

Article Image

Linda Xiao for The New York Times. Food Stylist: Yossy Arefi.

Berries and Cream

By Yossy Arefi

15 minutes, plus 30 minutes macerating

Makes 4 generous servings 

Article Image

Nico Schinco for The New York Times. Food Stylist: Barrett Washburne.

Scuttlebutt

Recipe from Caroline Fidanza and Rebecca Collerton

Adapted by Sara Bonisteel

2 hours (plus 1 day, if making pickled beets)

Makes 4 sandwiches 

Article Image

Yossy Arefi for The New York Times (photography and styling)

Focaccia

Recipe from Caroline Fidanza

Adapted by Amelia Nierenberg

30 minutes, plus resting and rising

Makes One 9-by-13-inch pan

Article Image

David Malosh for The New York Times. Food Stylist: Simon Andrews. Prop Stylist: Paige Hicks.

BBQ Shrimp

By Sam Sifton

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