The chicken sandwich. It’s our best-seller, it’s been on our menu since day one, and it sells like hotcakes!
The story with this little beauty is one that we’re particularly fond of as it features Mr Bould senior at his finest – a few glasses of wine down on a Saturday night ‘expressing himself’ in the kitchen…
Before we get to that, let's talk about sandwiches in general. They’re mostly a pretty sad state of affairs, mainly if we're talking about what you typically come across at retail; a couple of slices of dry (or soggy) bread with what promises to be an adventurous and delicious filling, but what inevitably turns out to be disappointing when eaten. It wasn’t that long ago that I found myself in, let’s call it a popular retail eatery & trader’, faced with the prospect of a fresh Lobster and truffle mayonnaise roll. “Wow, ” I thought, “A lobster and truffle sandwich, this is a game-changer. How can they offer this for such a reasonable price?!”
I bought the sandwich. Well well well. For all the promise and use of what had the potential to be great ingredients, what I got was bread – lots of it, a lobster’s fingernail (not seasoned) and some mayonnaise. What I got was a great example of a misguided effort to make as much money as possible and a sandwich whose ingredients we're given the go-ahead by someone more concerned with adhering to ’brand guidelines’ than they were developing something tasty.
This leads us into our first rule for creating a sandwich: Taste is everything. There are a couple of simple things we do in this regard – we season everything properly (mostly with salt or some kind of acid/ vinegar), and we always put at least as much filling into the sandwich (by volume) as another slice of bread would occupy. These things are so simple but so vital if you are to have the correct balance of flavours and taste what it is you are putting in the sandwich!
Next is the bread. For a retail environment, we need to select a food that keeps it's flavour and texture for the day that we wish to sell it. We make our sandwiches fresh, daily, and it can be a challenge to ensure the bread feels and tastes as fresh at the end of the day as it does when we first open the loaf. To that end, we have tried all kinds and continue to change periodically, always to improve.
Now to the filling. Chicken, crispy bacon and chive with a spiced and tangy mayo. We knew that we wanted a chicken sandwich staple as part of our offering, partly because it’s so versatile but also because, let’s face it, us brits feel safe around chicken! I think we were working in London when we first decided that chicken and chive was the combo for us. I forget the name of the sandwich shop, but they had a beautiful mix of chicken with fragrant fresh chive – it just worked so, so well.
Fast forward about six months, and we’re sitting in our dad’s kitchen, planning sandwich ideas. The football is on in the background, we’ve got a glass of wine in hand and dad is whipping up some salad with a piece of fish for us all to eat. Dad has had a couple of glasses, probably a few ’couple of glasses, ’ and he’s at his most creative. There’s an egg yolk being separated; there's groundnut oil, there's mustard, honey, turmeric and white wine vinegar. Some of it is being whisked some folded, it all being seasoned, and it’s all in the name of ’salad dressing!’
Alex and I, we’re not sure we want this creative abomination slathered all over our food, so in the interest of health and safety, I dip my finger in to taste. And that was it, the missing piece! We knew we wanted chicken with crispy bacon and chive, but we needed our mayo to pop. It was the perfect storm of acid, spice and tangy wonderfulness that you’ll find in our longstanding chicken sandwich. Thanks, Dad!
As you may have guessed, this is relatively a-typical of our usual food or drink design process. In general, the process takes time and is deeply involved. We often find inspiration in a dish or idea that we come across elsewhere and then work to create a Bould Brothers version. We tend to favour unusual combinations as it can be the things people eat less often that have the most significant impact. We place a strong emphasis on our foods having the right balance of salt, acid and umami (savoriness) and have strict preparation standards to make sure foods are sent out consistently and safely.
A good sandwich, a great packet of crisps and a coffee can, in our opinion, dazzle. It doesn’t need to be too complicated and it doesn’t take a tremendous amount of skill. It does require, however, that you care about what a simple sandwich lunch can be and what your customers’ experience should be.