Made in My Kitchen: Chicken Sandwich

I love sandwich. And I love it that it is simple, fresh and filling. Sandwich is not a Malaysian staple, so I will regard sandwich as a luxury meal (like how I was surprised at being charged RM20++ for a Subway meal in KLCC food court). I made this sandwich last week based on the drooling entries in Grilled Cheese Social, only that the major ingredient I omitted is the cheese. Apparently I had used all the cheese I had to make grilled cheese sandwich and not once I took picture of any of them.

My brother said that I put too many vegetables. My mother came back from Cameron Highlands with loads of veges namely cherry tomato, asparagus, lettuces, mushrooms, purple cabbage, capsicum and Japanese cucumber. All are calling for a salad, but my brothers won't eat vegetable for sure so I had to twist it a little, combine with some sauces, bread and meat. Hopefully they give in. They did, so yeay.

Making sandwich is I believe, a trial-and-error just like any other cooked dishes are. If we get one ingredient wrong to our liking, we might instantly don't like it. And it can be costly too, especially if we don't have some of the ingredients in hand. I had to invest in some imported products such as gherkin pickle, mustard, BBQ sauce, which to me are expensive, but i think it can go a long way, so it's quite worth it. Still!

To me, sandwich should contain protein (meats), vitamin (veges) and calcium (cheese) apart from the carbohydrate from bread. The choice of fillings are really up to you. 

Meat:

- Leftover chicken or beef, shredded (these are the best! It is cost saving, and adds some special taste to the sandwich)

- Chicken pepperoni (I tried this, and I believe you should put more than one to get some meat taste)

- Fish (sauteed, fried, or grilled. I recommend trying smoked salmon for some divine)

Vegetable choices

- Lettuce

- Asparagus (sauteed with onion, or boiled first)

- Sauteed mushroom

- Tomato (I prefer not the ripe one)

- Capsicum (for crunchiness)

- Cucumber (Japanese cucumber for crunchiness)

- Red onion (for its tangy and sweetness)

- Avocado (for some milky taste)

- Gherkin (for a sour taste)

- Olive

- Beetroot (for its sweetness!)

Cheese choices:

- Cheddar, Tasty, Mild, Mozarella, depend on your budget

- Cheese slices like Kraft can be good too

Sauces choices:

- Sweet chili

- Mayonnaise 

- Mustard (might be a bit sour to your liking)

- BBQ sauce (I tried Heinz, for me it's a bit sour)

- Black pepper sauce

Another sauce I have tried making is using fruit chutney (acar buah). It was quite different compared to our local fruit chutney. It was sweet with some taste of herbs, perhaps nutmeg. 

Anathoth Fruit Chutney. Source: Foodtown

To make the sauce: Mix 5 spoon of fruit chutney with some chopped garlic and ground black pepper. I used some grilled beef for the protein source, with salad and beetroot for vitamin. And voila! If I can get my hands on some beetroots and those fruit chutney, I would definitely making this recipe again. 

Open Beetroot Steak Sandwich in Recipes+ Edition August 2009