Forget Basic Egg Salad — Irish Funeral Sandwiches Will Have You Running To The Kitchen

Irish funeral sandwiches are typically served to comfort the bereaved and can vary widely in fillings, from plain egg salad or ham and cheese to more elaborate versions. Though there are nuances, if you take a traditional egg salad and pack it with ham, tomatoes, lettuce, cheese, and pickles, you've arrived at a sandwich filling that has laden many a platter and provided nourishment and consolation in Ireland for decades. 

To make one typical iteration of an Irish funeral sandwich, give peeled hard-boiled eggs a rough chop, then add cubed ham, grated cheese (typically cheddar), chopped onion, tomato, lettuce, and pickles. Although ham is common it is not essential, and some versions include chopped cucumber or scallions instead of onions. Mix it all together with an ample helping of a binder like mayonnaise and season to taste with salt and pepper. Choosing the right bread is essential to any sandwich, and these ones are traditionally served on buttered white bread. All that's left to do is cut it into triangles and serve.

To enjoy a faithful rendition of these sandwiches, a traditional recipe will call for salad cream, which is a dressing made with cream, mustard, and vinegar. Since salad cream isn't readily available stateside, mayonnaise is a common substitute, but the flavors aren't as punchy. Some home cooks will doctor mayo with a bit of vinegar, mustard, and Worcestershire sauce, but you can also make salad cream from scratch. Though hopefully not for their namesake reason, Irish funeral sandwiches are a hearty and comforting go-to that will certainly satisfy for any snack, lunch, or dinner.

While these sandwiches don't have anything to do with mourning per se, they evolved as a comfort food that is easy to prepare ahead, easy to hand out and eat, and filling. The practice was tethered to the expansive nature of Irish funerals, particularly Irish country funerals, which often saw more than a thousand people attend. People traveled great distances to honor the deceased, even those they never directly met. 

Irish funerals traditionally involved wakes at home that spanned a lengthy period of receiving guests, sharing stories, and toasting a loved one's life; though these long-form wakes are less common today. It was customary to provide food and drink like tea and sandwiches to everyone who attended, and friends and neighbors would step in to help supply the necessary abundance of food, so it stands to reason that the ingredients in the filling were varied.

Irish funeral sandwiches are not a precise recipe so much as a more-is-more situation. Every family likely has a version that they deem "the one"; part of the family love language. While an Irish funeral sandwich may not spring to mind as a typical Irish food like corned beef and cabbage, it has quietly been satisfying the masses for years.