During our childhood, we had fun with riddles like, “What came first, the egg or the chicken?” Sometimes it’s fun as adults to investigate silly questions like that.
So, here’s an icebreaker for your next party – “Is a burger a sandwich?” We’ll give you a head start on your guests with some answers so keep reading!
Is a Burger a Sandwich?
To answer this question, let’s look at what makes a sandwich a sandwich.
What’s a sandwich?
A sandwich can be defined as two or more slices of bread, usually buttered or spread with a fat such as mayonnaise, with a filling in between the slices. Reduced to its basic components, a sandwich is two slices of bread with a filling in the middle.
Variations come in as to which type of bread is used – wholewheat, brown, rye, white, and others. Fillings can be anything from Vegemite to peanut butter and jelly to ham with cheese.
Oily spreads for the bread serve to stop the filling juices from seeping through to the bread and making it soggy. Spreads may be butter, margarine, mayonnaise, or avocado. Embellishments include pickles, lettuce, and various sauces.
Sandwiches are the ultimate lunchbox convenience food. They’re quick to make, portable, and easy to eat with your hands. Workers and schoolchildren for generations have taken sandwiches along with them to eat when they’re away from home.
The British enjoy theirs with cheese and tomato, cucumber, or fishpaste. Americans enjoy peanut butter and jelly or the classic BLT – bacon, lettuce, and tomato. Most sandwich fillings do not require cooking, thereby making sandwiches your ultimate fast food.
Sandwiches can be dressed up for fancy tea parties by cutting off the crusts and cutting them into quarters – either triangles or small squares.
What then is a burger?
A burger is a bread bun/roll with a cooked meat patty in the middle. The meat varies from chicken to beef to fish but this is your basic burger.
Buns are traditionally white sesame rolls but the variety is endless because brown, wholewheat, or other buns may also be used. The bun is often toasted on the inside to prevent sogginess and is also sometimes spread with mayonnaise, sauce, or avocado.
Embellishments include mustard, pickles, tomato, lettuce, cheese, and more. As with sandwiches, variations on the hamburger theme are infinite. We have things like turkey burgers, veggie burgers, chicken burgers, and bison burgers.
Burgers are a little less simple to take to work or school because they’re generally bigger and messier to eat than sandwiches. They’re also best eaten hot. Due to their combination of a hot patty and cold lettuce and tomato, they don’t keep very well as the fresh ingredients go limp.
Burgers take longer to prepare compared to sandwiches because the patties need to be cooked. Plus, the buns need to be toasted. This makes burgers better suited to a Sunday afternoon barbeque by the pool than a child’s lunchbox meal.
Burgers can be dolled up for parties by miniaturizing them in the form of sliders. While you and your party friends are having this debate, you could bring up the concept of shape. Burgers are round and sandwiches are square…!
The bottom line is that technically, we can put burgers and sandwiches into the same category. However, there is a reason why they have separate sections on restaurant menus.
Great Sandwich Filling Ideas To Enjoy
We hope you’ve enjoyed our fun topic today. To end off, here are a few fun sandwich filling ideas for your lunchboxes:
- Ham, gherkins, and mayo
- Ham, lettuce, and pickled beetroot
- Ham and grated cheddar cheese
- Cucumber and grated white cheddar cheese
- Cucumber and cream cheese sprinkled with black pepper and dried dill
- Egg mayonnaise and lettuce
- Egg mayo and bacon
- Brie, bacon, and preserved fig
- Pulled pork or lamb
- Chicken and coleslaw
- Chicken and sweet chili jam
- Corned beef and fruit chutney
- Smoked salmon and cream cheese, cracked pepper
We hope you enjoy!