Talk:Cucumber sandwich

Tea?

We are at home to Mr Cockup here, I'm afraid. As the page on high tea correctly points out, high tea in England does not at all mean a polite meal with cucumber sandwiches, but a cooked meal - it's "high" by contrast with the lighter meal called just "tea", at which cucumber sandwiches might well occur. I've tried to correct it, but it's difficult when "tea" is so ambiguous, and some of its meanings unknown to some readers. seglea 07:57, 20 May 2004 (UTC)

I'd call the tea with cucumber sandwiches, scones and so on 'afternoon tea'. Harry R 10:10, 20 May 2004 (UTC)

The problem arises from the fallacy perpetuated by the page High tea that what a term originally meant is its proper meaning and any more modern variants are wrong. In fact a search of the web reveals that both uses of the term high tea are acceptable. A large number of websites mention this 'popular misconception as to the proper meaning of the term high tea.' seemingly without realising that if the usage is, indeed, 'popular' then the meaning has effectively changed. Teaandcrumpets.com et al are entitled to be as prescriptive as they wish when it comes to definitions. An encyclopaedia cannot be prescriptive; it must be descriptive. Harry's suggestion seems like a good compromise so I have incorporated it.

I made another slight rewording to avoid making dill sound like a spice. The mediocrity or otherwise of the novels and films is neither here nor there when it comes to arriving at a definition of cucumber sandwiches. It is also inherently POV.

Some good stuff in this article now. Monk Bretton 10:37, 20 May 2004 (UTC)

Going back up a comment or two... high tea doesn't say anything about which usage is "proper" so far as I can see, it just records - correctly - that there are two conflicting meanings, and that the difference is largely Anglo/American. That article is a bit of a mess for other reasons (there are major regional differences in the UK, and changes over time, too). The point that mattered for this article was that it was mixing usages - an American usage of high tea in the context of a hyper-English set of social conventions. "Afternoon tea" is a good compromise - it would seem a bit of a tautology in some communities, but it's not seriously ambiguous in any (except that if I remember rightly it also describes the afternoon smoko, or work-break, in New Zealand). (sighs) Why do the patterns and names of meals change so quickly? I does make our life difficult! seglea 17:59, 20 May 2004 (UTC)

No, fair enough, the high tea article isn't as prescriptive as I imagined it to be (it has changed somewhat since I last looked at it.) I was disputing, for what it is worth, that high tea only meant a hot meal in the UK. But this article is looking good now, I think, so no worries. As for the High tea article it is a bit of a mess, as you say. It tries to include too many different concepts. But I shudder in the face of trying to change it. Quite apart from the regional differences there are the class nuances! Perhaps we need a 'List of mealtimes, as ordered by social class' page cross referenced with a 'List of mealtimes as ordered by region (UK)'! I think I might leave that to someone else. Monk Bretton 18:29, 20 May 2004 (UTC)

---

This is quite ironic. I was writing an essay about The Importance of Being Earnest, and I noticed a link to this page from the main page. I was coming here to add a mention about that play that I had just read a few days ago, when I saw the two quotes! What irony! cryptfiend64 22:10, May 20, 2004 (UTC)

Great article!

This article rules. mnemonic

I second the above :) Sam [Spade] 01:13, 21 May 2004 (UTC)

Personal Experiences

has anyone here tried such a sandwich? any comments? mnemonic

Sure. In the last parish of which I was vicar, there was a great tradition for bring-and-share meals, and they were very good at them. When I was still very new there, the first one I went to I happened to say to the ladies behind the sandwich table, "What, no cucumber sandwiches?" Next one that was held, I arrived to find a special plate full of them, and labelled 'For the Vicar'. They weren't satisfied until I had eaten my way through the whole lot.

Oh, and very nice they were, too.

Tonusperegrinus 15:12, 23 May 2004 (UTC)

Yep. My mother had a curious rectangular plate that was used for nothing else - though they were always served slightly tongue in cheek. seglea 03:33, 24 May 2004 (UTC)

perhaps she was a "cucumber sandwich purist?" mnemonic 21:34, 29 May 2004 (UTC)

See? I knew they existed! Monk Bretton 02:03, 30 May 2004 (UTC)

field trial mark I type a-b test 1

i just constructed my own cucumber sandwich of white bread, cucumber (sprinkled with white vinegar and lemon juice) and butter. i must report that it was quite good. ✈ James C. 23:40, 2004 Nov 13 (UTC)

Dad's Army

Personally I think that the cucumber sandwich has become something of a metaphor for a gentile genteel unmetropolitan middle class society, which probably expired in the seventies.

In the Classic British Sitcom, Dad's Army, there were numerous references to Godfrey's sister Dolly's cumcumber sandwiches. These should not be overlooked when trying to define the wider meaning of the culinary item!

Good Article!

I didn't know something so light-flavored could be that good. For the record, I recommend a bit of fresh rosemary, to spice it up, though.

I don't know why this article is listed as "needing to be cleaned up" I think it's very good

Cleanup (December 2005)

I've attempted to do some cleanup of the article as of early January 2006. Further edits are welcomed.

Possible Plagiarism!

One of the links references on the article page, Cucumber Sandwich, is very, very similar to this article. I'm not sure where the plagiarism occurred, or if the same author is responsible for both, but I wanted to make sure that it was noted. The reason I was alarmed when I saw the other article is that there are very slight, intentional variations on sentences, the sort of thing that a grade-school student would do when lifting an encyclopedia entry. It seems more likely to me that the Cucumber Sandwich article from articleworld was lifted from this one.

For instance, from Wikipedia:

Because the cucumber sandwich is usually considered a delicate food, the bread is sliced as thinly as possible. The peel of the cucumber is either removed or scored lengthwise with a fork before the cucumber is sliced, and the slices of cucumber are dried gently with a paper towel before use.

From, articleworld:

The cucumber sandwich is considered a delicate food, so the bread is sliced very thin. The peel of the cucumber is either removed or sliced lengthwise. Then the cucumbers are dried on paper towels before they are used.

Neither article cites the other, so it appears that something fishy is going on! --Fthomas64 02:29, 11 December 2006 (UTC)

Should be easy to determin based on the article history. GMRE (talk) 12:03, 4 November 2014 (UTC)

Picture?

Can we get a picture perhaps? Or maybe I'll make one tomorrow and take a snap... —The preceding unsigned comment was added by 62.31.52.252 (talk) 23:50, 20 January 2007 (UTC).

While the current picture is rather lovely, it is at odds with the opening section, which reads "The crusts of the bread are cut away cleanly and the sandwich sliced diagonally twice, creating four small triangular tea sandwiches." So how necessary to the traditional cucumber sandwich is the cut? smontg2 5:37 EDT, 10 January 2008 —Preceding comment was added at 22:38, 10 January 2008 (UTC)

I LOVE that photo! All that silver-ware, hilarious. It'd be better to change the wording to incorporate alternative slicing patterns than to lose that photo. It really sums up the essence of what these sandwiches are all about. I wouldn't want to get on the wrong side of a "cucumber sandwich purist", but surely the idea is to slice them into dainty crustless bite-sized morcels, never mind at what angle. Dare I say it, some snobs might even consider triangle sandwiches to be rather middle-class, if you know what I mean. Otherwise, despite the lack of references, this is the best article about a sandwich that I've ever read. God Save the Queen! Traveller palm (talk) 06:47, 19 March 2009 (UTC)

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Thanks

Great article! It provided much more info than I needed but it is all interesting. Thanks! NancyHeise ^talk 00:29, 5 June 2010 (UTC)

"cucumber's cooling nature"

Please give a source. This is POV and pseudoscience 91.39.123.231 (talk) 00:54, 12 November 2011 (UTC)

It's moist, so it obviously has this effect. Duh! GMRE (talk) 12:07, 3 November 2014 (UTC)

American slant

The whole article has a surprisingly American perspective, given that the subject is supposedly a totemic food of the effete English upper classes. It's even written in American English. 'Pullman loaf'? Never heard of it. --Ef80 (talk) 16:55, 14 August 2012 (UTC)

Example in popular culture

The 1979 Bond movie Moonraker has a scene near its beginning where Bond meets Hugo Drax (a rich businessman, who will later turn out to be the villain) at Draxes home. During the meeting, Drax asks if he could interest Bond in a cucumber sandwitch, to which Bond responds "No thanks". GMRE (talk) 12:07, 3 November 2014 (UTC)

Which cucumber?

The article does not say whether the cucumbers are fresh or pickled. Maybe it is immediately clear to a native speaker what is meant? (English is my second language.)

Can I conclude from "there were no cucumbers in the market this morning" that they are fresh? --Hob Gadling (talk) 08:20, 13 September 2020 (UTC)

Bread used for making the cucumber sandwich

A sandwich that originated in the UK is it best to use the generic loaf of bread to describe the bread used to make the sandwich or the amercian term a Pullman loaf which may be used in the UK but not elsewhere Sharnadd (talk) 05:55, 29 December 2024 (UTC)