Alexis Soyer – Victorian Kitchen Genius and Chef

Alexis Soyer was chef to the aristocracy of Victorian London. But he also set up soup kitchens during the Irish Famine and organised the hospital kitchens of the Crimea.

Here, Aveling, interviews Alexis, about the class system and its relation to the sandwich:

Aveling: Is it true Alexis that although your culinary expertise is wide and unending, you are also a keen sandwich maker?

Alexis: Yes.

Aveling: You are French but you have worked in London and married an English woman and I believe this gives you the objectiveness, which I am looking for as I am particularly interested in the fact that you have dealt in close quarters with both aristocracy and serfs in equal measures. Furthermore, the French class system is much like our own and it is both this and your culinary skills, along with your altruistic concern for other peoples need for sustenance that I would like to put to you an idea of our own English class system, in the topic of a ham sandwich, in your case a jambon sandwich or baguette.

Alexis: Yes.

Aveling: I will now define our English class system -not as a simple analogy- but on a factual basis, with the makings of a sandwich. I shall begin...

Working class sandwich = Bread, butter (thinly spread) and ham.
Lower Middle class sandwich = Bread, butter, lettuce and ham.
Middle class sandwich = Bread, (No Butter but oil as a lubricant) tomato and ham.
Upper middle class sandwich = Bread, thickly spread butter and ham. (And would never consider anything else, especially tomato)
Upper, Aristocracy or Toff class sandwich = Bites of bread and then ham eaten alternately with absolutely nothing else. (A sandwich of the mouth rather than the hand)

...You will notice the lower middle and middle classes step away from the triangular way of seeing things of the start, middle and end structures, as Aristotle wrote his plays and Hollywood, to this day, still uses as its template, but for now this is not our main concern. You will further notice Alexis that the working class, though poles apart in the class system to the upper middle and upper classes, have almost the same appetite, (as though in being so opposite they stand side by side of the start/finish line. Did you find this to be the case when cooking for both classes yourself?

Alexis: Yes.

Aveling: Do you think this idea half-baked?

Alexis: No.

Aveling: If you are wondering where the nouveau riche fit into this, they don't eat sandwiches, they eat risotto. In France could you tell a persons class by the way they apply the ingredients of their sandwich, or is this too much of a generalization?

Alexis: No it is not and Yes you can.

Aveling: Thank you, Alexis.