“Do you think I can take it back?” said Gemma.
It was lunchtime. Gemma’s egg and tomato baguette from the canteen, a solitary bite taken out of it, was on the table between us, spread out and opened up like an autopsy patient on the slab. Between us we counted five thin slices of egg and six manky slivers of tomato. And that was it - no spread, no salad garnish, no nothing. It was a wan and sorry specimen even before you compared it to my walnut bread bursting with Serrano ham, artichoke hearts and rocket.
ME: How much do you think they’ve made off you with that travesty of a sandwich?
GEMMA: I don’t know, how much is an egg?
ME: Say eggs are £1.50 for half a dozen. So your egg cost 25p. And that tomato can’t have cost more than 10p.
GEMMA: And I bet they don’t use free range eggs either, I bet they use the cheapest nastiest battery eggs they can find. The baguette can’t be more than 10p. So they’ve made £1.32 profit on that sandwich. It’s a disgrace. And those tomatoes taste well cheap.
ME: That's true, but even so I’m not sure you can take it back. The sticker says ‘Egg & Tomato’ and technically that’s true. It also accurately depicts the complete lack of butter or mayonnaise.
GEMMA: Something about this tastes funny.
ME: Well, you don’t have to be Sherlock Holmes to pretty safely narrow it down to one of two ingredients.
GEMMA: It’s the egg! It tastes of vinegar. Here, taste this.
Gemma took a clammy slice of egg out of the sandwich and waved it in my general direction. With apt timing half the yolk promptly fell out and splatted onto the table between us. I took what was left and put it in my mouth. Chewy doesn’t come remotely close.
GEMMA: What do you think?
ME: It definitely tastes of vinegar. On the plus side, if you close your eyes and imagine really really hard you could almost fool yourself into thinking that you’re eating very overcooked squid. Almost.
GEMMA: This is so rubbish. Even Dave could make an egg and tomato sandwich. Although I’d have to boil the egg for him.
ME: And cut open the baguette.
GEMMA: And slice the tomatoes.
ME: And assemble it before giving it to him to put on a plate without dropping it.
GEMMA: Exactly.
ME: This must be a new definition of the word “make”. Would you like my yoghurt?
GEMMA: No thanks, I’m not hungry any more.
100 Words: Fog
1 day ago
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27 comments:
Perhaps they're challenging you to a pendat-off. Because pedantically, they've given you what you asked for. Egg and tomatoe.
ok, i confess. i've been lurking and not commenting here for a while because i was waiting until i had the most utterly hilarious and witty comment, but that's probably going to take a lot longer than i had initially thought. so hi! i love your writing. and i would have returned that sandwich so fast that i wouldn't even get to smell the vinegar egg.
Tennyson's right. You get what you ask for. But I do like your acronym: EAT. Makes me hungry just lookin' at it! Mmmm.
Although if Tennyson's going to spell tomato with an "e" then it puts me off a little. Rather "Dan Quayle", with his "potatoe" problems.
And by the way, very gentlemanly of you to share your yoghurt. That's just the kind of thing that a man who wears collar-stiffeners would do....
Good on you for sticking with the 'yoghurt' spelling. Even the BBC have gone over to 'yogurt' now. Sometime in summer last year judging by the results on the search page. Why weren't we told? This is a national scandal, no doubt something to do with those bloated fat cats in Europe and their yogurt lake. Give us back our 'h', keep the Queen's face on our money when we buy it and let us buy yoghurt by the inch, not the millilitre, just like our great Saxon ancestors did when they invented it by forgetting to put the milk back in the wattle-and-daub fridge.
Pardon me, have just realised that the viscosity of yoghurt would mean the EU's stockpile would be more of a swamp than a lake. They keep it next door to the custard bog and the polenta tor.
Far more entertaining than the real Monkey World, and hopefully smells better as well.
Monkey World - I think this idea has legs. I want to be let loose in the EU's armagnac pond for a while. Better still, I was watching Question Time on Thursday and a particularly aerated member of the audience referred to European politicians as "milking the gravy train" which is quite the mixed metaphor by anybody's standards.
As a fellow stoic Brit I think Gemma was quite right not to take the sandwich back. We're made to suffer. We enjoy it. The complaining amongst ourselves (but NEVER at the person responsible) is the Brit's raison d'etre. That and queueing.
DISCLAIMER: Any overuse of stereotypical descriptions is totally intentional and all complaints can be made (by non-Brits only, naturally) to: Toodlepip.bowlerhat@beefeater.com
Natalie! Australians do that too, I guess we inherited it from you lot.
After living in the US for 3 years I am getting the hang of complaining to the responsible party.
; )
Also, I love that Gemma said "well cheap" - now THAT'S English.
Natalie - That website address seems to be a throwback to a gentler time, when "what ho" was a salutation rather than a tricky decision in the red light district.
Tennyson - very dangerous to talk about pedantry and then spell not only "pedant" but also tomato wrong.
Lana - Thanks so much for commenting and following! I'm a fan of your blog too - it's mighty fine.
expateek - I was more gentlemanly still, I offered to give Gemma my yoghurt. That's me all over - 100% gentlemanly, 0% manly.
I find it incredible that you offered your yoghurt. You are supremely generous.
My wife comes from a family of strong-willed types that would throw that baguette at the manager and demand money back before making a scene.
I come from a family of chickens who like nothing more than keeping quite and causing anything but a fuss.
But I would have kicked up a fuss over that.
ugh I know its probably normal there to eat egg and tomato but it sounds so bland even with anything on it. I can imagine a small kids face here when he sees that in front of him. I would have eaten the 'yoghurt' hopefully thats the same thing as here hah.
It's been a sandwich-heavy week in the blogosphere, hasn't it?
I would have taken it back, even if they wouldn't give you your money back, at least they'd know how much they'd dissapointed you, especially if you mope off sadly, not ranting but just sighing heavily.
Mo - Kelly once sent a letter of complaint to Swizzels because her packet of Love Hearts were, and I'm quoting here, "not fizzy enough". So she too would have complained.
Mr C - I agree. There is an element that if you pick a sandwich like that you get what you deserve.
Jules - I agree. You wait ages for a blog posting about a disappointing sandwich and, like buses, two of them come along at once.
I question the wisdom of ordering a sandwich made from egg and tomato in the first place. I can't imagine what kind of ubercondiment would make that sandwich sing.
I agree Words x3, you could sprinkle it with crack and I'd still give it a miss.
I agree that an egg and tomato sandwich does not sound appealing at all. But I am not a fan of tomatoes, so there's that.
Since the egg tasted like vinegar, could they have been pickled eggs? *shudder* Pickled eggs how vile. If so, that is trickery of the greatest kind. What sly dog would find amusement in sneaking in pickled eggs into a rather basic sandwich? Maybe they did it in Emeril fashion "POW" adding a kick to every bite.
How ironic that your acronym is the exact opposite of what took place.
I wondered if they'd accidentally added vinegar the way you do when poaching eggs. But yes, there is simply no excuse for pickling an egg.
I thought of the acronym as we were heading back to our desks and I too was struck by the irony. So I pointed the acronym, and the irony, out to Gemma. And she said something I'll never forget.
"You what?"
'[T]here is simply no excuse for pickling an egg.'
That's a very bold and sweeping statement. Surely there's a very obvious excuse for pickling an egg; they last longer and don't require refrigeration. Very popular with scouts and the like whilst camping. Despite Trev & Simon's best efforts, pickling is a lost art. Pickling will become vital in the fast-approaching post-fossil fuel economy. Get pickling now; preserved foodstuffs may well be the currency in the new world order. Along with Pogs, of course.
Well if you will be like that then surely what you have listed are justifications, rather than excuses.
In the sense used, they're synonyms. I offer up the third definition of the noun 'excuse' from the 1993 New Shorter OED; 'Something that serves to excuse or gives ground for excusing; a justification, a reason.'
Mind you, those clever men at Oxford may know all that's to be knowed, but 'something that server to excuse' is a pretty rubbish definition of 'excuse'. Oxford English Dictionary of the bleedin' obvious, more like
Haha, wonderful entry.
BTW, as a scanning clerk at a grocery store I will have you know that there is a retail price a store cost - so the sandwhich shop made more than your silly Euro-sign 1.32.
And an egg and tomato sandwhich sounds intriguing, cause tomato omelettes are the best!
*and a store cost - I can't delete!
I feel I need to defend my choice of sandwich.....
When you have tasted the food from our canteen, you will understand why I chose something so simple - "surely they can't get an egg & tomato sandwich wrong", I thought to myself. I couldn't have been more incorrect...it was the most disappointing lunch I think I have ever had.
Mo - I am usually the complaining type and instantly regretted it when I got back to my desk, so promptly found out the email address of the catering manager and expressed exactly how I felt about their food. I have yet to receive a reply.
MrLS - If I remember correctly, you offered me half of your sandwich, not your yoghurt. It was still very generous.
Hooray! Gemma speaks!
Can I just say this - I mention Gemma's least favourite sex scene in the blog, not a peep. I talk about her sister and her boyfriend's brother getting down to some solo naked Twister, not a sausage. But impugn her poorly made sandwich choices and she comes out of the woodwork.
It makes me proud to be English.
Sometimes reading the comment thread is almost as good as reading the post. Almost.
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