When: November 3
National Sandwich Day commemorates the food that revolutionized lunch — convenient, customizable, and endlessly adaptable to any taste or cuisine.
The Earl of Sandwich probably didn't invent the sandwich. He did get an archipelago named after him — and that name didn't stick either.
The most famous food origin story in English history: John Montagu, the 4th Earl of Sandwich, asked in 1762 to have his meat served between two slices of bread so he could eat without leaving the gaming table. The story comes from a travel journal by Pierre Grosley, who visited London in 1765 and heard it secondhand. Whether the Earl was gambling or working — he was also First Lord of the Admiralty, with genuine responsibilities — is disputed. The concept of food between bread is ancient: Roman soldiers ate it on campaign, medieval farm workers carried it into fields, and the Hillel sandwich has been part of Jewish Passover for thousands of years. What the Earl's name did was give the form a noun. Once "sandwich" was a word, you could sell it, argue about it, and build an industry around it. Captain James Cook named the Hawaiian islands the "Sandwich Islands" in 1778, in honor of the same Earl. The name appeared on navigation charts and maps for nearly a century. When the Hawaiian...