BUTTER and JELLY SAMMICHES

By Mark Reed

I have been eating butter and jelly sammiches my entire life…well, as long as I’ve had teeth. They were a staple around the Reed house. They are one of my top 10 comfort foods. Add a glass of cold milk and my taste buds are in high heaven.

My personal choice is grape jelly. Grape jam is easier to spread. White bread is the default recipient. I have some friends who have never had this culinary bliss. It breaks my heart to think of the deprivation they experienced growing up. I like thin slices of butter that are placed in their little 1” squares filling up the face of that glorious white bread. In a pinch I will use whole wheat bread, but the food snob in me demands white bread for this delight.

Every time I eat one I flash back to a specific day in my youth. It is a memorable day due to it being the day I introduced one of my best friends to this culinary masterpiece. My buddy walked home with me after school at Smyrna Elementary. We were going to all the normal things 12 year old boys did with their early afternoon hours after being released from the bondage of a higher education. Yes, in those days, Elementary School was considered higher education in some circles in the south. But I digress.

My SOP (standard operating procedure) in those days was to head straight to the kitchen for my after school snack. It usually consisted of a sammich of some kind. I had learned to avoid suspicious looking potted meat on a dish in the fridge after I made a sammich with some, lathered with mustard. Quite good, actually. But when mom got home and called out who ate the leftover canned dog food, in the fridge, I quit chewing on a bone I found in the yard and vowed to never eat potted meat again. OK, I digress again. That happens to me.

Anyway, my buddy and me proceeded to scour the fridge and cabinets looking for fodder. The big jar of Welches Grape Jelly was right at eye level next to the butter. Issue resolved. B&J sammiches it would be.

My buddy hesitated and asked with alarm, “You gonna make a sammich with that?” I realized then that he was one of those poor deprived souls who had never experienced the joy of this life staple. I told him to trust me. As he knew me well, the look he gave me, told me that was the wrong thing to say. He still gives me the same look today 60 years later. I told him I would eat the first bite. He agreed.

I whipped up two sammiches and true to my word, took the first bite. He watched me skeptically as I chewed and said I had to swallow it. When I did, he only then picked up his sammich and took a small bite from a corner. I watched his eyes go big. He then wolfed it down before I could finish mine. He looked at me, a little drool slipping from the corner of his mouth, and asked in his best Oliver Twist voice, “Can I have another?” Well absolutely. I joined him for a second sammich. He beat me again.

This is when the real magic happens. He asked if he could have another. I looked at the loaf of bread and figured there was plenty and my family would not starve by another sammich being eaten. Two was my limit, so I did not join him as he made and devoured his third. I enjoyed watching him enjoy it so much. Then the request for another. I said to myself, damn the bread being eaten, let’s see how far this will go, so I nodded my head, smile on my face.

Now I have been accused of using exaggeration in my stories, and I admit that sometimes some exaggeration is utilized for the sake of a good story. But friends and neighbors, I am not exaggerating here. I watched my buddy eat seven sammiches. He admits to six. Personally I was in awe of his capacity. We were basically the same size and he could eat me under the table.

Just so you know, my buddy gave me permission to write this story, although I likely would have written it anyway. Well, maybe not if he begged and pleaded. But this is a totally factual story.

That’s my story and I’m sticking to it.