Well this was fun.
This is a specific sandwich, with a specific recipe, which I’ll paste here. But there’s no point in crediting it; I went looking for variations, but every single one I looked at was exactly the same. The only option is tomatoes. Most writers who tried it both ways recommended the tomatoes, so I included them.
However. Like any recipe, there is leeway, based on what you got, and what you want. After listing what it’s supposed to be, I’ll show you what I wanted and what I got.
Turkey Devonshire Sandwich
Cheese Sauce:
3/4 stick butter (melted)
1 cup flour
1/4 pound Cheddar cheese (grated)
1 pint chicken broth
1 pint hot milk
1 teaspoon salt
Sandwich
1 slice good toast (crusts trimmed off)
3 slices crisp bacon
5 slices thin cooked turkey breast
2 slices of tomato per sandwich
Melted butter
Parmesan cheese and paprika
Preheat oven to 450°.
Directions:
Cream Sauce:
Melt 3/4 stick butter in deep pan and add flour, stirring constantly.
Add chicken broth and then hot milk, cheese, and salt. Continue stirring for 20 minutes.
Cool sauce to lukewarm. Beat with wire whip until smooth before using. This makes enough sauce for 6 Devonshire sandwiches.
Sandwich:
In each flat, individual oven-proof casserole dish, place 1 slice of toast and top with 3 slices bacon.
Add 5 thin slices of cooked turkey breast.
Top with tomato slices.
Cover completely with cream sauce.
Sprinkle with a little melted butter, then with the combined Parmesan cheese and paprika.
Bake 10 to 15 minutes or until golden brown.
Take out the oven and ENJOY!
First things first: mise en place. I halved the recipe above. (Thank you Paprika 3 for the scaling feature!) What I have instead of “thinly sliced turkey breast” (by which I think they are implying deli meat) is some shredded turkey from all around the bird. What I have instead of sandwich bread is a couple slices of fresh Italian bread, which I left the crust on because I sent Mrs Mosca to pick up the bread and this is what she came back with, and it’s really good but kinda small and if I cut the crust off there won't be anything hardly left. I have some Wright thick cut bacon. And that’s some really nice Balderson’s 6 year cheddar. So, this is an ingredient upgrade right from the get-go.
The cheese sauce. This is NOT the same as a traditional cheese sauce, or a nacho sauce! Notice the proportions of flour and butter, liquids, and cheese. This stuff is really thick, and after stirring and heating for 20 minutes, then allowing it to cool to lukewarm, it has the consistency of whipped potatoes! You’ll see what I mean as we build the sandwich.
The instructions say use a casserole dish; I’ll get back to that in my summary. I used a cast iron skillet. First, the toast…
Bacon…
Turkey…
Tomatoes…
Cheese sauce.
Then, into the oven @450° for… well it said 20 minutes, but the thermo said give it half an hour to hit 160° in the center…
Turkey Devonshire!
Order up!
First, notice how thick that sauce is. It’s like paste; it’s not runny at all. You’re not going to use this on broccoli or green beans. But it’s perfect for this application, because it’s going to stick to the top of that sandwich and hold everything together.
Second: this is freakin’ awesome. I used to get this when I lived in Pittsburgh, when my grandmother took us out to lunch; it just sounded so classy! “Yaaas, I’ll have the Turkey Devonshire and a tomato juice with a lemon slice, please.” Oh man, we were livin’!
Third: as delicious as it is, making that cheese sauce is a royal pain in the ass for just one meal. Even with the recipe halved, I only used half the sauce on what you see. Half an hour went into the sauce alone. As a single serving, this is a restaurant sandwich, where it gets made frequently and the sauce is on-hand (and they probably use deli turkey, too). Remember the casserole dish? If you’re going to do this, make it a family meal, or part of a game day spread. Make a big casserole dish as if it were a lasagna tray of Turkey Devonshire, then slice it all into squares and put it out there with a spatula. That would be when you’d trim the crusts, so that all pieces would be the same.
But… Turkey Devonshire!
This is a specific sandwich, with a specific recipe, which I’ll paste here. But there’s no point in crediting it; I went looking for variations, but every single one I looked at was exactly the same. The only option is tomatoes. Most writers who tried it both ways recommended the tomatoes, so I included them.
However. Like any recipe, there is leeway, based on what you got, and what you want. After listing what it’s supposed to be, I’ll show you what I wanted and what I got.
Turkey Devonshire Sandwich
Cheese Sauce:
3/4 stick butter (melted)
1 cup flour
1/4 pound Cheddar cheese (grated)
1 pint chicken broth
1 pint hot milk
1 teaspoon salt
Sandwich
1 slice good toast (crusts trimmed off)
3 slices crisp bacon
5 slices thin cooked turkey breast
2 slices of tomato per sandwich
Melted butter
Parmesan cheese and paprika
Preheat oven to 450°.
Directions:
Cream Sauce:
Melt 3/4 stick butter in deep pan and add flour, stirring constantly.
Add chicken broth and then hot milk, cheese, and salt. Continue stirring for 20 minutes.
Cool sauce to lukewarm. Beat with wire whip until smooth before using. This makes enough sauce for 6 Devonshire sandwiches.
Sandwich:
In each flat, individual oven-proof casserole dish, place 1 slice of toast and top with 3 slices bacon.
Add 5 thin slices of cooked turkey breast.
Top with tomato slices.
Cover completely with cream sauce.
Sprinkle with a little melted butter, then with the combined Parmesan cheese and paprika.
Bake 10 to 15 minutes or until golden brown.
Take out the oven and ENJOY!
Then, into the oven @450° for… well it said 20 minutes, but the thermo said give it half an hour to hit 160° in the center…
Turkey Devonshire!
Order up!
First, notice how thick that sauce is. It’s like paste; it’s not runny at all. You’re not going to use this on broccoli or green beans. But it’s perfect for this application, because it’s going to stick to the top of that sandwich and hold everything together.
Second: this is freakin’ awesome. I used to get this when I lived in Pittsburgh, when my grandmother took us out to lunch; it just sounded so classy! “Yaaas, I’ll have the Turkey Devonshire and a tomato juice with a lemon slice, please.” Oh man, we were livin’!
Third: as delicious as it is, making that cheese sauce is a royal pain in the ass for just one meal. Even with the recipe halved, I only used half the sauce on what you see. Half an hour went into the sauce alone. As a single serving, this is a restaurant sandwich, where it gets made frequently and the sauce is on-hand (and they probably use deli turkey, too). Remember the casserole dish? If you’re going to do this, make it a family meal, or part of a game day spread. Make a big casserole dish as if it were a lasagna tray of Turkey Devonshire, then slice it all into squares and put it out there with a spatula. That would be when you’d trim the crusts, so that all pieces would be the same.
But… Turkey Devonshire!
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