If you spend any time on social media, you have probably seen Barry Enderwick: tall, bespeckled with strong button-down shirt game, invariably, standing in his kitchen, holding a sandwich.
Since 2021, Enderwick has welcomed viewers to his grand experiment. Every day, he tries a different "Sandwich of History" recipe from a vintage cookbook or fan submission. Enderwick introduces and constructs the sandwich with painstaking exactness to the original recipe, describes and rates the bite, then offers “plus ups” to enhance or improve on the original.
Recently, Enderwick tried "The Loser" from "The Winning Sandwiches for Menu Makers" of 1976, which included roast beef, cottage cheese, horseradish, tomato and watercress. He found it lived up to its name, and scored it at a 4.5 out of 10.
Another unusual creation was the Peanut Butter, Cream Cheese and Olive Sandwich from a 1925 edition of The Chattanooga News. Topped with lettuce and mayonnaise, Enderwick found it to be, "not to be horrible, and having some nutritional value," and asked his viewers to suggest possible plus-ups to make the experience more bearable.
One bite at a time, Enderwick has amassed over 300,000 followers, launched a cookbook and gained some surprising celebrity fans. Now, he's taking the show on the road, with “Sandwiches of History: Live!” coming to the Tempe Center for the Arts on Oct. 5.
The history of 'Sandwiches of History'
“In a way, 'Sandwiches of History' actually began because of a friend of mine in Phoenix,” Enderwick recalls.“In 2018, he sent me a PDF of 'The Up-to-Date Sandwich Cookbook: 400 Ways to Make a Sandwich' (from 1909), and that got the gears turning about trying to have some fun and make some of them,” Enderwick says.
What started as a lark soon became a bit of an obsession. Enderwick turned to the Internet Archive to dig for obscure and noteworthy recipes from the past. Then, as he says when about to take the first bite on his channel, he'd “give it a go.”
With so much material to work from, Enderwick decided to document his sandwich experiments. Drawing on his experience as a former brand manager for Netflix and applying his marketing savvy to the project, Enderwick began filming the first episodes in 2018.
Still, according to his recollection on the “Sandwiches of History” website, the first iteration missed the mark. He tabled the project for almost two years, revisiting the idea as TikTok was becoming popular in 2021 with a fresh approach. The account soon took off.
“The idea that really propelled it was just that I’m going to do this every day, and be consistent, and see if that actually pays dividends,” Enderwick says.
“The other thing I did, and was very thoughtful in starting, was to build it into my day. I make a sandwich for lunch, record it, and that’s the post for the next day. That way, it’s not a massively intrusive thing that takes over my life without pay,” he admits.
The segment's welcoming, repetitive nature (each video takes place in Enderwick’s kitchen in San Jose, California), his non-performative delivery and detailed descriptions of his subject matter make it easy to get drawn in. If you imagine Mr. Rogers making a tomato sandwich, offering options to make it even better and then promising to see you tomorrow, you've got the idea. As a result, the channel has become a sort of online comfort food.
“I’ve had a number of people tell me that, at every show, it’s a moment of sanity and relaxation in their day, because everything else is chaos and darkness in a general sense online. It kind of stands in contrast to other social media," he says. "With me, what you see is what you get."
Sandwich night live
As his fan base grew, Enderwick began collecting the best and worst of his research. In November 2024, "Sandwiches of History: The Cookbook" was released. To promote the book, Enderwick decided to forgo the dry reading and signing approach and instead plussed things up a bit.With the live show, he aims for something that is equal parts sandwich history lesson, trivia battle and interactive cooking event.
Enderwick includes anecdotes about his personal history, explaining his journey to becoming the internet’s favorite sandwich man. He often invites a high-profile guest to sample and discuss the featured sandwich.
Celebrities like "Bob’s Burgers" H. Jon Benjamin and Eugene Mirman, comedian Rob Huebel, The Black Key’s Patrick Carney, actor Amber Nash and The Dead Milkmen’s Dean 'Clean' Sabatino all count themselves as fans of the channel and have been guests on the tour, along with renowned chefs such as Nini Nguyen and Michelle Wallace.
“I never imagined, not in a million years, that people would be into this. I’m just a guy making sandwiches in my kitchen," Enderwick says. "The idea that I would write a book, go on tour, have these ultra-famous people joining me on stage to make a sandwich, never would have imagined it."
For what it’s worth, Enderwick genuinely loves sandwiches. His curiosity and earnestness come through, whether on a screen, page or stage.
Not sick of sandwiches
“I don’t really get tired of sandwiches. We get a lot of recommendations, for instance, we were in Buffalo, and we got recommended to tackle the Beef on Weck, which is kind of a regional favorite there. It was so mind-blowing and good (with) thin slices of beef and a horseradish sauce. The problem really is there are just so many good ones like that. From a Reuben to a Banh Mi, there’s just not one sandwich to rule them all.” Enderwick says.While there might not be one definitive “best” sandwich of history, Enderwick is quick to single out two he believes are the worst.
“The Yeast Sandwich came from the '1001 Sandwiches from 1936,'” Enderwick says.
The recipe calls for a compressed fresh yeast cake, mixed with “table sauce” (Worcestershire sauce) and put onto buttered bread.
“I’ve never eaten wallpaper paste or spackle, but texturally, that was what it was like. It tasted terrible, too,” Enderwick says.
Another haunts Enderwick to this day. The dreaded Oyster Sandwich came from the cookbook that started it all, "The Updated Sandwich Book."
“They had you chop up raw oysters, mix with olive oil and Worcestershire sauce, Tabasco, put it between lettuce and buttered bread. I love raw oysters, but this was a textural nightmare,” Enderwick says.
While these are obvious misses to modern sandwich connoisseurs, Enderwick is not dismissive or judgmental of what people put between two slices of bread in the past. Instead, he tries to understand.
Instead of simply chucking the Yeast Sandwich, he delved deeper into the book itself. With a little sleuthing, he learned it was a by-product of a marketing campaign to “Eat Fresh Yeast for Health” in the 1930s, shortly after sliced bread hit the market and yeast sales in America plunged. According to his research, a recipe book was concocted to utilize yeast in new dishes, and thus, the Yeast Sandwich was born.
To Enderwick, finding the story behind a strange sandwich helps to contextualize these bites and allows him to appreciate the complexity in something as seemingly simple as an old sandwich recipe. While the bites range from delicious to disgusting, the stories of how and when Americans choose to make sandwiches are rich morsels that fit into the greater collective culinary experience.
A sandwich a day
There are still thousands of sandwiches to be explored, and social media demands constant content creation. But Enderwick is pacing himself.“I am doing what I like to do. If I try to do something to keep the machine happy, then I am not going to be doing what I like to do, or it’s not going to be what I do, what is genuine, which is what people seem to be responding to," he says. "I don’t want to burn out on it. I just want to keep doing it, a video a day."
When pressed about what's next, Enderwick hints at the possibility of a second cookbook and tour, something “less Barry-show,” as he puts it, that is more community-based. He mentions fostering pop-up collaborations between sandwich-loving fans and local chefs and possibly raising funds for local charities.
For his fans, seeing Enderwick take on a different sandwich every day, for years, and not lose his innate humor and inquisitiveness about the project is inspiring. In the process, he's made his own history by putting some goodness, and the occasional great sandwich, out into the world for us to enjoy. That’s worth, as he would say, giving it a go.
Sandwiches of History: Live!
Sunday, Oct. 5Tempe Center for the Arts
700 W. Rio Salado Pkwy., Tempe
Find tickets at: purchase.tempecenterforthearts.com
