Thepla, sandwiches, wraps, pasta salads and dry snacks that travel well and need no reheating. (29 recipes)
Khakhra are thin chapaties roasted slowly on a griddle until they turn crisp, like a cracker. This masala version adds gram flour, fresh fenugreek, turmeric and chilli to the wheat dough. They are a light Gujarati breakfast or tea-time snack, and lovely with pickle, chutney or a smear of butter. You can also make them in a roti maker.
Warm new potatoes boiled in their skins and tossed in one of three dressings: creamy parsley sour cream, a tangy basil vinaigrette, or a fresh 'greeny' dressing of cottage cheese and herbs. Each dressing is enough for 500 g of potatoes, so make one, or make all three for a party. Serve the salad chilled on a bed of lettuce with a spoonful of single cream on top.
Every Japanese convenience store fridge holds a row of tamago sando, and Tokyo coffee shops (kissaten) have served them with morning coffee for decades. The filling is egg salad made rich with Japanese-style mayonnaise and a little milk, spread thickly between crustless slices of soft milk bread and cut into neat rectangles. Make them for a picnic, a lunchbox or a lazy breakfast. The usual mistake is overboiling the eggs: past 10 minutes the yolks go dry with a grey ring, and the salad loses its soft, sunny colour. Chef's tip: chop the whites finely but mash the yolks into the mayonnaise first, so the filling is creamy with little bouncy flecks of white.
Across Colombo at midday, office workers unfold a lunch packet: rice wrapped in a banana leaf or waxed paper with a little of everything around it. This vegan version is the one the rice-and-curry shops call "veg packet": coconut-milk parippu (red lentil dhal), a dry potato curry, a crisp mallung of chopped greens and fiery pol sambol. Chicken or fish curry is often added, but the vegetables alone make a full meal. The mistake is packing the dhal runny, which soaks the whole parcel; cook it thick enough to hold on a spoon. Chef's tip: wilt the banana leaf over a flame for a few seconds so it folds without splitting and gives the rice its scent.
Cheese pimiento is the orange spread every Filipino child knows from school baon, birthday party trays and afternoon merienda in Manila: grated cheese mashed with mayonnaise, chopped pimiento and a little sugar, spread thick on soft white bread with the crusts cut off. The mistake is grating the cheese too coarsely, which gives a lumpy spread that tears the soft bread; grate it finely and let it soften for a few minutes in the mayonnaise. Many processed and cheddar cheeses are made with animal rennet, so choose one labelled vegetarian. Chef's tip: a spoon of evaporated milk makes the spread silkier and easier to spread on soft bread. Contains milk, egg (mayonnaise) and gluten.
When Milan's offices empty onto park benches in July, the schiscetta (the Milanese word for a packed lunch tin) usually holds pasta fredda: short pasta dressed with olive oil, sweet cherry tomatoes, little mozzarella balls, black olives and torn basil. It is made the night before and tastes best at cool room temperature, never fridge-cold. The common mistake is rinsing the cooked pasta under the tap until it is icy and then dressing it: the starch closes up, the oil slides off and the salad tastes flat. Many mozzarellas are made with animal rennet, so look for one labelled vegetarian, or use cubes of a vegetarian cheese. Pack it with an ice pack and take it out of the bag 20 minutes before eating. Chef's tip: toss the drained, still-warm pasta with half the oil and the salted tomatoes straight away so it drinks up their juice.
Katsu sando began in Tokyo tonkatsu shops in the 1930s as a cutlet you could carry, and is now a fixture of department-store food halls, train-station kiosks and lunchboxes all over Japan: a crisp panko pork loin cutlet soaked in sweet-sour tonkatsu sauce between pillowy white bread, crusts trimmed off. The common mistake is slicing it while hot, which squashes the bread and makes it soggy; let it rest under a light weight first. Pork loin is a whole cut, so cook it to 63 °C and rest it for 3 minutes. Chef's tip: butter the bread with a little mustard mixed in; it stops the sauce soaking through and adds a gentle kick.
France sells millions of jambon-beurre every working day: half a crusty baguette, split, spread with good salted butter and filled with thin slices of jambon de Paris, the delicate cooked pork ham. Parisians eat it at the office, on a park bench or on the train. The common mistake is a stingy smear of hard butter; the butter is a filling, not a glue, so spread it soft and generous. Some add cornichons, which purists call a different sandwich. Chef's tip: fold each slice of ham loosely in half rather than laying it flat, so the sandwich is airy and every bite has ham.
The salad sandwich is the backbone of the Australian lunchbox and the school tuckshop order: soft bread built up with tinned beetroot, grated carrot, tasty cheese, tomato and crisp lettuce, cut into triangles and wrapped in paper. Beetroot is what makes it unmistakably Aussie. The common mistake is laying wet beetroot and tomato straight on bare bread, so by lunchtime it is pink and soggy. Many Cheddar-style "tasty" cheeses use animal rennet; choose one labelled vegetarian. Chef's tip: butter both slices to the edge and put the cheese and lettuce next to the bread, with the wet fillings sealed in the middle.
A school canteen and church-fete favourite across Australia, the curried egg sandwich is soft white or wholemeal bread filled with hard-boiled egg mashed with mayonnaise and a little mild curry powder, often with lettuce or cress. It goes into lunch boxes cut into fingers. The common mistake is mashing the eggs while warm, which turns the mayonnaise oily and the filling runny; let them cool completely. Chef's tip: warm the curry powder in a dry pan for 20 seconds first, and the raw, dusty taste turns sweet and toasty.
No Kiwi picnic, school trip or bach weekend is complete without a bacon and egg pie: flaky puff pastry wrapped around smoky pork bacon, peas and whole eggs that bake into golden rounds you can see when the pie is cut. It is served warm for tea and then sliced cold into lunch boxes the next day. The common mistake is pulling it out when the pastry looks done but the eggs are still runny in the middle; for a picnic pie that will be packed, the eggs must be fully set. Chef's tip: prick each yolk lightly before adding the lid, so the eggs cook evenly and don't bubble up through the pastry.
Since the 1940s, the Taiwan Railway has sold a famous biandang on its trains and platforms: a box of rice topped with a soy-braised pork chop, a dark lu dan egg, a few strands of suan cai pickled mustard greens and slices of braised dried tofu. Taipei commuters still buy thousands a day, and families make it at home for packed lunches. The common mistake is frying the pork chop straight from thick; beat it thin first or it curls and toughens. Chef's tip: braise the eggs and tofu in the same pot after the pork, so they soak up its flavour.
Gujarati families pack a stack of dhebra for every train journey, picnic and tiffin box, because the yogurt and oil in the dough keep these spicy millet and fenugreek flatbreads soft for two or three days. They are thicker than a thepla and earthy from the bajra, and they are eaten with pickle, chhundo or a cup of tea. The common mistake is adding too much water at once: the yogurt and fenugreek release moisture as you knead, and a slack dough sticks and tears. Chef's tip: pat them out on a damp cloth or between two sheets of plastic rather than rolling, the way Gujarati kitchens do, so the delicate millet dough does not crack.
Salade piémontaise is a fixture of French school canteens, motorway delis and summer picnic boxes: waxy potatoes in a mustardy mayonnaise with chopped tomato, hard-boiled egg, gherkins and diced cooked ham (pork). Despite the name, it is thoroughly French. The common mistake is dressing hot potatoes with mayonnaise, which turns it oily and sloppy; instead, splash the warm potatoes with vinegar and dress them only once cold. For a vegetarian version, leave out the ham and add a handful of sweetcorn. Pack it cold with an ice pack. Chef's tip: cut the potatoes after cooking, not before, so they hold their shape and don't go waterlogged.
The Scotch egg was sold as a travelling snack by the London grocer Fortnum & Mason in the 1700s, and it is still the picnic and pub-counter favourite of England: a boiled egg wrapped in pork sausage meat, crumbed and fried. Modern pubs serve them with a runny yolk and a dollop of piccalilli or mustard. Chef's tip: boil the eggs for exactly 6½ minutes and plunge into iced water; that sets the white enough to peel but leaves the yolk soft.
Pan bagnat, 'bathed bread' in Niçois, is the beach and market lunch of Nice, sold wrapped in paper from kiosks around the Cours Saleya and packed for picnics on the pebbles of the Promenade. A round crusty roll is soaked with fruity olive oil and filled with everything that goes into a salade niçoise: tuna, anchovies, hard-boiled egg, tomato, sweet green pepper, spring onion and black olives. Pressed for an hour, it turns juicy, compact and easy to eat in big, messy bites. Serve it on its own or with a few radishes and a glass of something cold. Chef's tip: rub the cut bread with garlic before the oil goes on; it perfumes every bite without overpowering the fish.
Birthday parties, office farewells and afternoon tea in a Buenos Aires confitería all bring out trays of sándwiches de miga: triple-decker sandwiches of paper-thin, crustless white bread with butter or mayonnaise and fillings of ham (pork) and cheese, egg, tomato, lettuce or olives, cut into neat rectangles. Specialist bakeries sell the large, very thin pan de miga sheets for them; at home, a soft sandwich loaf sliced thin and rolled flat works. They should be soft, moist and delicate, never dry at the edges. Dry sandwiches are the usual problem, so spread the mayonnaise right to the corners and keep finished trays under a damp tea towel. Chef's tip: assemble, wrap the stack in cling film and chill it for 15 minutes before trimming the crusts; the layers set and the knife cuts clean edges.
Every Hawaiian plate lunch, from drive-ins in Hilo to the lunch wagons of Honolulu, comes with two scoops of rice and one of this soft, creamy macaroni salad. It is simpler than American pasta salads: overcooked elbow macaroni soaked in vinegar while hot, then folded with lots of mayonnaise, a little milk and grated carrot. Chef's tip: cook the pasta past al dente, a few minutes longer than the packet says; plate-lunch mac is meant to be soft so it soaks up the dressing.
This is a raised pork pie in the style of Melton Mowbray in Leicestershire, the hunting town whose pies were carried in saddle bags; only pies made in the area may use the town's name, so this is our home version. Chopped, uncured pork shoulder and belly, peppered and spiced with mace, is packed into a crisp hot water crust made with lard, baked with bowed sides, then filled with a savoury jelly. Eat it cold with English mustard and pickle at picnics or on Boxing Day. Chef's tip: work the pastry while it is still warm; as it cools it cracks.
Coronation chicken was invented for the banquet of Queen Elizabeth II's coronation in 1953 by the Cordon Bleu school in London, and it became the filling of choice for jacket potatoes, wedding buffets and garden party sandwiches across England. Poached chicken is folded through a creamy, mildly spiced sauce of mayonnaise, curry paste, apricot and yoghurt. Chef's tip: poach the chicken very gently and cool it in its liquid so it stays juicy.
Quiche lorraine comes from Lorraine in north-eastern France, near Nancy and Metz, where it began as a bread-dough tart filled with eggs, cream and smoked bacon. It contains pork. The true Lorraine version has no cheese, just a deep, wobbly custard and crisp lardons, and it is eaten warm for lunch with a green salad or cut into slices for picnics. Chef's tip: blind-bake the pastry until it is golden and sealed; a pale base turns soggy under the custard.
In Nice the salad is a summer lunch eaten on shady terraces near the Cours Saleya market, and locals argue about what belongs in it. This is the generous everyday version found across the Riviera: ripe tomatoes, little potatoes, crisp green beans, soft-boiled eggs, good tuna and black olives, dressed with a sharp mustard vinaigrette. Use tuna in olive oil from a jar or tin, or a fresh tuna steak seared rare to medium. Chef's tip: dress the warm potatoes and beans first so they soak up the vinaigrette, then build the rest of the salad around them.
Across Georgia, Tennessee and the Carolinas, a platter of fried chicken still anchors Sunday dinner after church and every summer family reunion. Bone-in pieces soak overnight in salted, peppery buttermilk, which seasons the meat right through and keeps it juicy, then get a craggy flour coat that fries up deep gold and crackly. Serve hot or at room temperature with coleslaw, biscuits, mashed potatoes or corn on the cob. Chef's tip: let the dredged pieces sit on a rack for 15 minutes before frying so the coating turns slightly pasty; it clings better and makes the crunchiest crust.
The Cornish pasty fed tin miners and fishermen in Cornwall for centuries, its thick crimped edge a handle for dirty hands, and today bakeries from Penzance to St Ives sell them warm all day. The filling goes into the pastry raw: thinly sliced beef skirt, potato, swede and onion, seasoned only with salt and plenty of pepper, so everything steams in its own juices inside the crust. Chef's tip: slice the vegetables thinly and evenly, not in cubes; thin pieces cook through in the same time as the beef.
Showing 24 of 29 recipes
Show more recipesPage 1 of 2
Indian
Japanese
Sri Lankan
Filipino
Italian
French
Australian
New Zealand
Taiwanese
British
Argentinian
American