Can this tin opener Finnish the job?

My trusty tin opener had given me many years of service in its time, but as you may recall, it met its maker a few months back when the huge circumference of a tinned Fray Bentos pie proved too much for its ageing parts. Most tins these days have ring-pull lids, so my efforts for this blog have not been too hampered by its loss, but nevertheless the search for a replacement started soon afterwards.

Searching on eBay had me considering all sorts of devices, some as practical, long-term contenders, and others as more fun, whimsical purchases (isn't that what eBay is for, after all?). As a tin cannoisseur, I feel that having a collection of tin openers would be no bad thing. Falling rather more into the category of whimsy was this little number - "The '57' pocket can opener", produced "with the compliments of H.J.Heinz Co. Ltd." I'm not entirely sure when it dates from, but it proclaims itself to be "sturdy", "easy to use" and "perfect for picnics", which intrigued me greatly. What use would a tin opener ever have had at a picnic?

Thinking more about it though, it started to make sense. Go to any picnic these days and you will probably be met by the sight of a multitude of plastic packets, punnets and pots of ready-made, ready-washed, ready-to-eat salads, dips, baked goods, confectionery and all manner of other convenience foods, including the omni-present supermarket coleslaw (who is it who keeps bringing that? No-one eats it, that's for certain).

It's tempting to think that back in the day, all picnic food would have been homemade and lovingly wrapped like something from those glorious Famous Five-esque picnics of our imaginations, but it probably wasn't. Tubs of taramasalata might not have been around for long, but cans of corned beef and the like have, and it would have been far easier to pop a tin into a picnic basket with a loaf of bread, a plate and a knife than to make sandwiches at home, which would have gone soggy within an hour anyway. Easier as long as you remembered to bring a tin opener with you, that is. Suddenly H.J.Heinz's lightweight, pocket-sized tin opener seems like it really could have been "perfect for picnics" after all.

I was firmly of the opinion therefore that its first use had to be for some kind of al fresco dining experience - and I had just the thing for it. Rather than taking a tin of something to make a sandwich out in the open, this definitely felt like the moment to try a tinned sandwich. Yes, you read that correctly. A tinned sandwich. A sandwich IN A TIN.

Now, if I asked you to guess where this tin came from, what might you say? The USA? Japan, maybe?In fact, it was from Finland, purchased during a very brief trip I paid to Helsinki almost eighteen months ago. It's a really beautiful city, if you ever get the chance to go, very clean and unpolluted with lots of green open spaces, some lovely art nouveau architecture (among many other styles) and a fantastic food and craft market down by the waterfront, which I spent a good few hours exploring and enjoying.

While browsing the many stalls selling lovely fresh berries, extraordinary-looking mushrooms and all sorts of intriguing meats and fish, I came across one selling a variety of goods in jars, bottles and tins. The stall holder spotted my interest in the latter of these and informed me, in embarrassingly perfect English, that they contained ready-made rye bread sandwiches, filled with a small fish native to the lakes of Finland. Money and goods exchanged hands faster than you can say "Täyssäilyke Muikku Kakku". Well, faster than I can say it anyway - I don't know how good your Finnish is.

Fast forward the best part of a year to summer 2014, and a gloriously sunny day, just perfect for a picnic. I needed to go into town in the morning but head no plans for later, and so packed a rug, the tin and of course my new tin opener, and after finishing my errands, headed to the lovely Brunswick Square Gardens - surprisingly tranquil given its central location. Nice and empty too, which given that I was going to be sat there eating and taking pictures of a tinned fish sandwich, was probably a good thing.


Bizarrely, the label on the tin said "1kg", which had then been crossed out, and "200g" written next to it. The best before date was also handwritten, giving the tin somewhat of amateurish feel to it. Had the man on the stall been making and canning sandwiches at home? Quite possibly.

Fortunately for me, the label was written in German as well as Finnish, so I was able to ascertain that the sandwich was made with rye bread (Roggenbrot), and contained smoked bacon (geräuchetern Speck) in addition to the fish, which were "kleine maräne". I still had to do a Google translate for "maräne", a word I'd never heard before - and as it turned out, the English word for the fish was new to me too - "vendace", or Coregonus albula, to use its Latin name. Wikipedia revealed that it is a small whitefish, native not just to Finland but northern Europe in general, including a variety in the lakes and lochs of England and Scotland. Lots more detail about their biology, feeding and habitat on the Wiki page, if you're a fish enthusiast.

I, however, was interested only in opening the tin and giving the sandwich a taste. I removed the tin opener from its envelope, and following the instructions on the back, fitted it on the rim to begin opening it, turning the device "as if locking a door so that the point of the cutter pierces the can" and then repeating this all the way round, "by rocking the cutter backwards and forwards". The first few turns felt a little stiff, but once I'd got used to the rocking motion I was able to work my way around the circumference of the tin reasonably quickly - longer than it takes with a normal tin opener, true, but then again the device makes no claims to speed - it call itself "The handiest can opener you've ever tried", which given its size, portability and ease of use is probably true.

Prising off the lid, I was faced with a curious-looking pock-marked surface, almost like the cratered landscape of a rather wet moon or planet, which I assumed must be the top layer of rye bread. It was then that I realised I wasn't entirely sure how I was going to eat the sandwich, or at least get it out of the tin, as from the surface it did look a little too soggy to be trying to handle. Fortunately I had some napkins with me, so I covered the top of the tin with a layer of these, turned it over and then gave it a shake until I felt the mass inside come away from the bottom.


Removing the tin, I was surprised to discover a very different-looking surface; given that this was in effect the base of the sandwich, I had been expecting to see the same bread as before, but this was clearly a layer of the smoked bacon. For a moment I thought that perhaps it was a very Scandinavian-style open-faced sandwich, which had been canned upside-down, before noticing that in fact there was a second layer of bread - but it was still firmly stuck to the bottom of the tin.

No matter - I proceeded undeterred. I was glad I'd had the sense to use a good few layers of napkins, as the sandwich now sitting on it was rather moist. There was a good double-layer of the fish underneath the bacon, which were sans-head and tail but otherwise appeared to be whole - you could see the spines running through the middle of the fish. Like the bones in tinned salmon or other fish though, these were soft enough to bite through and added a nice extra texture to the sandwich.

The bacon had a slight chewiness to it but had a lovely strong smoky, salty flavour to it. I am quite a fan of pork and seafood together, and it worked well here, providing a good foil to the milder but still noticeable fishiness of the vendace.

The bread hadn't fared so well, and was obviously somewhat soggy, but being a robust rye it hadn't completely turned to mush and still had a pleasingly grainy texture to it. As to the layer left in the base of the tin, well I have to admit that I scooped it out with a finger and ate it anyway, but it wasn't a particularly pretty sight so it's probably for the best that I wasn't able to get any picture of that too. Without a good supply of napkins I would have been a fool to attempt it, but even so it did leave me with somewhat smoky bacony-fishy smelling fingers for a few hours.

So, are tinned sandwiches the next 'big thing' in food? I think sadly not. I very much enjoyed the taste and texture, so it certainly wasn't the culinary car crash it could have been, but unlike the tin opener , it was hardly the "handiest" sandwich I've ever eaten, and really not "perfect for picnics". The Earl of Sandwich would have struggled to keep playing cards while trying to eat one of these, and I dread to think what state his deck of cards would have ended up in if he did. I definitely think it's better to stick with tin foil than tin cans for transporting your sarnies.

But the tin opener itself was a hit, and while it wouldn't really serve as an everyday piece of kitchen equipment, I might just have to start carrying it around with me, just in case I find myself wanting or needing to get into a tin while on the go.

Which for a tin cannoisseur, is not an uncommon occurrence...