When Harry Met Sally comes around unexpectedly: you catch it on a flight, in a hotel room, or, sometimes, on iPlayer. Anyway, we watch it every few years and, every time we do, it’s just as fresh, just as good, just as biting, sharp, perfectly timed and expertly performed as it was on the first viewing. Each time, we’re also surprised by how food-centric it is: so many key scenes take place in restaurants, as do so many of the best lines (“Waiter, there’s too much pepper in my paprikas”), so, if there is one movie that should be celebrated in recipes, WHMS has to be it. To paraphrase one of Nora Ephron’s best lines, recipes are to people in the 2020s what movies were to people in the 1980s. We hope she would approve.
An orgasmic chicken sandwich (pictured above)
Roast or grilled chicken is really nice for sure, and fried chicken has its own appeal that gets the kids on TikTok snapping, but the real pros and grownups know that, for juiciness and flavour, you can’t beat poached chicken. It’s so easy, yet it delivers such a juicy, succulent bite. Make this sandwich for someone you love – it’s a bit more effort than your usual ham and cheese – but you know you need to put in the work to really satisfy. We can (almost) guarantee that you’ll be repaid with groans of pleasure, and you’ll know they’re not faking it.
Prep 10 min
Cook 45 min
Serves 2
2 x 300g good chicken breasts
2 ciabatta buns, or mini baguettes
4 gem lettuce leaves
1 plum tomato, sliced
120g emmental, grated
For the sauce
6 tbsp mayonnaise
2 tbsp coarsely ground black pepper – yes, that’s a lot, but that’s the point!
1 tbsp smoked paprika
1 tbsp honey
1 tbsp red-wine vinegar
Tabasco – as much as you can handle
For the pickled slaw
¼ white cabbage (about 140g), cored and very thinly sliced
100g sauerkraut
Mix the two slaw ingredients in a bowl and set aside. Mix all the sauce ingredients in a second bowl, then adjust the heat levels to your liking by adding Tabasco to taste – it should be very potent and over-seasoned, so add a bit more than you think it needa. Set aside.
Take a small saucepan in which the chicken breasts will fit snugly, fill it with water and bring to a boil – do not add salt. Gently lower in the chicken, cover the pan and take off the heat. Leave to poach for 25 minutes, then lift out the chicken, transfer to a board and leave to cool a bit. Cut each breast into ½cm-thick slices.
Cut the rolls in half and place them all cut side up under a hot grill, just to crisp up a little. Spread a third of the sauce over the cut side of the base of each roll and put on two separate plates. Top with a few lettuce leaves, tomato slices and half the slaw, then lay one sliced chicken breast on top. Spread the rest of the sauce over the top of each chicken breast, then sprinkle with the grated cheese. Transfer topping side up to a hot grill, until the cheese melts, then slap on the tops of the rolls and squish down a little, to secure. Eat at once with nothing on the side (this is a full meal) bar plenty of napkins (because it’s also a sloppy one).
Sauce-on-the-side salad
On the phone, while watching Casablanca together, Harry tells Sally that she’s high-maintenance, but that she thinks she’s low-maintenance, and concludes: “On the side is a very big thing for you.” Sally demurs: “I just want it the way I want it,” predicting the decades of fussy orders to come – cute when you’re Meg Ryan, a little less so for pretty much everyone else, and really tricky when it comes to social dining. So, here’s a low-maintenance salad for high-maintenance people: a selection of vegetables for everyone to pick and choose to go with a killer sauce. You may end up with a bit of extra sauce, but any leftovers will be perfect on the sofa with a generous helping of Casablanca or, indeed, When Harry Met Sally.
Prep 45 min
Cook 5 min
Rest 1 hr
Serves 4 as a starter
For the sauce
70g soft young goat’s cheese
1 garlic clove, peeled
25g mint, leaves picked and chopped
25g dill, leaves picked and chopped
¼ tbsp rosemary needles, chopped
2 tsp wholegrain mustard
1 tsp english mustard – Colman’s, obviously
½ tbsp flaky sea salt
Black pepper, to taste
1 generous pinch cayenne pepper
Juice of 1 lemon
½ tbsp white-wine vinegar
100ml olive oil
For the salad platter (all optional)
1 gem lettuce, leaves separated
250g new potatoes, boiled and halved
120g cherry tomatoes, halved
120g radishes, halved
1 shallot, peeled and very thinly sliced
2 seven-minute soft-boiled eggs, peeled and quartered
2 Lebanese cucumbers, cut into chunks
Also good
Blanched Tenderstem or regular broccoli
All types of green beans, blanched
Lightly steamed leeks or spring onions
Crunchy bitter leaves
(Basically whatever you have in the fridge that you like. This sauce is universally good.)
Start with the sauce. Put the goat’s cheese, garlic, herbs, mustard, seasoning and cayenne pepper in a food processor and blitz smooth. Add the lemon juice and vinegar, then process again until incorporated. With the motor still going, slowly add the oil until the mix emulsifies and turns into a smooth sauce. Ideally, let the dressing sit for at least an hour at room temperature before you serve, so all the flavours to get to know and like each other.
Arrange your chosen vegetables on a big platter – the potatoes and eggs may need a tiny drizzle of extra oil and a sprinkling of salt on top – then serve with the sauce in a little bowl. On the side.
