Broodje Beenham met Honing-Mosterdsaus

The butcher's shop has its own hour. Not morning, when the cases are still being polished, and not evening, when everyone is thinking of gehaktballen, meatballs, and potatoes. I mean that bright Dutch lunch hour when the slagerij door keeps opening, the bell keeps ringing, and someone is carving warm beenham into slices thick enough to make a roll feel like a meal.

The name already tells you most of the truth. Broodje is the little bread, the roll held in one hand; beenham is ham from the leg, the honest muscle of the pig, cured or seasoned and roasted until it can be cut warm at the counter. No mystery, no theatre. But let me tell you a secret: this is one of the great Dutch quick meals precisely because it remembers the Sunday joint without asking you to roast one.

The method is simple because the butcher has done the long work. Your task is not to improve the ham into something else. Warm it gently, don't dry it out, split a fresh white or brown roll, give it lettuce for snap, and spoon over a sharp-sweet honing-mosterdsaus, honey-mustard sauce, with enough mustard to keep the honey from becoming childish. Hou het altijd simpel. A dish without its story is half a meal, but a sandwich with too many ambitions is also a small tragedy.