Barry Enderwick Knows the Best Sandwich Ingredient Is Sincerity
Meet the man behind "Sandwiches of History."
The last earnest man on the internet makes sandwiches.
Barry Enderwick doesn’t look like your archetypal modern social media star at first glance, and things don’t appear much different upon a second or third one, either. He’s not a breathtaking Instagram model proffering sage advice about the coming week based on your Rising Sign, nor is he a muscle-dappled gym freak showcasing his esoteric Tuesday workout routine for a vast audience that will likely never try a single set. Enderwick more resembles Brian Posehn’s younger brother than an influential microcelebrity, and his algorithmically identical videos belie the stark contrast he provides people’s timelines while society rotely moves its collective opposable thumb up and down a Gorilla Glass screen each day.
The schtick is simple enough to understand after watching it once. Enderwick films himself making, and then trying, a single sandwich recipe, usually cultivated from a cookbook in the depths of the past. He proceeds to give said sandwich a score between 1-10 before “plussing it up” with an array of condiments and add-ons he already has on hand to see if he can improve upon the original recipe.
That’s it.
No, really.
If it sounds uncomplicated and borderline quotidian, it’s because it is. But that’s the magic behind “Sandwiches of History”, which has skyrocketed to nearly 300,000 followers on TikTok and 111,000 and counting on Instagram since launching in 2021.
Enderwick’s deep sincerity and unabashed monotonity smacks you in the face with the force of one of the pans he uses to fry such delicacies as Singaporean street food favorite the Roti john.
“Sandwiches of History” is magnetic in its pull and dialectical in its appeal – the mundane act of making and eating a sandwich on camera is such an unsophisticated idea that it makes the entire concept sui generis within today's modern social media realm of leathery sun-drenched beach rats and try-hard faux comedic hacks.
In fact, Enderwick says the No. 1 piece of feedback he receives from fans of “Sandwiches of History” is that they fall in love with his innocent content because of its anodyne sincerity, not in spite of it.
“It was surprising to get the feedback that this is wholesome, because that’s not something that I was necessarily going for. But there’s no guile here,” Enderwick said. “I’m not putting on a persona to do ‘Sandwiches of History’. What you see is me making sandwiches and then reacting to those sandwiches – every once in a while I’ll maybe make a joke about it or whatever – and then also try to stretch my culinary muscle to come up with some sort of ingredient that I can add that might be interesting, unexpected, and delicious.”
The California-based marketing executive got his start on social media just like everyone else: with the PDF of a cookbook written in 1909. After a friend sent him The Up-to-Date Sandwich Book and convinced him that it might make for some enjoyable content to feed the machine, Enderwick began his culinary experiment with excitement. A rough start on Instagram sparked an attempt to carve a niche within the Gen Z-littered TikTok app. When things took off there, Enderwick realized he wasn’t the only one interested in what an orange peel and chicken sandwich created in 1924 might taste like.
“I really do think it comes down to the fact that sandwiches are just universally loved. I think there’s also a kind of fascination with eating the food that was prepared earlier in time,” Enderwick said. “What did people in 1777, or what did people in 1865, or what did people in 1909, 1936, 1941, what was considered a good sandwich then? Could it be something that we should be eating today that we’re not? You’ve got your classic sandwiches like the Reuben that stood the test of time and deserve to be made and served, but are there other sandwiches that are undiscovered gems out there.”
“Sandwiches of History” isn’t without its saccharine standard catchphrases, which Enderwick employs without ingenuity or overcompensation. Before each bite, he lets the audience know he’s about to “give this sandwich a gooooooo” in what almost sounds like a sketch comedy version of a Baltimore accent. When he makes something that looks like it was invented by Beelzebub within the deepest layer of Dante’s Hell, like the raw oyster sandwich for instance, he lets us know that he’s “cautiously pessimistic” about it. It’s Enderwick’s real-life version of plussing up the broadcast in a way that codifies its charming simpleness and unpretentious allure.
“None of this stuff is planned,” Enderwick said. “It’s just stuff I say. When I say I’m ‘cautiously pessimistic’, that’s something I’ve said for years. I don’t have any catchphrases that I’ve made up for this. ‘Give it a go’ is just me.”
So why the sandwich?
This staple of diets across the planet may be named after the 4th Earl of Sandwich, but it has origins dating back to the 1st century, when rabbi Hillel the Elder decided to wrap Paschal lamb, charoset and bitter herbs inside matzah during the Passover seder. The humble sandwich's roots could run even deeper than that, and its universal appeal has drawn hundreds of thousands of people to Enderwick's now-blossomed idea from around the globe. His other channels, including ones showcasing craft beer, ice cream, and potato chips –while popular– lack the massive and all-encompassing appeal of “Sandwiches of History.”
How did two pieces of bread with filling slapped in the middle break through to the unwashed masses?
Enderwick offers a few explanations, including the sandwich’s convenient portability and capacity for cutting across socioeconomic strata. But, in the end, he believes it’s the interminable possibilities at play that make both his channel and, in turn, the sandwich itself such a fascinating and fawned-over gastronomic phenomenon.
“A coq au vin is a coq au vin. You’re not going to modify that by putting a lamb shank in it, because that’s going to be a different dish,” Enderwick said. “But you can make a lamb sandwich. You can make a coq au vin sandwich. You can do a lot of culinary mashups in a sandwich and try different things and cut across different cultures. The sandwich is pretty universal. There’s pretty much a sandwich in every culture.”
Waxing poetic about the ways in which an earnest player stands out among the Potemkin world of social media clout might be endearing, and sincerity undoubtedly adds to his channel’s meteoric rise in popularity across social media platforms over the past year. Enderwick said he’s currently pitching a book deal and TV show to take this hobby full-time, and there are surely further treasures among the horizon yet untouched and untapped.
But perhaps the reason why Barry Enderwick’s “Sandwiches of History” remains so beloved has to do with his attitude when crafting one of the hellish creations he finds in the back of a faded cookbook written when Louis Armstrong was topping the music charts and the television was a twinkle in some young inventor’s eye.
It’s one that mirrors how we can handle reality, with its insanity and inanity congealing into material truth. Even when things look bleak beyond measure, and you’re cautiously pessimistic about the whole damn thing, who knows?
Maybe it all blends together into something tolerable in the end.
“Comedians have that saying, ‘commit to the bit’, where even if it’s not something you’re into, or if it’s not going great, you’ve got to commit to it,” Enderwick said. “You’ve got to see it through. That’s kind of the same principle. I could change it. I could do all sandwiches that I think would be great, and that would be fun. But there’s fun in trying stuff that, on paper, looks bad, because you never know. Maybe it could work out.”