Bread

Braaibroodjies

Name: Braaibroodjies
Prep time: 10 min
Cook time: 10 min
Total time: 20 min
Yield: 6
Cuisine: South African
Ingredients: 12 slices white bread, thickly cut; 80 g soft butter; 300 g mature cheddar, sliced or coarsely grated; 3–4 firm tomatoes, sliced; 2 large onions, in thin rings; 4–6 tbsp fruit chutney; salt and black pepper

Toasted sandwiches with cheese, tomato, onion and fruit chutney, cooked in a hinged grid over the last of the coals. Reckon on two per person — there is never one left over.

Braaibroodjies come at the end of the evening, once the meat is off and the coals are fading. The chutney is the point at which they stop being toast.

Prep: 10 min
On the fire: 10 min
Serves: 6
Effort: easy

Toasted braaibroodjies with bar marks from the grid, cut open — Dumbassman · CC BY-SA 4.0

How hot

Gentle

You can hold your hand over the grid for 8 seconds · ≈ 150–175 °C

Every coal stage explained →

Which wood

Rooikrans

spicy, resinous

Method

Butter the bread

Butter one side of all twelve slices thinly. That side faces outward — it becomes the crust and stops the bread welding itself to the grid.
Build them

Lay six slices buttered side down. Spread chutney on the dry side, then cheese, tomato, onion. Season firmly; the tomato needs it. Top with the second slice, butter facing out.
Clamp them

Lay the sandwiches side by side in the hinged grid and close it tightly. A loose grid means they fall apart when you turn them.
Cook them

Hold them over mild coals — eight seconds on the hand test, meaning the heat left after the meat. Turn every 60 to 90 seconds for eight to ten minutes, until both sides are evenly golden and cheese oozes at the edges.
Serve at once

Cut diagonally and eat with your hands. Cold, a braaibroodjie is just a sandwich again.

Tips

The coals must be weak. Over full heat the bread burns before the cheese melts — which is why braaibroodjies always come last.
No hinged grid? Two cooling racks clamped together with a pair of braai tongs will do.
Slice the onion thin. Thick rings will not cook through in ten minutes and taste sharp rather than sweet.

Braaibroodjies prove that the best things at a fire happen on the side. They need no fire of their own, just the warmth left once the meat is resting on the board — and that is exactly the order they are meant for.

The composition is remarkably non-negotiable. Cheese, tomato, onion, chutney: leave out any one of the four and you will be corrected. The chutney carries the weight — its sweetness against the salt of the cheese, its acidity against the fat of the butter.

Where it comes from

Where the word comes from: Afrikaans · Literally „little braai bread“ *Broodjie* is the diminutive of *brood*, bread.

Braaibroodjies are the youngest of the classic braai sides and the only one that follows from a piece of equipment: the hinged grid. Without it a filled sandwich falls through; with it the thing is clamped between two grates and you can turn it in one movement.

The filling has stayed remarkably stable: cheese, onion, tomato, chutney. The chutney is the part that does not come from this kitchen. It arrived at the Cape via British India and has been in South African households since the late nineteenth century — the best-known brand goes back to a family recipe sold from around 1870. Without chutney a braaibroodjie is toast.

Its place in the running order is part of the thing. Braaibroodjies go on at the end, once the meat is off and the coals are dropping away. That is not an order of politeness but of physics: over full coals the butter on the bread burns before the cheese has melted.

Make them earlier and you get black slices with a cold middle — and let the fire go out first and you have made half a braai.

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