Just The Essentials -- This Creation Fills A Void With The All-In- One Sandwich

I FIRST ENCOUNTERED the Essential Sandwich - and an appreciation for just how essential it could be - at 33,000 feet, on a bargain trip to Paris.

The flight, one of those el cheapo cut-raters that seem too good to be true, had only a couple of inconveniences. One of them was that before you got to Paris from Seattle, you had to go to Detroit and change planes in the dark before flying on to the City of Light.

The other was that you had to eat on that first plane.

I am not one of those who unloose frequent diatribes against airlines food. For one thing, some of them (admittedly, only a few) feed very well. For another, considering the onboard reheating facilities, the number of meals served in a brief period of time and the brutal cost-cutting in the industry, it is remarkable that anything edible EVER gets served, especially in coach.

But the servings of alleged rigatoni that a traveling friend and I were confronted with on that night-flight to Detroit crossed the lines of not only good taste but digestibility.

The meal appeared to be woefully overcooked pasta, haphazardly slaked with an oil of some kind, wilted, pale gray-green peppers, and what may have once been cheese - or may not have been.

I couldn't eat it; not on my way to Paris (or, for that matter, to Purgatory) and I said so. My friend came to the same conclusion. But she had an alternative.

She rummaged into her carry-on bag and pulled out a square

little bundle wrapped in plastic. It looked a bit like a fat, squat burrito. She cut it in half. And we munched.

"What is this thing?" I asked her. "It doesn't look like much. But it's good."

"Essential," she replied.

"I know," I said. "But what IS it?"

"The Essential Sandwich," she elaborated. "I've been buying them for years. They are great to take golfing or hiking. Or even to give to your kids for a last-minute school lunch. They're made someplace in Seattle."

The Essential Sandwich is the brainchild of Jeff Fairhall. He does indeed make them someplace in Seattle, presently at 454 N. 34th St., in Fremont, near the Red Hook Brewery.

The "sandwich" we had sampled was the first one he had invented. It was simply and aptly named: Rice and Vegetables. For all of its simplicity, it was remarkably good. How did he come by its creation?

"I had worked in the natural-food business for six or seven years," he said. "In retailing, importing and wholesaling. I had a pretty strong commitment to organic agriculture - and in promoting organic, sustainable agriculture. I wanted to come up with a complete, self-contained meal. There seemed to be a need for one."

A Seattle native, Fairhall, 35, had worked with organic foods in Denver and Santa Fe before coming home to start his own business in June, '88.

"Starting this company was at first very much a cottage industry."

That is, he worked it alone.

"I rented space in a small restaurant on Latona, near Green Lake. It's now called Los Gatos. It was at that time called Speedy Gonzales - a small takeout place. I worked there during its off hours. I liked the idea of making something that was organic, nourishing and good for you - but still easy to eat."

Fairhall's sandwich wasn't really a sandwich - any more than a taco or a burrito is a sandwich. The prototype was essentially a scoop of mixed cooked grains and legumes, seasonings and vegetables wrapped up in a rolled and folded chapati, an East Indian flat bread that very much resembles a whole-wheat tortilla.

The product was folded much as a blintz is - first from the bottom, then top and sides - and then immediately, tightly sealed in two layers of plastic wrap, which keeps it fresh, compact and together.

"I took the first one I made to the Rainbow Grocery on Capitol Hill," he recalled, "and they were very happy with it. Very receptive. In fact, I made my decision to start the company on the basis of their response."

From one pillow-shaped sandwich, made by one self-employed self-believer, sold in one supportive store, Essential Foods grew - not explosively, but surely.

He returned to Speedy Gonzales and made some more, then took them around to other stores.

"At first I took them to natural-food stores, and then started up with mostly independent groceries, like Ken's (Market on Queen Anne). A breakthrough came when I started placing them on college and university campuses. Evergreen was probably our first big account. Now we sell to most of the community colleges and the University of Washington - at the HUB.

"We get a lot of new business now from places calling us and wanting our sandwiches - like Microsoft, which has something like 16 food facilities. But it was a gradual process, although there have been a few milestones - like getting the product into QFC," Fairhall says.

Essential Foods now offers a dozen different sandwiches, with two more coming out. They are made one batch at a time at the Fremont kitchen that Fairhall moved into a year and a half ago. He now has 30 employees working in a 4,000-square-foot kitchen.

The rice and grains, including polenta, are cooked in large volume pots, then transferred into a powerful mixer and blended with the other ingredients before coming to the assembly tables. Ingredients are the best procurable - organically grown brown rice, beans and tomatoes. Even the chapatis (or tortillas) are made from organically grown whole wheat flours.

None of it is fancy. But it's guilt-free eating.

For example, the Gallo Pinto sandwich, one of their best sellers, contains brown rice, pinto beans, tomato, onions, cilantro and parsley, along with the kick of jalapeno pepper, a naturally brewed soy sauce, safflower oil, rice vinegar and unrefined sea salt.

Some of the more exotic sandwiches ("We still call them sandwiches for lack of a better word") are the Indonesian, with cabbage, organic peanuts and raisins; and the Japanese, which contains nori ("sea vegetable") and wheat-free tamari.

They are usually eaten cold, but are more fragrant and flavorful when warmed.

My favorite is the Roti, an Indian-like concoction filled with curried potatoes (yellow Finns), fresh green peas, onions, carrots and celery. It reminds me a bit of southern Indian flavors.

Essential Foods continues to expand. A branch subsidiary has opened in the Bay Area, at Emeryville in the East Bay, and distributes: "From Santa Cruz to Santa Rosa."

But it is basically a Seattle company. "Seattle is a unique market for this type of food, where we could be accepted into the mainstream stores of the area," Fairhall says.

Those funny, plump little vegetarian sandwiches in plain brown wrappers are now in more than 240 stores in the Puget Sound market.

Fairhall, himself, is not a strict vegetarian.

"Although meat plays a very small part in my diet. I just basically favor the vegetable kingdom. I am an avid gardener."

It's not entirely surprising. Remember those P-Patch community gardens that dedicated urban farmers started up a couple of decades ago?

Fairhall was one of those. He still is.

While this interview was taking place, Essential Foods won a confirmed order for its first sale of a product (hummus) to a airline.

Some of them need it.

(Copyright 1993, John Hinterberger. All rights reserved.) Hinterberger's food columns and restaurant reviews appear Sundays in Pacific and Fridays in Tempo. Betty Udesen is a Seattle Times photographer.