50 State Sandwiches Challenge: North Dakota

You are probably wondering what happened to North Carolina and you are right, I did skip them to get to North Dakota.  That is because on July 25th I will be firing up the smoker and doing my first annual CAROLINA PULLED PORK OFF.  That's right, one day, two Carolinas.  I was told that if I was going to do Carolina pulled pork, the only way would be to smoke it and any attempts in a crockpot would be illegitimate.  So to recap, on July 25th, Carolina Pulled Pork Off AND on August 1st, the smoker comes back out to catch up with Kansas' burnt ends and some good old-fashioned Texas brisket.  It's all happening this summer at the Jersey Shore.  OK, now that that is out of the way on to North Dakota.  The Sloppy Joe doesn't really have origins in North Dakota, the people there just really like them and who am I but a heartless, cynical east coast man to tell them otherwise.  In reality, the sloppy joe is a derivative of Iowa's "loose meat" sandwich.  References to sloppy joes as sandwiches begin in the 1940s, with one example from Ohio saying "sloppy joes: originated in Cuba," which actually makes a lot of sense considering the ground beef-tomato sauce blend is reminiscent of picadillo, a very popular Latin American dish. OR they were referencing Cuba, North Dakota in which case, the sloppy joe actually IS from North Dakota.  Either way, the practice of putting ground beef in between a hamburger bun about American as it comes.  Now cue the scary lunch lady from Billy Madison...

Ingredients:

1lb ground beef

6 oz tomato paste

1 packet of sloppy joe seasoning mix

hamburger buns 

1. Brown meat in a large skillet on medium-high heat. 

2. Stir in seasoning mix, tomato paste, and water. Bring to boil. Reduce heat and simmer for 10 minutes.

3. Serve on hamburger buns. 

50 States Sandwich Challenge: New York

Sorry to all of upstate New York but there's no secret that the entire state is dominated by a city on a little island off the coast of New Jersey. New York is the first glimpse of America most of the world sees and it is also my "home city" so to speak.  I grew up a quick ferry ride across the bay from the city; most of the adults I knew commuted there to work, I root for their sports teams, every single field trip (except Poricy Park) I ever went on in school went there.  What I'm trying to say is, yes, I could just take a trip into the city to Katz or one of the hundreds of other Jewish delis between Red Bank and New York to get authentic pastrami on rye.  But that's not the point of this.  The pastrami on rye is the simple, yet delectable predecessor of The Reuben. In fact, pastrami on rye can be found almost 40 years before the emergence of The Reuben.  Sussman Volk opened one of New York's first delis at 88 Delancy Street in 1888, where he served meat on rye bread.  Pastrami came from a Romanian dish called Pastirma, which was cured goose.  Since geese weren't readily available in New York City, many Jewish immigrants from Eastern Europe served the much more accessible beef instead.  It is theorized that Pastirma became Pastrami due to the American simplification of words as pastrami would be next to the salami found in Italian delis next door.  Now if you'd excuse me, I have a ferry to catch as I will likely be in tears when I walk into Citi Field to watch the New York Mets tonight live for the first time in almost two years.  

Ingredients:

1/2 lb pastrami

1/4 lb swiss cheese

spicy brown mustard

rye bread

1. Place a generous amount of pastrami on your rye topped with two slices of swiss and as much spicy brown mustard as your heart desires.

2. Put your sandwich in a toaster oven or oven at 300 degrees for about 10 minutes or until the swiss cheese has started to melt.

3. Let's go Mets

50 States Sandwich Challenge: New Mexico

You may be thinking.  A burger? Is that a sandwich?  Well, technically, yes because its meats, cheese, and condiments in between bread.  But burgers are an entirely separate sub category within the sandwich game that can take months to explore.  However, New Mexico is famous for it's Green Chile cheeseburgers, so much so, that there is a Green Chile Cheeseburger Trail with 63 stops around the state.  No one knows for sure who invented the Green Chile Cheeseburger but the earliest known place to serve the spiced-up burger was the now famous Owl Bar and Café in San Antonio, New Mexico.  Opened in 1945 by Frank and Dee Chavez, the Owl Bar and Café was the famed lunch spot of scientists working on the Manhattan Project.  That's right, folks, those defecting German scientists invented perhaps the most consequential weapon in human history while eating a lunch with flavor for the first time in their lives.  That's American exceptionalism right there.  And what sets this burger apart from any other, is the Green Chile.  First grown by the Pueblo and Hispano communities throughout Santa Fe de Nuevo Mexico established by Spain in 1598, it has become a staple of New Mexican cuisine often served diced or within sauces elemental to dishes such as enchiladas, burritos, and of course our beloved burgers.  The usage really sets this burger apart from your typical summer BBQ burger, and with an extra 15 minutes of preparation, you can also impress all of your friends with this "exotic" delight as you get the flavors of European Spain mixed with Native American vegetables. 

Ingredients:

1 1/2 pounds ground beef

1tsp Cumin

1tsp Chili powder

3 cloves garlic

3 tsp olive oil

1 medium yellow onion

4 whole hatch chilis (they may be labels "green" or "Anaheim" depending on your grocery store)

4 slices pepper jack cheese

4 burger buns

1. In a medium bowl, combine ground beef, salt, cumin and chili powder.  Mix with hands and form your patties. No frozen shit here.

2. Set your grill to 350 degrees.  While pre-heating, toss the garlic and onions with 3 tsp of olive oil and sprinkle with salt and pepper.  Put them in a pouch of aluminum foil. 

3. Grill the whole chiles and your garlic/onion pouch for about 15 minutes.  Turn the chiles every 5 minutes and the pouch halfway through.

4. Place the chiles in a bowl, cover with plastic wrap and steam the skins loose for about 10 minutes. Meanwhile finely chop the garlic and onions and add to medium bowl.  Peel and seed the chile, finely chop and transfer to the garlic and onion bowl.

5. Cook your burger patties on the grill to your desired doneness and top with the pepper jack cheese. 

6. Build the burger.  I added some flair and spread guacamole on each side of my bun before adding my patty topped with the Green Chile mixture.  You can add some hot sauce (I did) or whatever toppings you like on your burger.  

7. (Optional) Drink a million Modelos by the pool.  Happy Summer! 

50 States Sandwich Challenge: New Jersey

This isn't a biased blog at all.  I would never come out and say that New Jersey is the most important culinary state in the entire country or that the contributions of 9,288,994 people living on 8,722 (mostly beautiful, historically toxic) square miles have done nothing but positively influence our national culture.  Nope, you won't find anything like that here.  This project is supposed to highlight every state's sandwich contributions, not just my home state. So please try to look past all of the "top food lists" (who writes these things anyway) that have New Jersey pizzerias, delis, and restaurants holding the majority. It really isn't fair to all of the rest of the states that have brought me so much sandwich joy over the last several months (with the exception of Kentucky, for real guys, Hot Brown, what the fuck).  There are a few directions you might think NJ's state sandwich could go:  Pork roll, egg, and cheese? Sausage and peppers? Sloppy Joe? All contenders.  But there is one sandwich that you can find anywhere in the country at any time in any (respectable) deli: The Italian Sub.  Yes, I call it a sub, because that's what we call it in New Jersey, not a hero, not a (pukes) hoagie.  As you can imagine, there's a lot going on when your state sits in between two of the largest, original American cities so let me break this down for you.  A great wave of Italian immigration came to the United States in the late 1800s and early 1900s, mostly settling in New York City and Philadelphia, eventually spreading to all of that open "garden" space in New Jersey following WW2.  Immigrants from Naples brought with them the Italian sandwich, made with crusted bread and stuffed with cured meats and cheese.  Legend has it that in 1910, Dominic Conti began selling these sandwiches on Mill Street in Patterson, NJ who observed the similarity of shape with the first experimental submarine (built on the docks of Elizabeth) thus naming the sandwich the "sub." This predates the Italian sandwich being called anything else but if you must know why it is also called the hero or hoagie you are in luck that this former History major is feeling generous today.  The name "hero" is credited to NY Herald Tribune food writer Clementine Paddleford (electric name) who wrote in 1930 that you needed to be a hero to eat the giant-sized Italian sandwich from James Manganaro's deli in New York.  Don't worry, the origin of hoagie is just as fun.  Hog Island was a shipyard in the area of Philadelphia during World War I and employed mostly Italian immigrants.  The workers were nicknamed "hoggies" because Hog Island, duh, and the lovely people of Philly, with their cute, backwater accents pronounced that word as "hoagie." The name stuck when South Philly neighborhood delis began offering the "hoagie" as the featured sandwich which became a household name once Wawa began selling them in the late 1970s (I do love Hoagiefest.) There are about a million places I could go to get one near me but in keeping with tradition, I will be constructing my own Italian sub today.  Let's see how it goes.  

Ingredients:

1/2 onion, thinly sliced

1 loaf of soft Italian bread (Livoti's, duh)

red wine vinegar

olive oil

salt and pepper

provolone cheese

Genoa salami

Pepperoni

Mortadella

Capicola

shredded lettuce (I used an Italian blend)

Pepperoncini 

sliced plum tomato

dried oregano

1. Split the bread lengthwise and drizzle the olive oil and vinegar on the bottom half.  Season with salt and pepper.

2. Layer the cheese and meat on the bottom. Top the meat with onion, lettuce, pepperoncini, and tomatoes.  Drizzle olive oil and vinegar on top of everything with a sprinkle of oregano.  

3. Personally, I think I killed it. 

50 States Sandwich Challenge: New Hampshire

This is now the second time on this list that poor Massachusetts has had one of its staple foods claimed by another state.  I guess that just comes with the territory of breaking up the Massachusetts Bay Colony into different states.  But really, the roast beef sandwich isn't exactly native to the North Shore.  Some trace of origins of the American-style roast beef sandwich as far back as 1877, described by The Washington Post as "a true taste of South Dakota", "unattractive" and "a tired ark in a gravy flood."  So why then, would Kelly's Roast Beef in Revere, Massachusetts claim to have invented the sandwich in 1951?  Well, I suppose it's the combination of cheese and horseradish that really spruced up the 'ole tired roast beef and gravy that drove the elitist Washington Post nuts, but today, the North Shore is the place to go for a roast beef sandwich.  Everyone knows that.  So, I'm sorry New Hampshire, I'm not sure where you really come into play here other than you share the same cold, rocky beaches of the North Shore and that Kelly's is planning to open a franchise in Manchester next year.  But that's just New England for you, folks.  New Hampshire just wants to live free or die (of Massachusetts taxes) and grab a roast beef.  No shame in that game.  

Ingredients

Roast Beef

Cheddar Cheese

Horseradish 

Arugula

Brioche bun 

1. Spread horseradish on your brioche bun.

2. Mountain of roast beef on top.  Cheese, arugula, and close.  Boom you have a roast beef sandwich. 

50 States Sandwich Challenge: Nevada

 Ok, Nevada.  I'm not sure where you got the idea that the Patty Melt is yours.  The Patty Melt became commercialized as early as the 1940s as a variant of the popular cheeseburger.  The difference here? Swiss cheese, caramelized onions, and rye bread pressed on the griddle.  The closest thing to credit to the Patty Melt that exists goes to Los Angeles restauranteur Tiny Naylor who may have invented the sandwich in the 1930s.  Even if Tiny Naylor did not invent the sandwich, he did help popularize it at his restaurants: Tiny Naylor's, DuPars, and Wolfgang Puck's Granita.  There is a Dupars in the Golden Gate Resort and Casino in Las Vegas which is a hilarious stretch for the state to claim this as their state sandwich but I suppose when you are surrounded by radioactive desert, you have limited culinary items to choose from of your own.  Good for you, Vegas, always on that hustle.  

Ingredients:

1 onion

1lb Ground Beef

Rye Bread

Swiss Cheese

Salt, Pepper, Garlic Powder, Onion Powder

Butter

1. Heat 2 tablespoons of butter on medium-low heat and cook the sliced onions slowly over 20-25 minutes until caramelized.

2. Mix ground beef with spices and form hamburger patties. Cook the patties however you like your burgers.

3. Assemble: Bread, Cheese, Patty, Onions, Cheese, Bread and place on a buttered griddle to toast. 

4. Put $100 on black and don't look back.  

50 State Sandwich Challenge: Nebraska

 Now this one may surprise you.  You probably expected the classic Reuben sandwich to be invented in New York, which claims have been made.  But the reality is, The Reuben's beginnings can be traced back to 1920 when an Omaha grocer,  Reuben Kulakofsky, asked for a sandwich made of corned beef and sauerkraut to be served during his late-night poker games held at the Blackstone Hotel.  Reuben was a regular at the Blackstone's poker room for 15 years from 1920-1935. The sandwich gained local fame, when the owner of the Blackstone, Charles Schimmel, put the sandwich on the hotel's lunch menu, whose fame grew nationally once the recipe won a national sandwich idea contest.  Today, you can find The Reuben sandwich at almost any deli in the country as it continues to be an all-time sandwich and incredibly simple to make at home.  If you don't like corned beef or don't have any handy, you can replace it with pastrami or turkey for an entirely new sandwich experience called The Rachel.  

Ingredients: 

1lb of Corned Beef

Rye Bread

Swiss Cheese

8 oz sauerkraut 

1/4 cup of Russian Dressing

Instructions:

1. Place bread on a foiled baking sheet and distribute the corned beef on top. Put in the oven on broil for 3-4 minutes to heat up the beef.

2. Top each sandwich with sauerkraut and a slice of swiss cheese.  Return to the oven and broil for 2-3 minutes until the cheese is melted. 

3. Remove from oven and spread empty side of bread with Russian dressing.  Top the sandwich dressing side down and return to the oven to broil for another 1-2 minutes.  

4. Serve warm.