Wednesday, September 8, 2010

Syracuse Sandwich: NYS Fair's German Stand Fried Bologna

Who: German Stand What: Fried Bologna on Rye
Where: NYS Fairgrounds Phone: Unknown Website: None
Parking: Kind of Accepts Credit Cards: No Take-Out: Yes Delivery: No

     If you read my last review I said I hadn’t done a lot of sandwich eating. I think I may have fibbed a little. Thinking about what I ate in August I realized there were two more sandwiches. I guess the heat was making me too lazy to write and too forgetful to remember (yeah that seems like a good excuse). This first sandwich was from the German stand in the international food pavilion at the NYS Fair. Most people will tell you that a sausage sandwich is a staple of any fairgoers list of must eats while the fair is going on. I am here to dispute that and suggest a sandwich that you shouldn’t be eating every weekend like you could a sausage sandwich. Here in Syracuse you can get Gianelli sausage at any meat market or grocery store, so why waste your money on something you’ve probably already had a few of this summer? 
     Last year while saving seat for Christine’s sister and brother-in-law, I happened to be sitting next to a man eating what looked to be a fried bologna sandwich. I don’t make a habit of talking to strangers in public but I had to know if I was right and if so, where could I get one? It was in fact a fried bologna sandwich and he got it at the German stand which was directly behind where I was sitting. The stand has a name but it isn’t coming to mind, it is the only one there so you won’t be hard pressed to find it. Christine is partially German and loves German food so she joined me in line figuring she could find something she would like. Oddly enough they had perogies (I have a funny story about that but I’ll tell it some other time) which Christine loves so she got those while I got fried bologna on rye.
     I forgot to take a picture for some reason; I blame being pumped to see Styx for free. Now I’ve eaten quite a few fried bologna sandwiches using Oscar Meyer bologna on white sandwich bread, which are good but aren’t nearly as flavorful as this one was. Lightly toasted light rye bread is the perfect vessel for bologna that was cut an inch to and inch and a half thick. Toasting the bread not only strengthens the bread to hold the heavy cut of meat but it also brings out the earthy flavor of the caraway seeds that are baked throughout the bread. Pan frying bologna draws out some of the fat and juices that get packed together during the preparation process. This makes the bologna kind of greasy but smoky at the same time. There is no need for condiments because the juices dampen the bread enough to keep it from tasting too dry. A single slice of regular bologna at the deli is absolutely horrible for you and the cut you get is probably equal to four or maybe five of those slices at least. So needless to say you don’t want to be eating these regularly, which is why this sandwich trumps the sausage sandwich when looking for something to eat at the fair.
Rating: Tasty – So simple, so fattening, so looking forward to next year’s fair so I can have it again.

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