Fried Bologna & Other Southern Sandwiches
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Southern Plate is more than just me typing and chatting away. In fact, YOU are the most important part of SouthernPlate.com. With that in mind, I hope you’ll take time to leave a comment and share your favorite sandwich from your childhood. See bottom of this post for more details! Gratefully, Christy 🙂 
When my mama was a girl they had a tradition of going out riding through the countryside on Sunday afternoons. They’d stop off at a little store to have thick slices of bologna cut off and made into bologna and cheese sandwiches. Pair that with a bottled drink and they were living high on the hog! “There just wasn’t anything like getting to ride in that car and look out the window while you ate a bologna sandwich!”.
This treat was passed down to my generation when we often sat down for lunch with a big loaf of bread and a stack of cheese slices in the middle of the table while Mama fried up bologna in a skillet. We’d each make our own sandwich and I’d make mine just like my brother did: Fried bologna, cheese, and potato chips settled in between two pieces of “loaf bread”.
Bologna sandwiches, sometimes referred to as “the poor man’s steak”, are such a part of our culture, they’re even used to gauge a person’s character. On the day we got married, my husband’s best man, Jim, had driven in a ways and was planning on staying overnight before heading back. He stayed with my Grandmother, who lived across the road from what was to be our new home. It had been quite a day with the wedding and reception and that evening Grandmama and Jim went out on her porch to relax and look out over the river.
For supper, Grandmama made the two of them bologna sandwiches.
To Grandmama, Jim and my husband represented a new generation, with a huge divide between folks her age and them. Grandmama had grown up dirt poor and picking cotton all of her life and here was this young man newly graduated from college with an engineering degree whose experience with her world had been nothing more than glancing at the cotton as the car went by. Its sometimes a little intimidating for folks who come from such humble backgrounds in situations like this, but when Jim accepted that bologna sandwich, it spoke volumes to Grandmama about the type of person he was at heart. Even now whenever he is mentioned she always chimes, in,
“That Jim is just a real good boy, he sat out there on the porch and ate a bologna sandwich with me”.
To make the sandwich from my childhood you’ll need: Bread, cheese, mayo…
and potato chips 🙂
My brother taught me the wonders of a potato chip sandwich over thirty years ago.
I think it almost made up for him cutting the entire side of my hair off a few years later.
Now we have to fry out bologna. I always cut a slit halfway through to keep it from curling up into a bowl as it fries.
I prefer Zeigler bologna because it is made in Alabama. I try to buy as close to home as I can because last thing we want is to end up relying on a company halfway across the country for our food supplies. I think it’s best to support local suppliers to ensure that you have local suppliers. Zeigler’s has been around for over seventy five years. Their main plant is in Tuscaloosa and our own highly respected Coach Paul “Bear” Bryant was once an owner of the company as well.
Reminder to all: I am not into football but Alabamians take their football very seriously.
So whatever team you are for, GO THEM!
You don’t need to spray your pan or anything, just put your bologna in it and cook it on medium, turning after it browns on one side. Some folks like there is just barely heated but I actually like a wee bit of black on mine 🙂
Note to myself: You use the word “actually” too much, stop it. Now. Seriously.
~sighs~
Oh lawd, that’s some good eatin’!
I always smoosh it a bit to crunch the chips down some 🙂
Grandmama, I’m a real good girl because I still eat bologna sandwiches!
A few posts back we got into a comment discussion on strange sandwich combinations we grew up on. It was a fascinating comment section and we all really got a hoot out of reading it. I’d like to devote this comment section to those sandwiches. What did you grow up on? What brands do you insist on and why?
Mayonaise sandwich? Mustard sandwich? PB and banana? Tell us all about it! Also, why do you think Southerners eat such strange sandwich combinations-ketchup sandwich, anyone?
I think it is due to lack of food. When food was scarce, you could put something between two slices of bread, call it a sandwich and then it suddenly seemed like a meal. What do you think?
If there is anything else you wanna talk about in the comments section, feel free to do that, too.
See someone else’s comment you wanna reply to? Go right ahead!
I consider this to be my big old porch and we’re all just a standing around visiting with each other.
Y’all keep the conversation going and I’ll keep the tea glasses filled!
We’re all family here anyways. 🙂
“The happiest of people don’t necessarily have the best of everything; they just make the most of everything that comes along their way.”
Submitted by Rebecca Hall. To submit your quote or read more, please click here.
I just love getting new positive quotes so thank you in advance!
I’ve got two for you! One from my mom – atomic sandwiches. Loaf bread with honey, raisens, and peanut butter. And one my dad loves — loaf bread with mayonnaise, cheddar cheese and pineapple rings. And egg and olive from Trowbridges — divine~!
Like Patricia, I’m not from the South, not even “South” anything – I’m from Jersey but spent my “formative” years in Philly. My grandmom always made fried bologna sandwiches when I was staying with her.
We did thin sliced bologna, fried with onions and mustard on white (or rye if she had visited my great grandpa in South Philly).
Even now, almost 40 years later, I still get that “want” for a fried bologna sandwich. Since I need to go to the store a little later, perhaps I will have one for dinner mmmmm.
I have always had fried bologneee sammiches. My house could have nothing but Zieglers. We would sometimes go straight to the fridge and get a cold “bolognee” or cold hot dog and snack on it then. And never anything buy BAMA mayo.
Who says you must eat fried bologna in a sandwich?? I eat it like steak! Just knife and fork. It was a delicacy when I was growing up, and I’m not from the south. I’m from Ohiya! ha ha Here we eat Dinner Bell bologna. My dad loves grilled ground bologna sandwiches (like ham salad, with bologna, mayo and relish, grilled on buttered bread). That’s something I could never get into, but pure bliss to him with Ballreich’s potato chips – local favorite.
Oh my…the ground grilled bologna salad sounds HEAVENLY!!!!!
What is Ballreich’s? Never heard of it!
Ballreich’s potato chips are a northwestern Ohio chip company, and they are good chips. I’m from northeastern Ohio, and cousins bring them when they visit.
There is a southwestern Ohio chip called Mike-sells, and they are even slightly (SLIGHTLY) better than Ballreich’s.
However, unless they are stale or rancid, is there such a thing as a BAD potato chip???? (Pringles are another category altogether, and do not count for ME as potato chips at all. I like the cheese ones.)
I prefer my bologna cold, not fried. The local brand in my corner of the world is called Superior’s.
However, my all time favorite sandwich is Jif Creamy (now made by Smucker’s, another Ohio company!) on whole wheat bread, either homemade (easypeasy when you let your processor knead), or on Cleveland’s Orlando Baking Company’s Deli Wheat. This is where my individuality/weirdness comes in: I do not like jelly or jam on my peanut butter sandwiches. I like a jelly sandwich, but never “peanut butter and jelly.”
Peanut butter toast is good when I am not dressed in church or appointment clothes!
Lawrence
Ballreich’s is just a locally made ruffled potato chip. They are divine. I think they are just a little greasier than the average chip, and what could possibly be wrong with that?
Zeigler THICK SLICED bologna, fried with just mayo. I still eat them to this day. We also ate corned beef hash sandwiches with tomatoes and mayo. We would fry the hash and then put it hot on our sandwiches. Takes me back.
Oh now when we got the thick sliced, we were livin’ like the rich folks! We only got thin when we were little but as we got in a better financial situation Mama started buying the thick! 🙂
I love hash!
I detest bologna…until it is fried. Man, it is so yummy on a sandwich and in a canned biscuit. We always had Ziegler growing up and I always had mine fixed the same exact way as you…chips and all. (Well, ACTUALLY, we always had Bama mayo.) We also had fried weenies (hotdogs) in our canned biscuits as well. When my mama would cut the bologna half way like you did to keep it from curling up, my brother and I would call it a pacman sandwich. I tried to tell that story to my daughter thinking she would think it was funny, but she had no idea who pacman was.
OH WOW! Here we are, some of us remembering when PacMan was first introduced and some of us having no idea what PacMan is!
He’s done come and gone in our time.
Okay, now I’m feelin’ old….
I used to use Bama mayo but when I found out it was owned by Welchs, I felt so misled! lol
My readers have sworn up and down over Duke’s and its made in one of the Carolinas so that works for me.
I still can’t help but feel proud when I see the name “Bama” though but I’m pretty certain it isn’t made in the south. ~pouts~
Christy, I love Bama mayo too, but Duke’s is good when I can’t get Bama. I was also surprised to find that Bama wasn’t made in Alabama. (go figure!!) I just read an article online. Bama mayo was purchased by CF Sauer Co. and Welchs got the Bama jelly and peanut butter products.
About The C.F. Sauer Company
Founded on October 13, 1887 by 21-year-old Conrad Frederick (C.F.) Sauer, Sr., the original C.F. Sauer Company manufactured, packaged and sold pure flavoring extracts in five- and ten-gram cartoned bottles. Today, The C.F. Sauer Company remains family owned and managed and is a leading manufacturer of Duke’s Mayonnaise, cooking oils and salad dressings; The Spice Hunter exotic spices, spice blends and natural foods; Bama Mayonnaise; and Sauer’s spices, flavorings and extracts. For additional information about The C.F. Sauer Company and its brands, visit http://www.CFSauer.com or call 1-800-688-5676
http://carolinanewswire.com/news/News.cgi?database=1news.db&command=viewone&id=4097&op=t
I think of pac0man when I look at that picture, lol.
oops, pac man.