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 🙂 bologna 003

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”.

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To make the sandwich from my childhood you’ll need: Bread, cheese, mayo…

bologna 007and 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.

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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!

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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~

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Oh lawd, that’s some good eatin’!

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I always smoosh it a bit to crunch the chips down some 🙂

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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!



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580 Comments

  1. My meme always made one of three sandwiches for lunch for us Grandbabies when we stayed the weekends with her & Papa. Every Saturday, we always got either a grilled pimento cheese sandwich, a good ol homegrown ‘mater sandwich *with Duke’s mayo of course (Is there any other kind here in the south???), or a fried bologna sandwich with ‘mater & cheese if we were lucky!! Oh how I miss spending Saturdays with my Papa out in the garden & the yard! Those weekends were the best 🙂

  2. #1 by far is the good ol’ mater sandwich! The best of the best…can’t beat it with a stick. It goes without saying that they have to be made with white bread (or light bread as my grandma called it). We also would cut open a biscuit, smear it with some Miracle Whip, and add a slice of onion.

    I think the reason we have such strange sandwich combos down here has to do with being po folks and having something that you could take to the fields for dinner. No cute little coolers back in those days.

    BTW, I like my fried baloney a little on the dark side, too. :o)

  3. I still eat fried bologna sandwhiches, too!! Must have black on them!!
    My dad was the king of weird sandwhiches. He would take whatever meat we had , roast beef, chicken, anything, put it on bread with mayo, pimento cheese, and then put it under the broiler. And, being the daddy’s girl I was, I tried every sandwhich he made!!

  4. My all-time favorite Summer-time sandwich is tomato, made with fresh tomatoes from someone’s garden here in Alabama. Now to make it really GOOD, slather your bread with homemade mayo (which I make just for this sandwich). I grew up with this wonderful homemade mayo and Alabama tomatoes. Many of these sandwiches were stacked with slices of fried bacon and lettuce. Now this is what I call a “perfect meal”!!!

  5. I put bologna in my scalloped potatoes and have a bologna casserole. I just dice it up in the potatoes. My whole family loves this.

  6. Boy did this bring back memories – I still love fried bologna sandwiches with mayo, and big slice of homegrown tomato! Of course, homegrown tomato with lots of mayo, salt and pepper sandwiches were my favorite That’s rich living! My two brothers ate all types of sandwiches, and if we didn’t have anything else, just white bread and mayo – Blue Plate Mayo. Of course, if I ate banana sandwiches, I had to have plain potato chips, still do. My friends from the North turn up their noses at sandwiches with mayo on them. They just don’t know what they are missing. I’m glad I’m from the South – we have the best food!!!!!!!!!!!

    1. You must have some crazy friends from the north! I was born and raised in Ohio and I would never dream of eating any sandwich without mayo! And I mean mayo (Hellmans) not that nasty old Miracle Whip!

  7. Oh, my goodness….one of my favorites as a little girl, and sometimes, as an adult woman. You just reminded me of one of the things that my Daddy introduced me to. Mine was made with Miracle Whip, fried really nice and brown, without potato chips as we could not afford them. This is not just something that a gal from Alabama eats because I am from Texas. I need to put bologna on my shopping list for my next trip to the grocery as I remember how good that fried bologna was.

    Thank you so much for all the great words of encouragement that go along with all the great, down-home recipes. May God Bless you and your beautiful family ALWAYS!!!!!!

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