A super sandwich matchup

You can talk smack, place bets, flaunt your Colts jersey and your Saints sweats.

Or you can settle your Super Bowl differences in the kitchen.

Are you an Indianapolis fan? Have a breaded pork tenderloin sandwich — that city's signature dish.

Are you marching with the Saints? Try a muffuletta — a New Orleans favorite for more than 100 years.

Or serve them both as the neutral host of a football bash this Sunday.

The breaded pork tenderloin is the quintessential Indiana sandwich, says Jolene Ketzenberg, food columnist for the Indianapolis Star.

“I grew up on it,” she said. “It's a sandwich that's served in every small-town diner and bar and all over Indiana.”

When the Colts played the New York Jets for a Super Bowl bid, Ketzenberg suggested slider-sized pork tenderloin sandwiches for parties.

“Indiana does produce a lot of pork,” she said. “And if they're not pounded too thin, you have a nice meaty sandwich — moist and tender inside, with a crispy outside.”

Nick's Kitchen in Huntington, Ind., claims to be the birthplace of the sandwich. In 1904, cafe founder Nick Frienstein started frying breaded pork to sell in sandwiches from a cart. Four years later, he moved indoors with his own cafe.

Part of the joy in a breaded pork tenderloin is seeing how far it extends beyond the bun.

“People must like the fun of having it as big as your head,” Ketzenberg said. “But really, you don't want it pounded too thin or you lose the meat in all the breading.”

The sandwich is usually served with potato chips, french fries or dill pickle spears. Condiment options are mayonnaise, pickles, onion, lettuce, tomato, mustard and ketchup — but traditionally no cheese. Ketzenberg prefers mayonnaise and pickles.

To round out the Indianapolis menu, you can serve a sugar cream pie, a staple in Indiana since the early 1800s. In 2009, it became the official state pie.

The muffuletta is another huge sandwich, stacked high with cold cuts, cheese and a zippy relish. You can cut it into quarters or wedges to share. Or you can jump on the slider bandwagon and make “mini-muffs” on small buns.

Food historians trace the muffuletta directly to Italian immigrants who settled in New Orleans, according to Dale Curry, retired food editor of the New Orleans Times-Picayune and author of the book “New Orleans Home Cooking” (Pelican Publishing Co.)

“The muffuletta-style bread was known earlier in Sicily,” Curry said. “The immigrants brought the idea of round loaves and more than one baker served it as a sandwich around the turn of the (20th) century. Putting the bread together with cold cuts as a sandwich is thought to be an American version. The local family that has carried the tradition to modern fame are descendants of Salvatore Lupo, founder of Central Grocery.”

Central Grocery, in the French Quarter of New Orleans, fills the sandwich with lots of imported ingredients: Emmentaler cheese from Switzerland, provolone and Genoa salami from Italy, Holland ham and mortadella sausage from Canada.

The grocery's characteristic olive relish (also called giardinera or olive salad) is made with its secret recipe. But other grocers and pickle bottlers make their own versions.

If you buy one of the bottled styles, buy one made with olive oil or plan on drizzling your bread with additional olive oil, Curry suggests, because the olive oil takes the place of mayonnaise in the sandwich.

“It's lunch, but it is also a party food; it's so popular here,” Curry says. “A lot of restaurants and po-boy places have it on their menus.”

The muffuletta predates the po-boy sandwich, which was first served on the streets to the poor in the 1920s.

Other dishes born in New Orleans, according to Curry, are Oysters Rockefeller, Oysters Bienville, Eggs Sardou and Bananas Foster. Drinks with a New Orleans birthright are the Hurricane, the Sazerac and the Ramos Gin Fizz.

Judy Walker, the Times-Picayune's food editor since 2004, offers another view on the city's food scene. The former Arizona resident said people in New Orleans don't know that their sandwich parties are somewhat unusual.

“They don't realize that in other parts of the country, they serve them only at tea parties,” Walker says. “Every party here, there are finger sandwiches galore. The first time I went to a carnival ball, people were hauling in finger sandwiches. It's crazy. People eat all kinds of finger sandwiches. They say they're ‘laying down a base,' eating something to get ready for drinking.”

The sandwiches are just what you imagine: white bread with the crusts trimmed off, fillings of egg salad or sliced turkey or something similar, and cut into triangles.

Walker says it's not unusual for a man to start his evening with eight finger sandwiches — equal to two full sandwiches — and then let the good times roll.

Contact the writer:

444-1052, jane.palmer@owh.com

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