That’s a Bunch of Boloney

For the Tucker Carlson (and William F. Buckley) fans out there, Washington Post Reporter Warns Journalists To Avoid Tucker Carlson’s ‘Dunk Tank.’

But of course. Given Carlson’s nightly ability to demolish leftwing shibboleths and those who claim to believe them, as William F. Buckley quipped when asked why Bobby Kennedy was declining repeated requests to appear on Firing Line, “Why does baloney reject the grinder?” – From Ed Driscoll at Instapundit

And now since we’ve established the premise of this post let me just ask: is there anything better than bologna in all it’s glorious varieties? I say no. American bologna – Oscar Mayer is the most famous but far from the best -

is a variation on German (garlic) bologna which is itself a derivative of the original ground meat sausage from Bologna: Mortadella (pistachios optional, although not really).

And the once popular “olive loaf” is itself just another variation of Mortadella,

one that few people seem to enjoy these days for some reason unknown to me.

I’m guessing it’s because they’ve only had the cheap, inferior variety. I love bologna in all of it’s glorious incarnations although my absolute favorite may be the humble ground bologna sandwich (best served on cheap, racist white bread).

Also known as “poor man’s ham salad” this is generally the recipe given:

Ground Bologna Sandwich Spread

Ingredients
1-1/2 lbs ring bologna
2 – 3 baby sweet pickles
3 – 1/8″ slices from 1 medium-size Spanish onion
1 cup mayonnaise
2 tsp yellow prepared mustard

Remove any strings or clips off the ends of the ring bologna. Cut the bologna into 4 sections for easier handling. Slit one side of each section lengthwise and remove the casing.

Install discs onto the front of the meat grinder for a fairly small grind and grind the ring bologna into the glass dish. After digging the rest of the bologna out of the grinder, dump the bologna into the mixing bowl.

Finely-chop the sweet pickles till you have about 1/2 cup, and then do the same with the slices of onion. Add the chopped pickle and onion to the bologna in the mixing bowl, then add the mayonnaise and mustard and mix it all together till it’s smooth. Taste it, adding some salt to punch up the flavor if necessary.

Transfer it to the storage bowl and refrigerate the spread until it’s ice cold. Use a fork to put a layer of spread about 3/8″ thick (my kids like it about 1/2″ thick on a slice of white bread, then close with another slice. Serve with kettle-cooked potato chips or steaming-hot French fries. MICuisine

My Mom’s recipe was simpler: just ground bologna, originally made with her hand grinder

but later just shredded on a hand grater through the largest sized hole, a chopped homemade dill pickle (never sweet in our house) no onion, no mustard, no added salt, and Miracle Whip to taste. I still make it the same way only I use a food processor and replaced the Miracle Whip with Hellmann’s decades ago. Imagine my surprise to discover this particular version is also known as “Monkey Meat Spread!” (can I say that?)

If  you don’t want to bother even that much, good old fried bologna is also good for breakfast, lunch or dinner.

Or if you’re feeling slightly more sophisticated and want to have a glass of wine with your bologna, go with the original Mortadella, sliced very thin – be sure to specify, it actually tastes different that way – and serve as part of a traditional Italian antipasto tray loaded with anything and everything else you have on hand.

Along with some good crusty bread or rolls you’ve got yourself dinner. And that’s no boloney.

Oh, and BTW, French baloney is known as “Lyoner” – I don’t know why I find that amusing, but I do. I guess we will see this weekend whether the French continue to be cheese eating surrender monkeys full of Lyoner, or have evolved into something with a bit more, eh…bite.

Bon appétit mon cheri!