New Orleans Muffulettas & Pasta Salad

My family loves New Orleans Muffuletttas.  Combine this simple Sicilian influenced mega-sandwich with Pasta Salad and you have an easy Sunday Dinner they will remember for a long time, and request often.

Muffuletta Ingredients

• 3 – 10″ Round Buns, or Large French Loafs
• 12 oz. –  Smoked Turkey Breast, or Ham
• 12 oz. – Hard Salami
• 12 oz – Beef Balogna
• 1 Pound – Sliced Provolone Cheese
• 15 oz. – Olive Salad Mix

Muffuletta Preparation

1. Split bun or loaf horizontally.
2. Sprinkle a liberal amount of oil from the olive mix on the lower bun.
3. Layer the meats, then the cheese, then add 5 oz., or approximately 1 cup of olive salad mix to each sandwich.
4. Wrap in heavy duty foil and heat in oven for 3o minutes at 350 degrees.  Sandwich will be warm through the center and the provolone cheese will be melted.

Combine your Muffulettas and Pasta Salad (recipe HERE) and you will feed 8 adults and a handful of hungry kids and have enough left for a snack and a smile on Monday.

The History Lesson

As a kid my family would make regular trips from the Mississippi Delta to New Orleans.  We had relatives in New Orleans and really loved the Creole as well as the Sicilian culture there.  We sampled traditional New Orleans cuisine from a variety of restaurants.  For example, we always ate oysters at Felix’s Oyster Bar.

The place we get your Muffuletta is Central Grocery Company.  It was founded in 1906 and remains basically unchanged to this day.  It is a museum of a grocery store that sells incredible sandwiches.  Central Grocery was started by a Sicilian immigrant, Salvatore Lupo.

The Muffuletta (sometimes spelled Muffeletta or Muffaletta, or other variation) is a simple sandwich made with great smoked and seasoned meats and cheese and topped with an incredible olive mix.

The last time Teresa & I visited New Orleans was a weekend when the New Orleans Saints played in New Orleans.  The exterior picture above was taken after Central Grocery Company closed on Saturday evening.  Then next afternoon there was s line of 50 minutes, just to get through the front door of this tiny grocery store!  It was worth the wait.

I never knew there was a place for about 10 people to eat inside of the store, near the back. There are three linear bars, with bar stools.  That day, we did eat inside the store and met some very nice admirers of the Original Muffuletta.

There are a variety of olive mixes available. I have found that a mix made by Boscoli is close to the mix made by Central Grocery Company.  They call it Italian Olive Salad.