The muffuletta or muffaletta is both a type of round
Sicilian sesame
bread and a popular sandwich that originated among
Italian immigrants in New Orleans, Louisiana, using the same bread.
History
The muffuletta bread has origins in
Sicily
(man) it, Siciliana (woman)
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.
The muffuletta sandwich is said to have been created in 1906 at
Central Grocery Co. on
Decatur Street,
,
Louisiana
Louisiana , group=pronunciation (French: ''La Louisiane'') is a state in the Deep South and South Central regions of the United States. It is the 20th-smallest by area and the 25th most populous of the 50 U.S. states. Louisiana is borde ...
, U.S., by its
delicatessen
Traditionally, a delicatessen or deli is a retail establishment that sells a selection of fine, exotic, or foreign prepared foods. Delicatessen originated in Germany (original: ) during the 18th century and spread to the United States in the m ...
owner Salvatore Lupo, a Sicilian immigrant. Sicilian immigrant
Biaggio Montalbano (
Wikidata
Wikidata is a collaboratively edited multilingual knowledge graph hosted by the Wikimedia Foundation. It is a common source of open data that Wikimedia projects such as Wikipedia, and anyone else, can use under the CC0 public domain license ...
), who was a delicatessen owner in New Orleans, is credited with invention of the Roma Sandwich, which may have been a forerunner of the Muffuletta.
Another Italian-style New Orleans delicatessen, Progress Grocery Co., originally opened in 1924 by the Perrone family, claims the origin of the muffuletta is uncertain.
The traditional-style muffuletta sandwich consists of a muffuletta loaf split horizontally and covered with layers of marinated muffuletta-style
olive salad
Olive salad is a salad or giardiniera made from green olives, black olives, olive oil, celery, cauliflower, carrots, sweet peppers, onions, capers, parsley, pepperoncini, oregano, garlic, vinegar, herbs and spices. It is used to make the muffalet ...
,
salami
Salami ( ) is a cured sausage consisting of fermented and air-dried meat, typically pork. Historically, salami was popular among Southern, Eastern, and Central European peasants because it can be stored at room temperature for up to 45 days ...
,
ham
Ham is pork from a leg cut that has been preserved by wet or dry curing, with or without smoking."Bacon: Bacon and Ham Curing" in ''Chambers's Encyclopædia''. London: George Newnes, 1961, Vol. 2, p. 39. As a processed meat, the term "ham ...
,
Swiss cheese Swiss cheese may refer to:
Cheese
* List of Swiss cheeses (from Switzerland)
* Swiss-type cheeses or Alpine cheeses, a class of cooked pressed cheeses now made in many countries
* Swiss cheese (North America), any of several related varieties o ...
,
provolone
Provolone (, ) is an Italian cheese. It is an aged ''pasta filata'' (stretched-curd) cheese originating in Campania near Vesuvius, where it is still produced in pear, sausage, or cone shapes long. Provolone-type cheeses are also produced in othe ...
, and
mortadella. Quarter, half, and full-sized muffulettas are sold.
The signature
olive salad
Olive salad is a salad or giardiniera made from green olives, black olives, olive oil, celery, cauliflower, carrots, sweet peppers, onions, capers, parsley, pepperoncini, oregano, garlic, vinegar, herbs and spices. It is used to make the muffalet ...
consists of olives diced with the
celery
Celery (''Apium graveolens'') is a marshland plant in the family Apiaceae that has been cultivated as a vegetable since antiquity. Celery has a long fibrous stalk tapering into leaves. Depending on location and cultivar, either its stalks, ...
,
cauliflower and
carrot found in a jar of
giardiniera
Giardiniera (, ) is an Italian relish of pickled vegetables in vinegar or oil.
Varieties and uses
Italian giardiniera is also called sottaceti ("under vinegar"), a common term for pickled foods. It is typically eaten as an antipasto or with s ...
, seasoned with
oregano and
garlic, covered in olive oil, and allowed to combine for at least 24 hours.
A muffuletta is usually served cold, but many vendors will toast it.
Etymology, pronunciation, and orthography
The name is believed to be a
diminutive form of ''muffe'' ("
mold
A mold () or mould () is one of the structures certain fungi can form. The dust-like, colored appearance of molds is due to the formation of spores containing fungal secondary metabolites. The spores are the dispersal units of the fungi. Not ...
", "
mushroom
A mushroom or toadstool is the fleshy, spore-bearing fruiting body of a fungus, typically produced above ground, on soil, or on its food source. ''Toadstool'' generally denotes one poisonous to humans.
The standard for the name "mushroom" is ...
"), perhaps due to the round sandwich bread being reminiscent of a mushroom cap; or from ''muffola'', "muff, mitten,".
The forms ''muffoletta'' and its
iteration
Iteration is the repetition of a process in order to generate a (possibly unbounded) sequence of outcomes. Each repetition of the process is a single iteration, and the outcome of each iteration is then the starting point of the next iteration. ...
s are modern
Italianisms of the original
Sicilian. Like many of the foreign-influenced terms found in New Orleans, pronunciation has evolved from a phonetic forebear.
Depending on the specific
Sicilian dialect, the item may be spelled:
*''muffiletta''
*''mufiletta''
*''muffuletta''
*''muffulettu''
*''muffuletu''
*''muffulitteḍḍu''
*''muffulittuni''
*''mufuletta''
There are similarities between the muffuletta and the
pan bagnat
The pan bagnat (pronounced ɑ̃ baˈɲa (pan bagna, and alternatively in French as pain bagnat) is a sandwich that is a specialty of Nice, France. The sandwich is composed of pain de campagne, a whole wheat bread, enclosing the classic salade ...
sandwich which comes from
Nice
Nice ( , ; Niçard dialect, Niçard: , classical norm, or , nonstandard, ; it, Nizza ; lij, Nissa; grc, Νίκαια; la, Nicaea) is the prefecture of the Alpes-Maritimes departments of France, department in France. The Nice urban unit, agg ...
, France.
See also
*
List of American sandwiches
This is a list of American sandwiches. This list contains entries of sandwiches that were created in, or ''commonly'' eaten in the United States. A sandwich is a food item consisting of one or more types of food placed on or between slices of brea ...
*
List of sandwiches
A ''list'' is any set of items in a row. List or lists may also refer to:
People
* List (surname)
Organizations
* List College, an undergraduate division of the Jewish Theological Seminary of America
* SC Germania List, German rugby unio ...
*
Pan bagnat
The pan bagnat (pronounced ɑ̃ baˈɲa (pan bagna, and alternatively in French as pain bagnat) is a sandwich that is a specialty of Nice, France. The sandwich is composed of pain de campagne, a whole wheat bread, enclosing the classic salade ...
References
External links
*
Central Grocery Co.— Home of the American-style muffuletta sandwich.
*
{{American bread
Louisiana cuisine
American sandwiches
Italian-American culture in Louisiana
Cuisine of New Orleans
Sicilian-American cuisine
Italian breads
American breads
Olive dishes
