Woonsocket’s Dynamite (sloppy joe) Sandwich

It’s hard to find a recipe for Woonsocket, Rhode Island‘s Dynamite sandwich–a hoagie-ized version of the Sloppy Joe–to feed fewer than 20 people. Dynamite sandwiches are a community thing, served at “a dinner, a barbecue, a church fundraiser, a wedding or a funeral… in people’s homes, at family gatherings and at community events.”¹ Dynamite is what they make in Woonsocket when they need to feed a horde.

As it happens, I have a horde at home. Sounds like something I should look into.

Dynamite refers to the sauce, in fact, not the sandwich–the sandwich is the first and best use of that sauce, but it’s also used to top pasta, or as a dip with tortilla chips, or for any number of other ways you might use infinitely reheatable leftovers. Elsewhere in Rhode Island they name this sandwich after the bread roll, not the sauce, calling it a “torpedo.” In Woonsocket though, the sauce is the… Hmm, I feel like I had an appropriate rhyme here but I’ve misplaced it.

Dynamite sauce consists of ground beef with bell peppers, onions, bell peppers, tomatoes or tomato sauce, bell peppers, and garlic… did I mention bell peppers? They generally use a combination of green and red peppers, and add a little crushed red pepper to justify the spicy-sounding name. Salt, pepper, bay leaf, herbs… these things make an appearance too. And I did see some recipes that used a higher proportion of meat and less of the veggies. By and large though, the ratio of onions/peppers to meat hovered between 2:1 and 3:1 with more peppers than anything. Bell peppers are what give this sauce most of its flavor.

Despite having a small army to feed at home, many of the recipes I saw were going to make just too much sauce for me to reasonably use, so, as I often do, I took what I liked from one recipe and another and came up with my own version. A little Rhode Island in Illinois.^{2 3}

So this post is Jim-in-DIY-recipe mode rather than Jim-in-investigative-doofus mode or Jim-in-bitching-about-British-sandwiches mode or Jim-in-eating-20-dumb-sandwiches-and-never-getting-anywhere mode. As such, allow me to present you with my Dynamite recipe.

Additional Steps:

6. Reheat some of the remaining sauce for sandwiches for lunch the next day

7. Reheat some of the remaining sauce and serve with spaghetti noodles

8. Reheat the rest of the sauce, mix with 2 lbs cooked macaroni, put into 9″ x 13″ casserole pan and top with shredded cheddar cheese. Heat in oven at 350° F for 15 minutes for another quick dinner and to finally get rid of the stuff.

9. Spend another 3 days bringing leftovers of this casserole to work for lunch.

---

You might have gotten the impression that I was annoyed by having so much of this sauce on hand. Quite the opposite. With a family of 5, anything you can make that will feed them for most of a week has to be put into the “win” column.

And frankly, I thought it was really tasty. Mindy loved it too. Damian and Max both enjoyed it. Ian, the 8-year-old… well I probably shouldn’t have let him see me preparing it. He saw how many onions and peppers went into the sauce and developed a phobia of it. He cried when I told him he had to try the sandwich (even though I let him have it on a regular hamburger bun with barbecue sauce) and refused. He literally said he could not put it into his mouth. I had better luck getting him to try it in casserole form, but he still would not eat the whole bowl.

But how were the sandwiches? Sloppy. Maybe not as sloppy as a Sloppy Joe–as long as you don’t split the hoagie roll all the way through, you’ve got a bowl-like container for your meaty sandwich sauce. But the sauce soaks into the bread, the bread compresses when you bite it and squishes the sauce out the top, and if you have a beard like yours truly, well, after a few bites your face smells delicious.

I think my favorite application might have been the spaghetti though. (horrors!)

I might top my spaghetti like a clueless Midwesterner (hint: I am a clueless Midwesterner) but with some cheap spaghetti, cooked al dente, the sauce made a terrific meal that stretched it further than any of the other uses. Without the sweet/tangy notes you normally get in a Sloppy Joe sauce, it’s simply a natural over pasta. It was great in the macaroni casserole too.

I may not have gotten the optimal Woonsocket Dynamite experience–standing in line in the church basement, sauce being ladled out of vast steam table pans onto waiting torpedo rolls, my foam plate buckling under the weight, a mortifying spill, hastily stammered apologies, etc.–but I feel like I get the gist of things. And if it weren’t for an 8yo boy who refuses to eat anything but PBJ & breakfast cereal, I’d probably make it monthly.

¹ Rhodeside Diaries. Dynamite: a saucy blast from Woonsocket, by Christopher Martin.

² Disclaimer: I have never been in, or near, Rhode Island, and as such I am completely unqualified to have made this. I’m pretty sure I nailed it though.

³ “little Rhode Island” did you see what I did there? Oh, you did? Right.