Just How Great is a Gatsby?

Numerous viewings of Lethal Weapon 2 have taught me that it’s unwise to get a bunch of South Africans angry. So let me start by answering the question in the title: pretty great! A Gatsby is a big sandwich, stuffed with meat and fries (“slap chips,” where the sliced potatoes are soaked in vinegar before frying), salad and sauces, stuffed into a big long roll like a baguette.

The story goes that a fish shop owner named Rashaad Pandy in Athlone, a suburb of Cape Town, needed something to feed some laborers after a day of work but didn’t have much on hand at the end of the day. Being an inventive sort, he slapped some Polony, atchar and chips into a big round loaf of Portuguese bread and divided it between the four of them. One of the fellows, the surprisingly nicknamed “Froggie,” having recently seen the 1971 movie version of The Great Gatsby exclaimed “It’s a Gatsby smash!”

Pandy started selling the sandwiches in his shop under the name Froggie gave them, eventually switching to a long torpedo-type roll for greater ease of portioning, and they have apparently caught on widely in the Cape Town area. It’s one of those seemingly apocryphal origin stories but as it turns out, nobody is contesting his version of events, and it’s recent enough (1972ish) to be in living memory. (In fact, Pandy was still around as recently as last August, judging by this video)

There are many popular flavors of Gatsby–various types of seafood, “Vienna” (hot dogs), “Russian” (kielbasa), steak, curry, chicken, etc. I settled on trying the original version, polony and atchar, and the delicious sounding masala steak. A Gatsby is way too much for one guy, much less multiple Gatsbys. I needed the assistance of my usual collaborators, my wife and sons, as well as her parents who happened to be in town when we ate these.

What the heck is Polony?

A simple Google Image Search settled that.

Oh. It’s bologna. That makes sense. I wasn’t able to get the real thing–people are not big on shipping meat products overseas unless you’re ordering, say, a cargo container worth. But bologna? I can get that just about anywhere.

But what the heck is Atchar?

Atchar (or Achar) is an Indian word for pickles. There is a large population of Indian South Africans, mostly in the Durban area but also in and around Cape Town (the home of the Gatsby) and other areas of the country. The South African version is generally a mango pickle, and I was able to get hold of 2 different varieties.

The “grated mango” version on the left is made with green mangoes; it’s tart and spicy, with an aroma and flavor heavily influenced by a hit of toasted fenugreek seed. The “hot” version on the right uses riper mangoes yet is more sour, with a more straightforward chili flavor. They’re both pretty interesting condiments that I’m sure will find many uses in this house.

But… mango pickle and bologna?

I know. I thought the same thing, so I gave myself a bit of a sneak preview.

Weirdly, it works. There are some chewy/crunchy/inedible bits in the atchar that you have to watch out for, but it works at least as well with bologna as mustard, which is my preferred condiment for bologna.

Making slap chips

Simply slice some russet potatoes into thick bats and…

Here is where things start to come off the rails a bit. I decided to use my mandoline slicer to get the most evenly-cut fries I could, but of course the mandoline slices the potatoes a bit thinner than a proper thick-cut English-style chip. Oh well, let’s call them slap frites instead.

A 10-minute bath in white vinegar after slicing not only gives the potatoes a little flavor boost (probably more of a boost with these thinner-cut potatoes than you’d get with the thicker ones), but lowering the pH of the potatoes’ surface also stops enzymatic browning from occurring.

The potatoes are first fried at a lower temperature to cook them through.

After the first fry, the potatoes are cooked, but haven’t taken on much color, and the surface hasn’t gotten that great crispness that defines a good fry (or chip).

I fried them again in batches until they were golden brown and then held them in a warm oven while I prepared the rest of the ingredients.

“Polony” and atchar Gatsby.

For these sandwiches, I’m using a 2ft long baguette, nothing special, just a regular old grocery store baguette. They’re long enough that they hang off the sides of my cutting board and, in fact, are too long for my camera to fully capture. I’m doing the two different atchars on different ends of the sandwich so people can avoid the “hot” version if they choose.

I used an entire package of bologna, cut in half and fried on a griddle.

Then my “chips”

and tomato and lettuce.

It’s… gargantuan.

I cut it into 6 pieces and shared it among those of my family who were interested. (The 9yo did not like the look of the atchar). It was received well but to be honest, not terribly enthusiastically. Bologna is bologna and a bologna sandwich is a bologna sandwich, even if it’s 2 feet long and slathered with mango pickle.

Masala Steak

I was far more excited to try masala steak, which is chunks or strips of tenderized steak cooked in curry spices. I followed this recipe for the most part, using powdered kashmiri chili instead of red pepper flakes. I also added a tiny splash of fish sauce just to boost the richness of the meaty stew it became.

I started with about a pound and a half of tenderized skirt steak

First I made a paste of all the spices and rubbed it into the meat.

I sauteed the thin-sliced onions, then added the steak and tomatoes and eventually a little water, braising the meat until it was falling-apart tender.

I assembled the sandwich the same as before, only this time I added the fries after cutting it into six pieces. To be honest, I just forgot.

Some people took theirs on the side instead of adding them to the sandwich. I stuffed mine right in.

The masala steak was delicious–a bit of heat from the chili but mostly those delightfully aromatic curry spices that melded so well with the Indian-style mango pickle. The chips added bulk and texture, and the tomato and lettuce were… just kind of there, to be honest, but not unwelcome.

I’d love to try making more of these–a Tribunal commenter from Cape Town says that hardly anybody orders polony anymore, and that the most popular flavors are masala steak and fried eggs (Fried eggs! That would have really put it over the top!) for the high-end option on payday, or Russian (essentially kielbasa) for a cheaper night out. (And now I’m thinking of a Maxwell Street-style Gatsby and I know that this will happen someday soon)

These would be great drunk food (if you could get somebody else to make them for you–anybody interested in opening a South African style sandwich shop in south suburban Chicago?) and a more interesting and filling meal than one of those giant family-sized sub sandwiches you can get at the grocery store that are all bread (though now I’m wondering if I could get my local to add a mound of fries to one of those–I’m not sure if it would be an improvement but anything would be better than a standard grocery store sub).

But we’ve reached the end of the month, it’s a holiday weekend and I am not sure I even want to leave the house, so I guess that’s it for the Gatsby, for me, for now.