Yung St. Paul sandwich is made with an Egg Foo Yung pancake, crispy bacon, tomato and pickles. It originated in St. Louis and is as good as it sounds. Perfect for breakfast, lunch or dinner!
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This is an updated publication from 2016.
So how did a recipe for a foo yung St. Paul egg sandwich catch my eye? Yes, I know it’s a great name for a sandwich, but this one is worth it!
I found the recipe in the cookbook Lucky Peach 101 Easy Asian recipes, which came out not too long ago. I like the lucky peach.
My son even gave me a subscription to the magazine one year; he had found it before me! (Unfortunately, it is no longer.)
Maybe because
I’m a big fan of okonomiyaki, a Japanese egg pancake, or maybe because I like sandwiches that I can call dinner, is one of the reasons Ive this sandwich
.
Manservant also fell in love with this one and I’ve already lost count of the number of times I’ve done this beauty
.
This foo yung St. Paul egg sandwich has an interesting history. Derived from the Chinese immigrants who came here to build the railroad, the giant transcontinental railroad, is when Chinese food made its inroads into America. Chinese food quickly became Americanized Chinese food.
The story goes that in St. Louis,
MO (yes, I know some of you are from St. Louis, so you can check my “facts”) these little foo yung egg pancakes, (which my mother used to cover with a horrible brown sauce that also contained canned bean sprouts), somehow, miraculously, were placed between two slices of white bread, (probably the soft type), and then somehow attributed to someone from St. Paul, Minnesota.
Apparently, the sandwich’s creator named it after his hometown in St. Paul, Minnesota, but his restaurant was in St. Louis, MO! Wikipedia claims that the sandwich is completely foreign in St. Paul!
Yes, I’m sure it’s more than you want to know!
I took several liberties with the classic foo yung St. Paul egg sandwich. First, I coughed up my white bread instead of just hitting the egg burger between two slices of soft white bread. That choice is up to you!
Instead of using plain mayonnaise, I amplified the flavor by mixing some soy sauce and sriracha.
Instead of mixing ham, turkey or beef into the foo yung egg pie, I chose to add crispy bacon to my sandwich. Feel free to do both!
Also, since fresh bean sprouts are hard to find unless I run to Sprouts or the Asian market, I use canned and chopped water chestnuts to crunch. I love bean sprouts, but since they spoil so quickly, I usually add up to water chestnuts in any recipe where I can get my way.
This
foo yung St. Paul egg sandwich is intended for a plate of white paper and paper napkins. This is the dining food at its best!
Growing up in a thriving metropolis like Kankakee, Illinois, didn’t offer many opportunities to eat ethnic food; that’s unless you count Italian food or pizza as ethnic.
I think it has changed and now the big K3 even has Mexican food, however, 40 years ago one would have had a hard time finding a taco, unless it was a prepared shell, in a cellophane wrapper, in the grocery store.
