Kelly, Trevor, and I were traveling in Europe for April & May of 2023 for 50 days. While we were working (hosting groups, scouting, and meeting travel partners), we still had a wonderful time with fantastic adventures.

Still sometimes it’s nice to be home and enjoy our own country. While doing just that, and appreciating being back in the USA, I came across an intriguing article.

In the June 2023 Bon Appetit, I read an article by Katie Honan called “The Untold Tale of the Artichoke Parm, the Most Mysterious Sandwich in Brooklyn.”

I was immediately in love with the idea of this sandwich.  However, I don’t live in NYC and won’t be visiting there for another 2 months, so I decided to make it on my own.

The only problem is there is not a recipe available, and even the one not revealed is supposedly unreliable.  So I worked with what details and clues in the article that I could discern, and with what I could see in the pictures. 

Probably most importantly, I enlisted the help of my wife Kelly, who is a former professional chef.  And trust me, she is still a chef, but with a very appreciative audience of one at this point.

A few things I insisted on that Kelly would normally never permit…things like store bought sauce (did I even say that in this house?) and pre-sliced grocery store mozzarella.  Otherwise the recipe would be going down the rabbit-hole and become another unrepeatable version. 

So, in order to re-create this reliably and recipe ready, we used the following ingredients:

Recipe for 1 Sandwich

24 oz jar of RAO’s “Homemade” Marinara (we used about 6oz)

Publix Low Moisture Part Skim Sliced Mozzarella 8oz pack (we used about half)

Footlong Hero roll from Publix bakery (the ones they use for their sandwiches) 

Reese 12oz jar of Tender small artichoke hearts (seemingly in water not brine)

2 large eggs

Salt

Chopped Garlic

Italian seasoning

Olive oil

Drain the entire jar of artichoke hearts, then squeeze the water out of them by hand, and then squeeze them again.

Slice up the artichokes

Take a medium bowl, and put 1 oz oil, italian seasoning, salt, & chopped garlic to taste

Add the artichokes to the bowl, and mix all of it together

Take a (half-sheet) sheet pan and spray with Pam, sprinkle with salt

Put the contents of the bowl on the sheet pan, relatively spread out

Cook in the oven at 170 degrees F for 3 hours

After 3 hours, check for taste and consistency.

Take about 2 oz of sliced mozzarella and cut it into more or less ½” rectangles

Take another medium sized bowl and put in 2 eggs, the cut up cheese, about 4 oz of marinara, and the partially cooked artichoke hearts; mix together

Take a medium sized saucepan and put over medium-low heat; spray with pam or small amount of olive oil.  On our gas range this was on 3 out of a possible 10 for heat.

Put the mix into the saucepan and cover.  Watch it for melted cheese and good bonding overall.  For our stove this was probably about 10 minutes.

Showing uncovered about 80% of the way:

During this 10 minutes:

Slice the bread in half longways, except keep one edge intact longways

Partially toast the bread open faced in toaster oven (on Toast)

Take about 6 tablespoons of marinara and generously spread it on both halves of bread and smooth it out with the back of the spoon

When the artichoke mix is finished, put it directly from the pan onto the bread (on the side that will be the bottom), keeping it nicely smoothed out end to end.

Take a couple of slices of mozzarella and cover the artichoke mix.  Put it back in the toaster oven (on Toast) until the cheese is nicely melted.

Close the sandwich, cut in half.   Wait about 5 minutes and serve.  Share ⅓ with your wife.

Without a doubt, when I am in NY this August, we will go by Mama Louisa’s in Brooklyn and try the real thing…and perhaps make adjustments.  That being said, I cannot imagine a better sandwich than the one we made here at home.  

The Graham Version of the Artichoke Parm shown below:

Make sure to visit Katie’s original article and to compare her photos of the Mama Louisa OG here, not to mention an incredible history of this lovely sandwich!

Thanks Katie it was a wonderfully researched article and quite enjoyable to read – obviously inspirational!  Thanks Kelly for making this 1000x better than I would have done alone! And thanks Charlie for inventing it in the first place, 70 years ago!

You can follow Michael on Instagram @ theoutlandersociety

UPDATE August 4th, 2023: We went to Mama Louisa’s in Brooklyn today and got the artichoke parm! Delicious and worth the wait and you should go if you get the chance. That being said, Kelly’s is different…and, I think, better.