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Sandwich Monday: Lard Bread

By Ian Chillag
Published October 28, 2013 at 2:03 PM EDT
Lard bread gives a bad name a good name.
NPR
Lard bread gives a bad name a good name.

There's a thing you can find, mostly in Brooklyn, called lard bread. It's bread, with cured pork baked right into it, and it's not the slightest bit embarrassed about its name. We had ours imported from Brooklyn's Mazzola Bakery.

Eva: Now I know when people call me "lard bread" they mean it as a compliment.

Miles: Hard outside with a ham surprise inside. This is the closest we'll ever come to a meat piñata.

This is what you see right before you realize what true happiness is for the first time in your life.
/ NPR
/
NPR
This is what you see right before you realize what true happiness is for the first time in your life.

Robert: It's called "lard bread?" This is a meal with a PR problem.

Ian: Just goes to show you can't judge a book by its cover. Speaking of which, I'd read a lot more if books had secret ham hiding in them.

Peter: I understand U.S. Customs seizes 1,000 loaves of "cocaine bread" a year. The smugglers should probably change the name.

The feeling you're experiencing right now is called "lard dread."
/ NPR
/
NPR
The feeling you're experiencing right now is called "lard dread."

Ian: Sure, fill bread with cured pork and it's "delicious." Fill me with cured pork and I'm "eating my feelings."

Peter: From now on I'm going to tear open every loaf of bread I get like it's a present on Christmas morning. And be horribly disappointed, much as I was on Christmas morning, because I'm Jewish.

Miles: This is really something you can only do with meat. No one's excited to find a hidden piece of kale in their bread.

The grease made the paper bag this bread came in 99% invisible, meeting its Kickstarter goal in record time.
/ NPR
/
NPR
The grease made the paper bag this bread came in 99% invisible, meeting its Kickstarter goal in record time.

Robert: Lard bread will never make it with a name like that. Nobody bought raisin bread back when we called it "shriveled up dead grape bread."

Ian: They said a guy named Barack Obama could never get elected. You say something named lard bread will never sell. My point is this bread should command the armed forces.

Miles: Beltway politics are just too rough — he'd be eaten alive.

Eva: Interestingly enough, "lard bread" was a pet name for President William Howard Taft.

Eva thinks we're kidding when we tell her it's called lard bread.
/ NPR
/
NPR
Eva thinks we're kidding when we tell her it's called lard bread.

Eva: So it's not really lard bread. What's bread with actual blobs of lard in it called?

Miles: Delicious.

Robert: Twinkies.

[The verdict: delicious. Perfect. There's some debate about who makes the best lard bread, so if you're in Brooklyn, it's probably best to try them all.]

Thanks to Dan Pashman of The Sporkful for pointing us toward lard bread, thus changing our lives forever.

Copyright 2021 NPR. To see more, visit https://www.npr.org.

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If you’re reading this, you believe in trusted journalism and in learning without paywalls. You value access to educational content kids love and enriching cultural programming.

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