Guy Fieri, you sonofabitch, you did it. All these years spent cramming my maw full of fried mozzarella sticks (this is not a tale I’m telling —  lookit me last Superbowl Sunday, when this blog was but a glimmer in my groin or whatever) and forever feeling like something was missing. There was a hole that needed to be filled with flavor, a weeping wound begging for a salty salve. Leave it to Guy. He sniffed out that hole — and he filled it with salami.

OK, so it’s already cheese. And it’s already deep fucking fried. And you’re thinking that Guy is just being gross by adding an additional, unhealthy component and wrapping the mozzarella in a couple slices of slappity deli meat before it’s breaded and boiled in oil. Well, stop for a second with the knee-jerky, granola-crunching, Liberal cacapoo and hear the man out, will you … 

I said it once and I’ll say it a million times … if you’re gonna eat something that’s not supposed to be good for you (like fried cheese) then eat the over-the-top, super-duper (yep, I said it, “super-duper” version of it. 

DIONYSIAN HEDONISM. The best part is that this dish appears in the “For Kids” section of the book. By the time our youngsters’ arteries are clogged up, we’ll all have mechanical hearts manufactured by Dyson (with no unpleasant buffeting).

THE INGREDIENTS … 

I forgot to mention these guys. Spring roll wrappers. That go around salamis that go around cheese. I’d never worked with them before, but they remind me of skin grafts. Which I’d worked with a lot. 

So, like I said, skin, then salami, then rolled up around a Polly-O string cheese. The first one I made looked like an accident. So I exacerbated that by clutching it in my greasy fist. 

Oh, but I got the hang of it. And they were still obscene looking.

Oh, that’s better. I actually egg-dredged and bread-crumbed them TWICE. If I’ve said it once, I’ve said it a million times: if you’re going to eat something that’s not supposed to be good for you like fried cheese … oh, shut up.

Now, listen. I’d been drinking wine for a couple hours before and during the making of these. My perception might’ve been altered, buuuut these things were so genuinely delicious. Oh, wait a minute. On second thought, I bet it had to do with the fact that they’re FRIED CHEESE STICKS WRAPPED IN SALAMI. 

And remember, taste makes waste!