All Knoxvillians know about steamed sandwiches. In fact, all Knoxvillians know steamed sandwiches so very deeply in their consciousness that they rarely consider their standard hot-ham-and-cheese has, in fact, been steam-heated. It’s so widespread — such a default — that most people seem puzzled if you poke around to find out why we do it this way. You get a lot of shrugs, a lot of “Well. I never really thought about it.”
In Knoxville, we understand hot deli sandwiches are called hoagies; we understand they should be soft and squishy; we understand (at least implicitly) they should be made that way by a joyride in a Fresh-O-Matic steamer, which is about the size of a big microwave and retails for $1,370.
In 2009, The New York Times offered readers a chance to fire questions about regional foods to foodways historian John T. Edge, executive director of the University of Mississippi’s Southern Foodways Alliance. Of the 25 questions posed in the comments, two asked for an elucidation of the Knoxville tradition of steaming sandwiches. Edge dismissed the question by telling us, “Steamers are embraced elsewhere,” then got back to a narrative concerning the nuanced terroir of barbecue sauce.
Steaming appliances may be embraced elsewhere, but I’m certain it is only in Knoxville that you could lift the lid of one and expect to find a hoagie there. While I am aware of the great power of the collective American consciousness to ruin anything regional and peculiar — last year, thousands of people lost their minds on Twitter when they found out that St. Louisans prefer to slice a bagel like a Texan slices a brisket — I am here nonetheless to stand tall and tell you: This is special. There are half a million hillbillies in East Tennessee who have been steaming each and every one of their hoagies for over 50 years.
It took several years of moving around after college to grasp it: There were no steamed sandwiches to be found in the Carolina Lowcountry, or on the West Coast, or even in Nashville. By the time I moved back to North Carolina in 2019, I had gone from hoagie-curious to hoagie-obsessed. I wanted to know exactly when and why we started steaming hoagies in Knoxville, but no one I spoke with knew. If I wanted the truth, I would have to dig it up myself.