What is the craziest thing you’ve ever eaten? I have a few contenders. But the answer to the question of “what is the craziest thing you’ve ever made” is obvious. A good friend of mine is from Rochester New York, as is one of my favorite internet chefs Andrew Rea (Bingeing with Babish.) The local fare of Rochester is known as the Garbage Plate. An unholy amalgamation of meat and carbs. A simple yet satisfying meat sauce and white hot sausage sit atop a throne of macaroni salad and home fries, drenched in ketchup and mustard. If it sounds disgusting, trust me, any worries about the taste go away as soon as it hits your tongue. The only guilt you will feel is about the damage you just did to your heart valves.
Babish shows how to make it here. So I don’t see the need to copy the entire recipe since he’s got it in video form. The only changes I made were in the macaroni salad. Since I have access to the vastly superior Oregon brand Reeser’s Macaroni salad, I just used that instead of making the homemade stuff he does. Though his recipe looks fantastic as usual. I also, finally, learned how to make diner style home fries from this recipe.
The real trick throughout this is the recipe relies A LOT on properly browning all of the food. So get a good thick cast iron skillet to do all of this. It’s the best thing. And be patient throughout the process. Proper browning means not moving the food all the time. So just let the heat do its work and set timers if you must.
Now, the real challenge lies in attempting to eat this entire thing in one sitting. My buddy from Rochester referred to his friends as “gravitationally challenged” and solely blamed the easy access to Garbage Plates for it. I can see why. The combination of flavors works wonderfully. But you need some cheap beer and garbage TV to go with it.
