The beauty of life is that we’re free to live it in just about any way we see fit. For some, that means joining an intramural sports league or taking up paper mâché crafting in our most independent moments. For others, it means putting chocolate candy on your savory meat sandwiches.
On August 8, Twitter user @KariVanHorn shared an image of a unique menu offering at one of the vendors at Kauffman Stadium, home of the Kansas City Royals. The sandwich, named “BBQ Reese’s Sandwich,” is made with pulled pork doused in Sweet Baby Ray’s BBQ sauce and topped with bacon bits and crushed and crumbled Reese’s Peanut Butter Cups.
Although the saying goes “don’t knock it until you try it,” a lot of people decided to ignore that idiom altogether. In just one day, 2,798 Twitter users retweeted the image of the BBQ Reese’s Sandwich, with most of those folks using a quote tweet to leave their scathing opinion on the offering. An additional 774 people responded in the thread directly, many of them with the same kind of vibe — let’s just say that.
“Why do Americans eat like they’ve got free healthcare?” said one user on Twitter.
“Every day we stray further from God’s light,” added another Twitter user, one of many in the thread with the same sentiment.
“I do not support this for me, but I also don’t support your right to do it, and will sit idly by when they come for you,” said another Twitter user, possibly threatening a possible intervention by the food police.
“Oh, my God, @Royals! Lifelong fan ... but delete that sandwich ASAP,” said one user on Twitter. “It’s an ABOMINATION.”
“I am a fan of all of these ingredients,” started another user on Twitter, encouragingly — at least, until they completed their statement with “I am NOT a fan of combining them. Ugh.”
Still, there are some people who, while taken aback by the ingredient combo, would actually try it, including at least one TODAY Food reporter (sorry, not sorry) but also a few others on social media.
"Do I like this idea? No. Would I eat it? F*** yes," said one user on Twitter.
“This is quite possibly the most disgusting concoction I’ve ever seen,” said another Twitter user before adding that they were “booking a Southwest flight to Kansas City International Airport immediately.”
While the Twitter account receiving a heaping helping of sandwich critique claimed the sandwich was "new," it actually has been around for awhile, having been introduced earlier this year in April as part of a slate of new menu additions by Aramark, a American food service, facilities, and uniform services provider that works with sports stadiums like Citi Field, Citizens Bank Park, Coors Field, Fenway Park, and Kauffman Stadium, among others.
For the 2022 Major League Baseball season, Aramark and its partners introduced a variety of new culinary and tech offerings to the stadiums they work with, calling these “new unlikely, yet delicious, food combinations”as part of the “Dare to Pair” menu according to a press release.
While some of these offerings are decidedly more straightforward, like the “Lil’ Chicken & Waffles” made with fried chicken, waffles, lemon honey and maple syrup offered at New York Mets’ Citi Field, others like Fenway Park’s “Fluffer Nutter Fries” made with sweet potato fries, crushed peanuts, cilantro, peanut and fluff sauces are sure to incite hearty food debates.
Still, as people on social media both recoil in horror and amorously run toward the BBQ Reese’s sandwich, its creator took the opportunity to drop another culinary bomb in our laps.
“If y’all are mad about our BBQ Reese’s Sandwich, wait til you see our Jerry Garcia Dog with jalapeño pickled dancing gummy bear relish for #GratefulDead Day at the K,” said @TheKFoods on Twitter in response to the brouhaha over the peanut buttery pork invention.
We reached out to Aramark for comment on these quirky menu items, and they let us know that Aramark executive chef Johnny Woychick created both the BBQ Reese’s Sandwich as well as the “Jerry Garcia Dog.” The latter in case you’re wondering is a spicy chorizo link topped with red-colored mustard and fried ketchup, which is ketchup that was stirred into tempura batter and deep fried and “Dancing Bears,” a relish that contains gummy bears pickled in jalapeño juice.
This colorful and distinctive menu offering will only be available for “Grateful Dead Night” on August 10 and served at Kauffman Stadiums’ Rivals Sports Bar in right field. Woychick’s other viral creation, the BBQ Reese’s Sandwich is currently on the menu at Sweet Baby Ray’s barbecue pit located behind the Price Chopper Patio in right field.
If you’re wondering where all these ideas come from, Woychick enlightened curious minds when he spoke to Kansas City Magazine in June and said the idea was a spur of the moment invention at a little get-together he had at home.
“I had just brought some smoked pork belly home, and I had some Reese’s Peanut Butter Cups,” said Woychick to Kansas City Magazine. “So I combined them. Everybody loved it, and I kept that idea in the back of my head.”
Woychick added that him and his team found the sandwich needed some crunch, so they added bacon bits. “They’re almost like pop rocks,” he said.
We can see another idea brewing already: a pop rocks cheeseburger, perhaps?
