Earlier today I mentioned how I made and ate – and enjoyed – a PB&O, a Peanut Butter and Onion sandwich. I found the recipe in a 1932 cookbook and then discovered Hemingway loved them.

Basic recipe is: 2 pieces of bread or a roll split in half. Get some peanut butter, mix it with a dash of hot sauce, spread it on the bread. Then get a big ol’ slice of onion – an entire cross-section, not a ring – and cover the bread with it. It needs to be a *SWEET* onion. Don’t use a regular kind of onion, it needs to be sold as a sweet one – Bermuda, Vidalia, or some other variety of sweet onion.

The key to enjoying the sandwich is making yourself aware that both peanut butter and onion have complimentary sulfur compounds. They were essentially made for each other.

Now, I didn’t want to do the hot sauce, so I thought of something else to add. I used a sweet tomato-based barbecue sauce and that made a lovely flavor addition. Next time, I’ll use a sliced tomato instead. Knowing that Southeast Asian cuisine combines peanut butter with cilantro in tasty ways, I put some cilantro on that sandwich, as well.

I like to have my bread toasted, so I did just that, but the onion was 100% raw. Eating the sandwich with all that onion was very delicious, but there was also the interesting impression one gets when eating all that onion in one go. I felt powerful as I ate the sandwich, feeling the power of the onion coursing through me. Did it put hair on my chest? Most likely, yes. It’s a Hemingway Special, by way of Vietnam with that cilantro.

Just remember, for your PB&O, it *must* be a sweet onion, or you won’t want to have another one anytime soon. I did it right, so I’ll want to do it again.