The Secret Ingredient That Makes Chicago-Style Egg Rolls Unlike Any Other

When you think about dishes from the Windy City, you're probably imagining Chicago-style hot dogs, Italian beef, and deep-dish pizza (which Chicagoans don't actually eat terribly often), right? But zoom in on lots of different foods around here, and you'll notice tiny details that give our style of Midwestern cooking some serious personality. Among Chicago specialties that don't get mentioned often — because it's less about the item itself — are good old egg rolls (yep, the Chinese takeout kind). There's one component that makes ours particularly unique.

That's because the secret ingredient is peanut butter. Some egg rolls around the city feature peanut butter in the filling, which adds a rich background flavor that ties the proverbial room together. It's not particularly overwhelming, but you can definitely taste its presence, which indicates that you're eating at a place that's cooking in the preferred Chicago way. I will note that not every Chinese-American restaurant in Chicago makes egg rolls with peanut butter, but it's kind of unmistakable once you notice it. After that, other egg rolls taste sort of flat in comparison.

An exploration about the origins of this style of egg roll by the Chicago Tribune eventually led to Chinese restaurant owner David Leong, who was based in Springfield, Missouri. He said he had picked up the trick during a stint in a Philadelphia restaurant in 1945, after he'd come back from his Army service during World War II. But the trail went cold from there. For some reason when the peanut butter variety somehow migrated to Chicago, locals' taste buds loved it, and that's how many of us prefer them to this very day.

If you don't live around Chicago, it might be hard to hunt down a place that serves egg rolls with peanut butter in the filling, though it isn't impossible. You'll just have to ask an employee of a Chinese restaurant whether their egg rolls have peanut butter in them (pounce if they say yes). And if you can't find any, it's now up to you to make some for yourself. It's simply a matter of adding a few tablespoons of peanut butter to your filling of choice. And if you need help figuring out how to roll your egg rolls properly, we've got some instructions for you. Then you can dip them into your sauce of choice and enjoy them just like Chicagoans do, without having to buy a plane ticket.