Mother In Law Sandwich appears as a signature dish in 1 United States cities. See each city's local variant and where to eat it.
Mother-in-law sandwich · Chicago
A whole Chicago-style tamale (machine-extruded cornmeal in waxed paper, not corn husks) crammed into a soft hot dog bun and smothered in spicy beanless chilli. South Side cult; Anthony Bourdain put it on TV.
The mother-in-law emerged in the 1950s on Chicago's South Side, where the city's unique cornmeal tamale tradition (rolled in paper, steamed in hot-dog warmers) met the chilli-on-everything sandwich culture of the Midwest. The name comes from the joke that both kinds of mother-in-law give you heartburn. Fat Johnnie's at 7242 S Western Avenue and Johnny O's on 35th Street are the canonical operators; both have served the sandwich continuously since the 1970s. The tamales come from only two Chicago manufacturers, Tom Tom or Supreme. Anthony Bourdain featured it on No Reservations in 2008, calling it the evil step-brother of the hot dog.