Culver's ButterBurger
Fresh, never-frozen beef on a lightly buttered toasted bun; Wisconsin-born chain's signature. The butter goes on the crown of the bun.
Andrew Lekashman
Cudighi Sandwich
Cinnamon, nutmeg, clove, no fennel: cudighi is a pork sausage spiced like a pie, pressed into a patty, griddled, and topped with pizza sauce and mozzarella. The Upper Peninsula's own Italian sandwich.
Cuban Sandwich (Tampa)
The Tampa Cuban presses four meats onto a lard-enriched loaf: roast pork, boiled ham, Genoa salami, Swiss. The salami is the marker that separates it from Miami's three-meat build.
Cuban Sandwich (Miami)
Order a Cuban at a Miami ventanita and the cook leans on the plancha until the sandwich loses half its height. That flattening is the recipe, and the city's marker is what it leaves out.
Cuban Sandwich (Key West)
Key West folds lettuce, tomato, and mayo into its Cuban, which the mainland calls heresy. Its cigar community predates Ybor City by a decade, though the sandwich's age there is less firmly fixed.
Croqueta Preparada
Miami's croqueta preparada presses a whole fried ham croqueta into a Cuban sandwich, cracking its crust open on the plancha so a second, saucier filling runs through the ham and Swiss.
Croque Monsieur (American Bistro)
American bistro interpretation: ham and Gruyère with béchamel on toasted bread, broiled; upscale brunch staple.
Croissant Sandwich (Trendy)
A split butter croissant with ham and cheese, or egg and sausage at a drive-through: the American boom that began with sliced bakery croissants in 1977 and peaked in the 1980s.
Crispy Fish Sandwich
A breaded white fish fillet on a steamed bun with cold tartar and a half-slice of American cheese. Lou Groen invented the Filet-O-Fish for Catholic Cincinnati in 1962.
Crawfish Po' Boy
Fried or étouffée-style crawfish tails on French bread.
Cracklin Sandwich
Fried pork skin (cracklins) on French bread.
Crab Cake Sandwich
Lump Chesapeake blue crab barely bound with egg, mayo, and a little cracker, pan-fried or broiled on a soft bun. Maryland's restraint sandwich, and where the name was printed.
Country Ham Biscuit
Salty cured country ham on a fluffy biscuit; Southern breakfast staple.
Cornell Chicken Sandwich
Charcoal-grilled split chicken in a vinegar, oil, and egg baste from a 1950 Cornell recipe, pulled off the bone onto a soft white bun. Upstate New York firehall and county-fair food.
Corned Beef Sandwich (Cleveland)
Piled corned beef on rye; Cleveland has more corned beef per capita than anywhere.
Corned Beef on Rye
Salt-cured beef brisket sliced and served on rye with mustard; Jewish deli staple.
Corn Dog
A frank on a stick is dipped once in cornmeal batter and dropped into hot oil, the coating sealing in a single pass. No bun, no assembly: the carrier and the cooking are one step.
Connecticut Steamed Cheeseburger (Ted's)
At Ted's in Meriden the beef never touches a hot surface: patty and cheddar steamed in separate metal trays, the molten cheese poured over the meat. A Connecticut-only burger since 1959.
Connecticut Lobster Roll
Warm lobster slipped into melted butter and spooned hot into a griddled split-top roll, eaten before the butter cools. By most accounts the older New England roll, and the one that never went cold.
Connecticut Hot Dog
Hot dog served in a split-top bun with sauerkraut and spicy mustard.
Coney Island Hot Dog (Original)
A grilled all-beef frankfurter with mustard and kraut, sold at Surf and Stillwell Avenues since Nathan Handwerker undercut Feltman's with a five-cent price in 1916.
Coney Island Hot Dog (Michigan)
Flint's coney is a Vienna frank with a dry, crumbled beef-heart sauce, mustard, and raw onion, ordered "two up" at counters that date to Flint Original in 1919.
Colorado Green Chile Burger
A Colorado green chile burger arrives smothered: a cheeseburger flooded with gravy-thick pork green chile until the bun gives way, eaten with a fork. Built on the Pueblo Mosco chile.
Colombian Arepa de Huevo
A Colombian Caribbean street food that fries its own filling shut: corn dough puffed hollow, slit, packed with a raw egg, and fried again until the shell crackles and the yolk still runs.