Sausage sandwiches are a crowd-pleaser at St. Joseph Festival

DOVER — It takes nearly a year of preparation to get everything ready to sell the popular sausage sandwiches at the annual St. Joseph Festival in Dover, which will be held this Friday and Saturday.

The process begins in August with the purchase of hot peppers, according to Keith Knestaut of New Philadelphia, who is chairperson of the sausage booth with his wife, Jean. They are both members of St. Joseph Catholic Church in Dover, which sponsors the festival.

More: St. Joseph Festival returns to Dover on July 16 and 17

They usually purchase about 10 bushels of the peppers. A group of volunteers then gathers at Tuscarawas Central Catholic Elementary School in Dover to get the peppers ready.

"We cut and clean them and fry them and then freeze them," he said. "We do that in August or September when the hot peppers are ripe."

Cooking the peppers is fun, but the volunteers have to use caution.

"Wear your PPE, Personal Protective Equipment, because you don't want to have your hand on those hot peppers for a couple of hours," he said. "Your hands will burn and anything you touch. Don't touch your eyes or any sensitive parts."

Then the following spring they purchase raw sausage from Sugar Valley Meats. The sausage is precooked about three weeks before the festival. It is cooked on a Friday night.

Volunteers from the Loyal Christian Benevolent Association are an important part of the process.

"They are a huge help," Keith said. "After the cooked sausage cools, then the next morning we can cut it in half and repackage it, put it in the freezer and then it's ready for the festival weekend."

During the festival, the sausage is reheated on the grill and is ready for consumption by customers.

People can get their sandwich plain, or they can have hot peppers, green peppers or onions on it.

"Sugar Valley Meats makes the sausage, and we ask them for their mild Italian seasoning, which is good by itself, but there's quite a group of avid sausage eaters that like them hot," he said. "So we pile the hot peppers on there. They can ask for extra. We can give them all them want, and I know that helps the beverage sales."

This year, they order 450 pounds of sausage in one-third pound links. That makes a little more than 1,200 individual servings.

In 2021, they ordered less, because they weren't sure how many people would attend the festival due to the COVID-19 pandemic. Unfortunately, they ran out of sausage early on Saturday evening.

Fortunately, someone went to the grocery stores in town and bought all the sausage and buns he could find, Keith said. The man refused payment for the food.

What is the most popular sausage sandwich at the festival?

"It depends on who you are," he responded. "Some people want all hot peppers. There's some people that just want green peppers.

"We're not afraid to run out of green peppers or onions, but we do not want to run out of hot peppers for those avid hot pepper sandwich eaters. They are our biggest customers. They're our most avid customers."

Jean and Keith have been involved in working at the sausage booth for about 20 years and have been in charge for the past 12 or 13 years.

Jean said the nights of the festival go fast because they stay busy. They don't cook a lot of sausage in advance so it will be hot for their customers.

Fortunately people are willing to wait. Last year, some customers waited 40 minutes in line, she said.

After 20 years, the Knestauts still enjoy working at the booth.

"It's the people and the fun, joking around with them," Keith said. "You don't see them for long periods of time. You see them coming in and out of Mass and some people you don't see because they regularly attend another Mass. You get to catch up."

They both credit the volunteers with making things go smoothly at the booth.

It takes 24 volunteers just to fill all the jobs at the booth in four shift during the two nights of the festival, as well as people to process the hot peppers and cook and cut the sausage. At least 300 volunteer hours are involved from start to finish.

"It's mostly our volunteers that make the show run," Jean said.

St. Joseph Festival

The St. Joseph Festival will be held Friday and Saturday evening at St. Joseph Catholic Church, 613 N. Tuscarawas Ave., Dover. 

Chicken teriyaki, authentic tamales, homemade powdered-sugar waffles, fresh squeezed lemonade, ice cream, pizza, baked goods and a large beer garden are some of the food varieties that are hallmarks of this festival. Crafty Ladies will be hosting a room in the Family Life Center offering a wide assortment of homemade crafts and novelties.  

On stage, entertainment will include:

Friday:

5 to 7:30 p.m., Tequila Mary

8 to 11 p.m.,  Badstone

Saturday:

5 to 7:30 p.m., Larry Notz and Mandolin Dave

8 to 11 p.m., Moonlyterz

All proceeds go toward funding St Joseph's Church outreach through the weekly soup kitchen, school, youth ministries and church missions throughout the year.

Source: Joe Sciarretti 

This article originally appeared on The Times-Reporter: Sausage sandwiches are a crowd-pleaser at St. Joseph Festival