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A grilled Polish sausage on a poppy-seed bun with caramelized onions and mustard.
Grilling

Maxwell Street Polish

Prep 10 min Cook 25 min Total 35 min Servings 6

By Lukasz Jagiello

Published Oct 12, 2026 · Updated Oct 12, 2026

Photo: Victor Grigas, CC BY-SA 4.0, via Wikimedia Commons

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About this recipe

I only post recipes that I have tried and verified and are good to my taste — all taste may vary.

The onions cook until they are sweet and soft, then sit on a sausage whose casing has blistered. Mustard on top of the onions, not under the sausage, is what you taste first.

Ingredients

Method

  1. 01

    Heat a grill or a heavy skillet to medium.

  2. 02

    Cook the onions in the oil with the salt, stirring, until they are soft and deep gold, 15 to 20 minutes. They should be sweet, not black.

  3. 03

    Grill the sausages, turning, until the casings blister and the centers are hot, about 10 minutes. A fully smoked sausage only needs the blister and the heat.

  4. 04

    Toast the buns. Set a sausage in each, cover it with onions, and add a stripe of yellow mustard. Sport peppers are optional.

Notes & swaps

  • This is the grilled Polish sandwich from the old Maxwell Street market. It is not a boiled kielbasa and cabbage dinner, and it is not a Chicago-style hot dog.
  • The photograph shows the sausage, onions, and mustard on a poppy-seed bun.

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