How much meat can one sandwich reasonably handle?
At one Indiana deli, the answer is apparently “keep going.”
Pastrami shares rye with house-smoked corned beef, Swiss cheese, and mustard, already giving lunch plenty to deal with before the rest of the menu enters the picture.
Then the smoker starts showing off.
Brisket and pork spend hours over hickory, while other sandwiches pull from Chicago-style favorites and house-smoked classics.
That makes ordering harder than it should be.
You may walk in convinced the pastrami is the plan, then spot something else coming off the counter and immediately begin negotiating with yourself.
My advice? Do not get emotionally attached to your first choice.
The menu has other ideas.
Pastrami And House-Smoked Corned Beef Share The Same Rye
The Hot Pastrami & Corned Beef sandwich is exactly what its name promises. Pastrami and house-smoked corned beef are layered on rye with Swiss cheese and mustard, keeping the supporting ingredients familiar while the two meats carry most of the flavor.
The corned beef, not the pastrami, is identified as house-smoked. One brings the peppery deli character associated with pastrami, while the other adds smoke to the corned beef side of the sandwich.
Rye and mustard keep things pointed in a classic direction. Swiss softens the sharper edges without turning the sandwich into something overloaded with toppings.
If you are the person who removes half the extras from a sandwich before taking the first bite, this one already speaks your language.
The real choice is appetite. Do you tackle the full pastrami-and-corned-beef combination, or save the house-smoked corned beef for a Reuben later? Either way, the deli side of the menu starts with meat rather than decoration.
Fat Dan’s keeps the sandwich straightforward enough that you can tell what each component is doing. Anyone who has lost a good sandwich beneath unnecessary toppings knows why that matters.
The SoBro Location Keeps Lunch And Dinner Hours Every Day
The College Avenue shop opens at 11 a.m. seven days a week. Monday through Thursday it serves until 10 p.m., Friday and Saturday stretch to 11 p.m., and Sunday returns to a 10 p.m. closing time.
That schedule makes the restaurant equally practical for an early lunch, an afternoon sandwich, or dinner when a plate of smoked meat sounds more convincing than cooking at home.
Friday and Saturday add an extra hour, useful when the evening starts later than expected.
Pickup and delivery are available through the restaurant’s ordering setup, so eating there is not the only option.
Let the time of day choose the mood. Lunch may call for a single deli sandwich and a side. Dinner opens the door to brisket, smoked pork, wings, or a burger without making the meal feel rushed.
The hours are simple enough to remember: opening stays the same, while Friday and Saturday run later.
House-Smoked Corned Beef Gets A Second Life In The Reuben
Corned beef does more than share space with pastrami. The House Smoked Reuben builds another sandwich around it, pairing the meat with sauerkraut, Swiss, relish, mayo, ketchup, and rye.
That makes the decision surprisingly specific. The pastrami-and-corned-beef sandwich leans toward mustard and a cleaner deli profile, while the Reuben adds tang, creaminess, and more competing textures. Same smoked centerpiece, very different lunch.
House-smoked corned beef also appears elsewhere on the menu, including a tot basket with sautéed onion, cheese sauce, and a fried egg. It is a good reminder that the smoker is not operating only for one signature sandwich.
If your idea of a Reuben depends on sauerkraut doing some real work, this version gives it a clear place beside the smoked meat and Swiss. If mustard is the reason you ordered pastrami in the first place, the simpler rye sandwich may be the easier call.
One visit can belong to pastrami, another to the Reuben. The relatable problem is deciding whether to repeat a favorite or let the same corned beef show up in a different form.
Italian Beef Lets You Decide How Messy Lunch Gets
Chicago-style Italian beef brings a different kind of sandwich logic. Thin-sliced roast beef comes with spiced au jus on an Italian roll and giardiniera peppers, with the option to order it dry, dipped, or wet.
Those three words change the experience more than another topping would. Dry keeps the bread firmer. Dipped gives the roll a quick meeting with the jus.
Wet pushes the sandwich farther toward the wonderfully impractical end of lunch.
Giardiniera supplies the peppery bite that keeps the beef from tasting one-note. The roll has to handle both meat and jus, which is why choosing the moisture level becomes part of the order rather than an afterthought.
This is also a natural point to know where you are headed: Fat Dan’s SoBro is at 5410 N College Ave, Indianapolis, IN 46220.
This is where napkin confidence gets tested. Are you a dry-order person who likes structural integrity, or does the whole point of Italian beef involve accepting that lunch may require both hands and immediate cleanup?
The menu also offers an Italian sausage and a Chicago Combo that splits beef and sausage, with sweet or hot peppers. A bigger appetite can turn the decision into a two-meat problem without involving pastrami at all.
Spiced jus, giardiniera, and the choice of dry, dipped, or wet keep the sandwich firmly in Chicago territory.
Fourteen Hours Of Hickory Smoke Changes The Direction Of The Menu
Move away from the deli sandwiches and the smoker takes over. Pork and brisket each spend fourteen hours over hickory before they are served, giving the menu a barbecue lane alongside its Chicago standards.
The pork is hand-pulled and served with sauce, pickle, and onion. Brisket is sliced, dry-rubbed, and paired with the same basic accompaniments. Those are not complicated builds, which leaves the long smoke time as the main event.
Wings get a different treatment. The jumbo wings are hickory-smoked for three hours, dry-rubbed, and offered with a choice of sauces. Ribs appear on Saturdays and Sundays, while the smoked meatloaf is a Wednesday-only item.
That weekly rhythm gives repeat visits a little personality. Wednesday brings meatloaf, the weekend opens the door to ribs, and pork or brisket can pull you away from the sandwich you expected to order.
Fourteen hours is the sort of cooking time that makes waiting twenty minutes for dinner at home suddenly seem very reasonable. It also gives you a useful fork in the road: keep lunch in deli territory, or let hickory smoke take over the whole order.
Smoke links the deli and barbecue sides of the menu, from corned beef to brisket, pork, and bacon.
Chicago Dogs And Sausage Keep The Windy City Theme Going
The Chicago Dog uses a quarter-pound Vienna beef dog with yellow mustard, tomato, neon-green relish, diced onion, sport peppers, a pickle spear, and celery salt. Ketchup does not join the lineup.
It is one of those orders where removing several toppings changes the point, because the pile of sharp, sweet, fresh, and pickled flavors is what creates the recognizable Chicago combination.
The Maxwell Street Polish takes another route with sautéed onions, mustard, sport peppers, and celery salt. Italian sausage comes with a dipped Italian roll and a choice of sweet or hot peppers, while the Chicago Combo brings sausage and Italian beef together.
If sandwiches are starting to blur together, this is where the menu resets. A dog snaps, sausage brings fennel seasoning, and the Polish leans on onions and mustard rather than rye and Swiss.
Which Chicago lane sounds right when you sit down: deli counter, beef stand, or sausage? There is no need to choose the most famous option just because it has the best-known name.
Each format has enough recognizable detail to stand on its own, so “Chicago-style” means more than one kind of sandwich.
Burgers And Smoked Extras Make Changing Your Mind Very Easy
Pastrami may start the conversation, but burgers can derail it quickly. The Fat Burger anchors that part of the menu, while other versions add combinations such as sautéed mushrooms, Swiss, smoked bacon, onions, peppers, or house sauces.
The NY Fat circles back toward the deli counter by pairing pastrami and smoked corned beef with Swiss, spicy mustard, and the garden toppings. It is the option for anyone who looks at a straightforward deli sandwich and thinks, “Good start, but what if we kept going?”
Sides are not limited to plain fries. Tots, house-made coleslaw, macaroni and cheese, cottage cheese, and a whole Chicago pickle give the table several directions to go. A shared basket can also make sense when the sandwich already looks like a two-handed project.
Chicken, a veggie burger, and grilled cheese add choices for tables that do not all want the same thing.
Pickup and delivery help when the meal needs to travel, while catering is available for larger gatherings. That flexibility is handy when the group vote says sandwiches, but nobody wants to organize a table full of different orders on arrival.
The hardest part may still be the first thirty seconds with the menu. You came for pastrami. Then Italian beef started talking.
Brisket joined in. A Chicago dog waved from the next section. At some point, changing your mind stops being indecision and starts looking like the correct response.