Lucky tuna salad and fanny pack meatballs: What Phillies fans bring to Citizens Bank Park

“What is your spaghetti policy here?”

Once a throwaway joke from a 2010 Always Sunny in Philadelphia episode, the question has become shorthand for gauging whether a ballpark allows food from the great beyond — Ziplocked bags of cold spaghetti and red sauce included.

Most do. At Citizen Bank Park and 26 other Major League Baseball stadiums, fans can bring in food so long as it’s sealed and can fit inside a stadium-approved bag (12 inches by 6 inches by 12 inches‚ in the Phillies’ case). Naturally, there are exceptions: The Athletics strictly prohibit outside food, while the Tampa Bay Rays and Detroit Tigers require a doctor’s note for a spaghetti bag. (The San Diego Padres even have a special exemption for food that “can be thrown as a projectile,” so hot dogs are no-go, at least in the hands of a Philadelphian.)

Baseball’s lax food policies have long been viewed as a way to keep America’s pastime accessible, especially as ticket and concessions prices continue to rise. Generally, most fans keep it simple: sandwiches, chips, fruit, or a bag of pre-cooked glizzies.

But in Philly, the Bank’s spaghetti policy has taken on new life as Phillies fans redefine what’s considered acceptable ballpark food, smells and food safety be damned. For some, smuggling in tiramisu or seafood is a sign of dedication. For others, it’s about committing to a bit.

Regardless, Philly wouldn’t have it any other way.

“As much I as love ballpark food, I don’t want to miss anything because I’m waiting in line” at concessions, said Laura Bider, a season ticket holder who prefers to tote a fanny pack full of meatballs and what she called “pocket pickles.”

At the start of this year’s baseball season, we asked Phillies fans to tell us about the best food they’ve brought inside the ballpark. We fully expected to hear about supermarket rotisserie chicken, booze-soaked fruit, and the best BYO condiments.

We did. But we also received 100-plus submissions of the most outlandish things we’d ever heard: fresh mussels, hard-boiled eggs, racks of ribs, and oysters tucked inside hoagie rolls, among others. (We don’t judge, we just listen.)

“Bring whatever feels lucky to you, whatever is going to pack you with enough protein and joy to get you through a game,” said Sarah Dlugos, 28, of Graduate Hospital. She believes her curried tuna salad helped the Phillies sail to the National League Championship in 2023. She also had a retort for skeptics: “It’s none of anybody else’s business.”

Actually, it’s our business. Here are the wildest foods people have brought inside Citizens Bank Park, for better or worse.

Ideally, a baseball game is like an airplane: You respect leg room, and never, ever eat smelly food that spoils easily.

Not here. In Philly, fish and mollusks are totally acceptable ballpark fare.

Dlugos packed a tuna salad sandwich on untoasted whole wheat bread to all eight Phillies games she attended during the 2023 season. And while the flavorings ranged from dill to Sriracha and sesame, the outcome remained the same: Every time Dlugos bit into to her mushy, slightly warm sandwich, the Phils won.

“I even had tuna salad for game two of the NLCS when the Phillies beat the [Arizona] Diamondbacks 10-0,” she said. “Lucky tuna.”

Dlugos assured us that she downed her sandwiches quickly, to limit any odor, and she recommends copycats eat their tuna before the third inning at the latest. After all, her sandwiches had already survived several Broad Street Line stops before making it to the stands.

Haters, she suggested politely, can go kick rocks. “Whatever you do is between you and the tuna,” said Dlugos.

Not everyone is so lucky.

It was June 2012 when Jersey resident Dom Ellis walked into Citizen Bank Park with a bag of fresh mussels taped to his back and a dream: for Chickies & Pete’s to steam his shellfish and top them with a drizzle of their cheese dip.

“For some reason that popped into my head, and I thought it sounded really good,” said Ellis, now 34, of Pennsauken.

His hopes were dashed when the Chickie’s & Pete’s staff in section 126 refused to so much as touch the mollusks. “I remember the lady looking at me like I had three heads,” Ellis recalled. “The manager was like, ‘Do you think anyone here knows how to cook mussels?’”

Ellis said he would’ve paid at least $50 for cheesy ballpark mussels. Instead, he dumped them in the trash. To date, Ellis is so scarred that he refuses to bring food inside any ballpark.

“A lot of people lost that day,” Ellis said. “I lost. The Phillies lost.”

More recently, someone did succeed at getting shellfish to the stands.

Last year, Ty, a local influencer who goes by “the Hippie Meathead,” smuggled 60 oysters inside the Bank by stuffing them in hoagie rolls, shells and all. He wrapped the rolls in tinfoil to avoid any interrogation. (The 25-year-old Rittenhouse resident declined to share his last name out of fear that his seafood habits could hurt his career.)

Once inside, Ty put the oysters on ice that he retrieved from concessions and shucked them with a screwdriver. He slurped some straight, while others topped hot dogs and pizza slices that were shared with strangers. A few went into a beer bat filled with Yuengling. Ty chugged it like an oversized shooter.

“It tasted like the ocean,” he said. “Oh, and victory.”

Forget peanuts and crackerjacks: The new frontier of baseball fandom is bringing elaborate spreads to the ballpark. Dozens of Inquirer readers responded to our survey with tales of dinners spread across several innings.

A reader from Point Breeze prepped a full steak with potatoes and shrimp scampi for night games. Another wrote via Reddit that they managed to get a full barbecue spread — smoked brisket, mac and cheese, cornbread, and baked beans — inside for a World Series game.

Kevin Kilroy’s most memorable Phillies game involved eating lasagna and tiramisu in the stands for a birthday party. It wasn’t exactly a five-star meal: The cold lasagna was “just edible.” The tiramisu, a family recipe, was a toppled mess. Not that Kilroy minded.

“Each Phillies game is special because of the people I’m with,” said the 33-year-old Olde Kensington resident. “The food is a way to celebrate that.”

First-time season ticket holder Alex DiDonato, 28, has already built a reputation in section 317 for bringing ornate dinners: a rack of ribs, crab cake sandwiches with homemade aioli and grilled corn, a charcuterie board, and, more recently, a DIY taco kit with ground beef, guacamole, shredded cheese, and lettuce.

The new tradition started as a way for her make each game feel special. The Spring Garden resident hasn’t had a single miss yet, she said, and has plans to bring a tray of baked ziti next. The only downside: her seats.

“We sit at the edge of our section, so every time someone comes into our [row], we have to stand up and take all of our food and dips and drinks with us,” DiDonato said. “It’s a bit of a problem.”

Bider, with her meatball-filled fanny pack and back-pocket pickles, isn’t into all the flash. The 46-year-old from Swedesboro just wants the Phils to make the playoffs.

The one time she splurged on a stadium hot dog and an ice cream helmet last year, the Phillies lost to the Los Angeles Dodgers in the first game of the division series, Bider said.

“It was all my fault,” she said, “And, no offense to the stadium, the food was nasty.”