How clashing origin stories of St. Louis’ pork steak tangled Schnucks, Google and Wikipedia

Who invented the pork steak? It depends on where you look for the answer. For at least several years, Wikipedia and Google results have credited a Florissant resident named Winfred Steinbruegge, suggesting he invented it in 1956 to honor the birth of his youngest son.

But if you consult the website of supermarket Schnucks, you’ll find something different. On a page dedicated to “How the pork steak was born,” Don and Ed, members of the Schnuck family, are named the pork steak’s inventors — two culinary innovators who in the 1950s “wanted to offer a cut of meat for grilling that was inexpensive enough to fit every family’s budget.”

Both claims are wrong. That’s according to Robert Moss, who serves as the contributing barbeque editor for Southern Living magazine and restaurant critic for the Post & Courier. He scoured newspaper records, finding that the history of pork steak stretches much further back in history — though he does credit St. Louis for jumpstarting its popularity.

“You can certainly say that St. Louis is the home of the pork steak,” Moss told St. Louis on the Air. “For a long time, it was about the only place you could find them.”

Moss first stumbled into the contradictory origin stories of pork steak in 2020, but the issue has recently resurfaced on local news. In September, a KSDK fact check concluded that Schnucks' claim of inventing the pork steak lacked evidence — finding it “false.” A spokesperson for the supermarket conceded it could not back up the claim because “there is no one who is working at the company now that would have been around back then” to share more information.