Short answer: Bologna is a meat. Baloney is nonsense.
Dictionaries and usage authorities differ on whether baloney and bologna are homophones in English. Some say both should be pronounced “baloney,” while others say bologna should be pronounced like the Italian city, Bologna (“boloan-ya”), where the sausage originates. All authorities agree that the two spellings have different meanings.
Baloney usage
Baloney is used in informal contexts to mean nonsense or foolish talk. It is an early-20th-century American coinage derived from bologna. It may also be partly derived from blarney, which in one of its definitions means nonsense or deceptive talk.
These writers use baloney well:
Not only does Main Street not believe it, a good part of Wall Street thinks it’s baloney as well. [CNBC]
Don’t give me this baloney that he applied for his retirement a long time ago. [Tonawanda News]
Baloney is often used in the phrasal adjective phony-baloney (or, in British publications, phoney-baloney)—for example:
As such, they are perfectly suited to the phoney-baloney gimmickry of 3D . . . [The Guardian]
Bologna usage
Bologna, short for bologna sausage, is a type of sausage made of finely ground meat that has been cooked and smoked. Because baloney is a legitimate word, bologna should not be used in its place. These are examples of correct bologna usage:
The meat at Gray’s Papaya tasted like burnt bologna. [NY Times Fifth Down Blog]
It was an uninspiring loaf of French bread and a ring of Oscar Mayer bologna. [Boston Globe]
