First stop: Campos Deli (214 Market Street, Philadelphia, PA), the official cheesesteak of local sports teams. Campos has a family-friendly feeling, it’s got the cozy-chain vibe: branded t-shirts behind the counter, tchotchke on the walls and a few cafe tables. I tried the cheesesteak hoagie (steak, cheese, onions, lettuce and tomato for $9.25) and the chicken heater (Chicken, Jalapeno cheddar and hot sauce $7.75). The cheese steak hoagie was by far the better. It had the meaty savory appeal I was looking for with some vegetable to keep it varied. The heater was decently spicy, but was pretty one-dimensional after the steak: spicy chicken, bite after bite. Something about the whole experience left me feeling a little duped. After I ordered I was asked if I wanted a side of cole slaw or pasta salad. Where’s the focus? Where’s the grit? It felt a little like a reproduction, as if I was in vegas at the “cheesesteak experience”.

Nearly bursting and with my vision fogged from eating, I stumbled down a few doors to stop number 2, Sonny’s Famous Steaks (228 Market Street, Philadelphia, PA). Something about this place struck me as more authentic immediately: no bric-a-brac, just a few tables, a meat slicer and a flat-top grill. The menu didn’t have any salads or vegetarian options, just meat, cheese and onions, focused and simple. I ordered my whiz-wit and didn’t get any weird up-sell, just a delicious sandwich. To be honest, I was so full, I couldn’t sit there and eat another. I took it home and man was I mad. I’d fallen for a trap. Sonny’s cheesesteak was incredible and it was exactly what I’d wanted a cheesesteak to be. It was over-the-top creamy and savory. Every bite was a warm blanket, a pair of warm socks, heated car seats. There was no excess cheese, no dripping grease. This may be the best cheesesteak I’ve ever had. How could I have filled up on lettuce and tomatoes and spicy chicken. Spicy chicken! I was ashamed. Though I was beyond full, I relished every cozy bite.

It seems to me as if Campo’s sold some tasty cheesesteaks, but then got popular, started diversifying, securing sports endorsements and making pasta salad. I don’t want to hold their success against them, but I can’t shake the feeling the at the experience is a bit manufactured. I had another day in Philly, I would’ve returned to Campo’s to try their whiz-wit and see if they still had it. Until then, I’ll return to Sonny’s and get what I should’ve gotten all along.

Campos is slightly higher on complexity of the Hoagie (lettuce, tomatoes)

Sonnys kept it simple

Sonny’s Wiz Wit

Chicken Heater

Cheesesteak Hoagie

Cheesteake Hoagie up close. Yum

Braising takes forever and makes delicious tender meat. The hardest part was not devouring the braised short-ribs right out of the pot. I recommend never making this by yourself or you’ll have no one to hold you back. Also, I’d double or quadrupple the recipe: you’ll want 3rds and leftovers. They’re good enough, don’t worry!

Get shoppin and make some NOW, before winter ends!

Here’s the recipe:
Braised Short Rib Sandwiches with Pickled carmelized onions and argula

This didn’t last long:

The only thing you can’t see is the restraint:

We made a handful of delicious meatball sandwiches and along the way we discovered a few things.

• Meatball Mystery 1: Meatballs are not very hard to make. These took about an hour, which is well worth it for this level of delicious (a lot).
• Meatball Mystery 2: Homemade meatballs taste much better than the deli variety. They are more tender inside, they are a little smaller (in this case) and most importantly, they haven’t been sitting around feeling lonely all day. When your meatballs feel good, you feel good. You can heat them up with the sauce and avoid the wild temperature fluctuation that sometimes happen at delis.
• Meatball Mystery 3: They are much easier to eat when you don’t have excess sauce. By serving just the right amount of sauce, you can avoid soaking the bread all the way through and worrying that it’ll fall apart in your hands. I know I’m not the only meatball sub eater who has day-nightmares about stuffing meatballs into my mouth with my hands becuase the bread has disintegrated under too much hot tomato sauce. It’s horrible! Serve some sauce in the sandwich and in a little bowl on the side in case you want more half-wich through.

Meatball Sandwich Recipe (adapted from Cooks Illustrated “Classic Spaghetti and Meatballs “, published Jan 1 1998):

Meatballs
2 slices white sandwich bread (crusts discarded), torn into small cubes
1/2 cup buttermilk or 6 tablespoons plain yogurt thinned with 2 tablespoons sweet milk
3/4 pound ground beef chuck ( or 1 pound if omitting ground pork below)
1/4 pound ground pork (to be mixed with ground chuck)
1/4 cup grated Parmesan cheese
2 tablespoons minced fresh parsley leaves
1 large egg yolk
1 small clove garlic , minced (1 teaspoon)
3/4 teaspoon table salt
Ground black pepper
vegetable oil for pan-frying (about 1 1/4 cups)
Instructions:
1) Mix bread parts and buttermilk in a bowl and mix with a fork until pasty.
2) Mix all ingredients in another bowl (including the result of step 1). Mix lightly with your hands. Use a spoon to grab the mixture and roll 1.5″ diameter balls in your hands.
3) In a large saucepan, add vegetable oil until it’s about 1/4″ deep. Heat until it sizzles when meatballs are added. Brown meatballs on all sides. When finished, set them aside on paper towels. Don’t let the oil smoke or it’s too hot.

Simple Tomato Sauce
2 tablespoons extra-virgin olive oil
1 teaspoon minced garlic
1 can (28 ounces) crushed tomatoes
1 tablespoon minced fresh basil leaves
Table salt and ground black pepper
Instructions:
1) Throw out the oil in the meatball pan, saving the bits on the bottom.
2) Brown the garlic in new olive oil, in the same pan.
3) Add all other ingredients. Simmer until sauce thickens, about 12 minutes.

Sandwiches:
1 loaf soft italian bread
Parmesan cheese, sliced and grated
basil, chopped

1) Add the cold meatballs back to the sauce to warm up.
2) Cut the bread into 8-9″ sections and add small slices of Parmesan cheese.
3) Toast the bread to melt the cheese.
4) Add 3-4 meatballs per sandwich and spoon a light portion of sauce ontop. Sprinkle on top with basil and grated Parmesan cheese.
5) Enjoy!

Raw, delicious meatballs:

Sizzle:

Heating with sauce:

The completed sub:

Laid open:

It looks bigger from this angle:

This recipe comes from the incredibly in-depth book, Beautiful Breads and Fabulous Fillings: The Best Sandwiches in America (Amazon link), by Margaux Sky. The book has great recipes and great photos, but horrible cooking instructions. It’s one of the few sandwich books I’ve read that the writer’s love for sandwiches seeps through each and every page, like the way marinara sauce leaks through the bread of a meatball sub, even though you ate as fast as you could. Each sandwich recipe in the book starts with a reference to the correct bread to use and includes directions to make your own mayonnaise, mustard and ketchup. That’s what I call thorough! Simply Sandwiches wants to make air-sandwiches (“high-five”) with you, Margaux Sky!

Sky scopes open-faced eggplant parm as:

• butter
• sliced eggplant, peeled
• flour
• shredded Parmesan cheese
• marinara sauce (home made, with book recipe)
• French bread (home made, with book recipe)

Making the sandwiches themselves was relatively simple: pat the flour on the eggplant and fry in boiling butter. Cover in cheese, melt and put on buttered bread topped with marinara sauce. The long haul was making the bread, as always. The bread is sweet, delicious and chewy. The marina sauce was a bit too sweet (I forgot to add the red wine), but the sandwiches turned out tasty.

Naturally, you can substitute a soft Italian hero and canned marinara sauce, if you’re LAZY.

Sweet, lumpy ‘wich foundation:

Eggplant Parm 1: Like an incredible robot-person sent from the future to save you

Eggplant Parm 2: I’ll be back (for leftovers)