June 23, 2008
Platters of splatter: Comparing notes with Ian Froeb
In late May (on the 21st to be exact), Riverfront Times food critic Ian Froeb announced, via his Gut Check blog, an end to his "Cheesesteak Quest," having found what he believed to be the most authentic Philidelphia cheesesteak in St. Louis. Froeb decided that, thanks in part to its "perfectly carmelized onions and nuclear-orange shade of Cheez Whiz," 9th Street Deli's "Just Like Philly" sandwich deserved the coveted title of St. Louis' champion cheesesteak. After finishing Froeb's review, I hopped in my car and steered its crooked hood ornament toward Shenandoah Avenue, where 9th Street Deli and its critically-acclaimed, grease-bomb cheesesteaks are located.
While Ian Froeb might have been on a quest, inspired by a reader's letter inquiring which St. Louis restaurant serves the best cheesesteak, my long-time cheesesteak binging is unsolicited. I've been gorging myself on cheesesteaks ever since my senior year of high school when my best friend Lacy and I visited Philidelphia and made a midnight stop at Pat's King of Steaks, the restaurant that invented the cheesesteak. We left converts, covered in Cheez Whiz and whispering that the slop from Pat's King of Steaks was even better than the records we'd scored at Zipperhead.
Like Froeb, I've sampled the Natural Fact's Philly cheesesteak as well as Penn Station's. They're good (my best culinary evaluation), but topped with a thick slab of cream cheese, gravy, pickles and onions, Mom's Deli's Beef and Philly is even better. More than once, I've convinced other customers waiting during the Mom's lunch-hour rush to abandon their orders of Charlie's or Dad's Specials and go for the gravy pleasure that is a Beef and Philly. I've also choked down Subway's Philly, and Froeb's description of Sonic's Philly - "resembled a dessimated turd" - applies here as well. Not exactly manna from Heaven. And the Philly Grill in Rock Hill, a restaurant that could've doubled as a police substation judging from the fleet of cop cars chronically idling in its parking lot, came and went before I ever got a chance to try one of its cheesesteaks. Passing out free sandwiches to law officials is just bad business strategy, I guess.
Anyway, my first attempt to go to 9th Street Deli was a flop. Not realizing the dipshittedly obvious: Shenandoah dead ends at the Missouri Botanical Garden, and 9th Street Deli is actually located on the other side of Shenandoah in Soulard, I drove dazedly up and down side streets before begrudgingly caving and heading to work. On the Friday of Memorial Day weekend, I persuaded my boyfriend that we should go to 9th Street Deli for lunch. But when we got there, a handwritten sign was posted in the window saying the store had closed early because of Memorial Day. Faced with my second aborted attempt to wolf down St. Louis' best Philly cheesesteak, I had what probably qualifies, for a 22-year-old, as a tantrum.