A PROPER BREAKFAST SANDWICH

From a friend I learned that a local restaurant's baked pistachio crusted Brie was divine. The same friend, for some reason, now pines for liverwurst on white bread. So his food tastes are eclectic and very broad. Something I can well appreciate. Another friend likes Thai, Burmese, Italian, and once a week a cheeseburger at Sam's. Not sure how he is about bacon or caviar. Bacon AND caviar. The San Francisco sushi roll that has yet to be invented.

This is a preamble to mentioning the Chicago Italian Beef Sandwich. Something that has never till now cropped up on my gustatory horizon, given that there are several television shows which I do not watch, and have only grudgingly accepted hoagies and Philly cheesesteaks as, arguably, food.

Sometimes, a man needs a bucket of grease on a toasted bun. Especially after midnight when one is still in one's teens and twenties and had way too many 151 rum and cokes.

For the record, I am no longer in my teens or twenties, and never developed an affection for rum and coke, no matter what the rum was. That's far too centre-of-the-country-red-trash for me. Singlemalt Scotch, one cube. Which I now abstain from, as I do all alcohol, because it might combine badly with my pills. And a nice cup of tea two or three times a day decreases one's incidents of death, per scientific research over the past twenty years.
Consider having tea instead on your next riotous night out.
You'll probably end up dead far less often.


This isn't Chicago. We don't swill Malört, don't support lousy sports teams, and don't go back to our neighborhoods in the wee hours with high powered rifles for some casual drive-by shoot-outs, because we're civilized. Faugh on deep dish pizza. Inedible!

But we do have Chicago style Italian Beef Sandwiches.

Which sound like a nice healthy alternative to a bacon chili cheese dog for late at night. Might even be good for breakfast. I don't eat breakfast, because the best way to start the day is caffeine, nicotine, and bad news from elsewhere read with minor indignation.

An Italian Beef Sandwich (which is quite unknown in Italy) consists of thinly sliced roast beef simmered with its juices ("gravy", jus) served on a French roll with giardiniera (mixed pickled vegetables) and / or pickled Greek peppers (called Italian peppers, or pepperoncini), then sloppily augmented with the pan juices (aforementioned gravy or jus).

That actually sounds pretty damned good.

Add a squirt of Sriracha.




BY THE WAY: The last five spammers calling from "American Senior Benefits" (or: Services, Agency, Offices) were Alex, Jack, Wayne, George, and Michael. Must be open enrollment time again. Somebody should go all Chicago neighborhood drive-by on their rumps.

At least two of them sounded like Surinder or Vikram from some sleazy identity theft outfit in Hyderabad or Jabalpur. Where the monsoon has started. He and his colleagues are probably bored out of their minds with the rain and the Americans they're trying to scam.
Poor bollocky bakrichodes.




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