ALLENTOWN IS NICE: Wit brie and capers

Friday, April 4, 2008

Wit brie and capers

The other day I mentioned a WIP radio promotion on chesesteaks -- something I had vaguely remembered hearing while taking a nap as I drove up the Turnpike between here & Q-town.

I'm not a big WIP fan usually. If I want to be screamed at I could just stay home. (Just kidding, honey, that never happens.) But I do like to hear as much as possible about the Phillies this time of year and the "talk" keeps me awake in the car, sometimes as far as Vera Cruz. After that the rumble strips take over.

This morning, I looked at the Web site. It's "Glen Macnow's Ultimate Cheesesteak Challenge." He and some interns went to 45 places, had a cheesesteak with onions and provolone and rated them.

His Top Ten: 1) John’s Roast Pork, 14 East Snyder Avenue; 2) Steve’s Prince of Steaks, 7200 Bustleton Avenue; 3) Chink’s, 6030 Torresdale Avenue, Philadelphia; 4) Talk of the Town, 3020 S Broad Street; 5) Grey Lodge Pub, 6235 Frankford Avenue; 6) Slack’s Hoagie Shack, 2499 Aramingo Avenue; 7) Sonny’s Famous Steaks, 228 Market Street; 8) Tony Luke’s, 39 East Oregon Avenue; 9) White House Sub Shop, Mississippi and Arctic Avenue, Atlantic City; 10) Dalessandro’s, 600 Wendover Ave. (Roxborough).

I've only been to four of the Top 10 (1, 3, 4 and 8) and they are all great. Regrettably at John's Roast Pork, I didn't have a steak. Some I've never heard of and some I just don't get -- Slacks (a chain and a WIP sponsor), and going all the way to Atlantic City for a sandwich. But it's not my list.

Here's all 45: http://www.610wip.com/pages/351421.php

Some notables: Jim's, 12; Rick's, 30; Geno's, 35; Pat's, 42. My, um, gut tells me Jim's and Rick's should be higher and Pat's and Geno's are about right.

The photo shows John Kerry daintily nibbling his steak with SWISS CHEESE at Pat's. Beyond the forbidden topping, the steak also appears to be covered with lettuce and tomatoes. A hoagie steak sighting! More a rookie mistake than a true faux pas. Anyone else would have been sent to the back of the line. Kerry at least had a steak. Neither Clinton nor Obama has had one yet on the campaign trail, according to the Daily News. Obama actually turned one down. ... OK that's about as political as this non-political blog gets.

1 comment:

Anonymous said...: see, the first mistake was wit provolone. The only way to judge is wit wiz.

Ed Rendell has a routine about how to eat the perfect cheese steak:
-crappy meat: don't even attempt to make it grade A
-wit wiz: it gets into all the nooks and crannies (his words, i swear)
-don't drain the grease from the onions

I shall always take the word of Rendell on this matter. The guy has made a 2nd career out of cheese steak commentary.; April 5, 2008 at 10:36 PM

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Meanwhile ...

... A group of Allentonians has traveled into the past in an attempt to kill the demon Marge before she comes to Allentown and destroys the city. However, they have repeatedly failed in those attempts. They have bungled them so badly, in fact, that they have created an Alternate Timeline in which Marge lives quietly in her chalet in Turkey and calls herself Mrs. Egram, in which she never eats her brother Ronan and in which she becomes a significantly less evil demon than the one that is destroying Allentown in the present. The time travelers -- demon hunter extraordinaire Maximillian A. Bear, his son Max Jr. (formerly the polar bear cub spirit Max), Karl, the Green Guy and Truman (the ghost who was transformed into a flying polar bear rug when he escaped from Marge via the Secret Room time portal) -- find themselves trapped in Alternate Time, having run afoul of the Crows (principally through eating several of them) who previously had assisted in their journeys through time. The time travelers have joined with Mrs. Egram in an attempt to travel to non-Alternate Allentown to stop Marge in the present time, where St. Michael the Archangel struggles with steroid detoxification as he continues to be locked in mortal combat with Marge in the streets of downtown Allentown, which has largely been transformed into a smoldering ruin. Meanwhile still-unemployed super agent Jack Bauer and a small band of followers have traveled to Parallel time to battle a new enemy to heaven itself -- the deceased actor Paul Newman, or so they believe. Newman took control of Parallel heaven and initiated the celestial lockdown protocols, blocking travel to and from Parallel Time. However one portal remains open -- that guarded by the mysterious Old Donovan in a forgotten comfort station deep beneath downtown Allentown. It was believed that Newman seized Parallel Heaven after drugging Jesus with tainted tortilla chips; however, a new story seems to be emerging. The Bauer party, however, has been separated, with Bauer traveling to the Parallel Antarctic Vatican; Atown-Liker ending up in the TV Chef Network Studios, where he is reunited with the Countess of Monaco, who has be retransformed from a sea monster back into a woman who sort of looks like a sea monster; and the Player washing up at Parallel Atown Liker's headquarters. Also, Rudolph and Gen. Trexler have been banished to hell for not answering Old Donovan's questions correctly and Bubbles, the little angel, was banished to the Macungies. Their fates will be determined at some point in a flashback. Meanwhile, Bauer has learned that Newman is not his target. The enemy of heaven is actually the Crows, who are attempting to bring about the Apocalypse through the use of an ancient holy artifact being guarded at the South Pole by Parallel Pope Boneyface. Meanwhile, while in Parallel Time, non-Parallel Atown-Liker was nosing around Parallel Atown-Liker's headquarters where he either had a massive hallucination or was transported to Dickensian London via a Secret Armoire. Meanwhile, the Irish warrior Cuchulainn remains dead after being mortally wounded by Trexler; and the Spanish Armada, led by turncoat Archangel Gabriel, remains quiet after being defeated by an underwater assault by Trexler and the frightening firepower of Santa's Battle Sleigh 1. With the help of Little Ronan (a.k.a. Parallel Time-Alternate Timeline Purgatory Ronan) and [[[Spoiler Alert!]]] Rudolph, Santa recovered sufficiently enough from depression, substance abuse and the death of Prancer to deliver the goods on Christmas. Meanwhile, the fate of Ponzi remains unclear. Previously Newman sent his small dog into Parallel Time to ingratiate himself with President Madoff and to steal Madoff's investment fund. Ponzi was forced into hiding after angering Kevin Bacon, the Muppet Bert and some TV chefs who have vowed to cook and eat him.