Chicago-style Food- the Italian Beef

Here's a small tribute to the best food in the world- Chicago-style food!!!

Let's start with one of my favs- the Italian beef sandwich. On a french or Italian roll, plain or toasted, with or without garlic butter- Gonnella bread is the best.

Next comes the beef. Vienna brand beef. Beautifully slow-cooked and spiced Italian beef that is actually from lesser-cuts, but once it's slow-roasted it will literally melt in your mouth and with no rubbery fat- just pure beef, juicy and tender. Now you have the choice of how you want your beef. If you want it real juicy ask for it "wet" and they'll take your sandwich in tongs and dip the whole sandwich, bread and all, into the au jus.

El Pasoans will understand this next step. You just HAVE to have giardeneira on it. That's pickled jalapeno slices, pickled carrots,pickled sliced celery, pickled cauliflower(some mixes), and/or pickled sliced sport peppers (serrano)in a delicious hot pickling sauce- it's chopped bite-size and is almost as important an ingredient as the beef.

Next comes the sweet peppers. These are blanched green peppers (boiled for 1-2 minutes then thrust into ice cold water to stop the cooking process). They taste nice and sweet and are not too crunchy and not too soggy- just perfect for Italian beefs or Italian sausage sandwiches with marinara sauce- another Chicago Italian specialty.

A good beef will never be fatty and you'll eat it so fast because it melts in your mouth and because they can be messy if you like 'em wet- but don't worry- no one's looking while you eat it to see how messy you are- they're gulping down their own as fast as they can!

The best beefs in Chicago are at Portillo's, Zippy's, Al's Beef (Taylor St), and MY fav- Johnnie's Beef in Elmwood Park, Il. Johnnie's Beef has a "beef nazi" taking your order- just like the soup nazi on Seinfeld- you better know what you want and how you want it when you're next or you'll be skipped over. These guys are serious- there are usually lines traveling half-way around the building to get in. They only have an ordering counter and a counter opposite to eat at- there are a few picnic tables outside and people eat there or in their cars when inside is full. The weekends there's actually security guards to keep order. Oh- you also have to have a real Italian Ice when you go to Chicago- Johnnie's has 'em, of course.

You can go to Chicago for this wonderful food for the true experience, or you can even order it online and they'll ship it to you on dry ice ready to heat and serve through Lou Malnati's Pizzeria, a famous Chicago restaurant that has partnered with other Chicago favorites for ex-pats and other lovers of authentic Chicago-style food at http://www.loutogo.com/

http://www.youtube.com/watch?v=l8yVjXKVDQ8&NR=1