Chicago Sandwich Canon: Breaded Steak
Hi sandwich fans! I may be an internationally recognized sandwich expert, but I have a special interest in the sandwiches and other street foods of Chicago. We’ve got your deep dish pizza, sure, and several other styles of pizza, but let’s leave those aside for now. The Chicago-style “dragged through the garden” hot dog is a masterpiece of balance, a bewilderment of different flavors and textures coming together to create the riotous sausage-inna-bun you’re all familiar with. The lesser-known “Depression dog,” using a subset of those same toppings and a blanket of fresh-cut fries has topped many a list of the country’s best hot dogs. The Maxwell Street Polish sausage pares that down further yet, combining a hot, garlicky, smoky section of kielbasa with sweet grilled onions, pungent mustard, and pickled serrano peppers that can and often do bring some serious heat. The Italian Beef sandwich, lauded as it has been recently in the national media following the success of a television show about the struggles of a family-owned Chicago sandwich shop, is still an underdog in the pantheon of great American sandwiches. And the Jibarito, created in Chicago with a heart that is purely Puerto Rican, is another of our better known street foods, swapping the bread out of a garlicky steak sandwich and subbing in crisp fried plantains.
This Chicago Sandwich Canon series often covers those sandwiches that are among the lesser known of Chicago’s street foods. Chicago–socially, culturally, culinarily–is like an iceberg. The parts you see–the Loop, Millenium Park, Navy Pier, River North, Steppenwolf Theater, the Magnificent Mile, Lincoln Park, Wrigley Field, etc.–the parts that get most of the cultural reporting, are mostly centered around the North Side and the downtown area. There is a far vaster and lesser known (at least to people elsewhere) South Side with its own cultural and culinary institutions, and most importantly, at least to this site, its own sandwich culture. Many of those sandwiches have been or will be covered in this series: the Mother-In-Law, the Freddy, the Sweet Steak, the Big Baby, the South Side Hoagy, and the Jim Shoe. A case could also be made for the Poorboy, though that does seem to be mainly a suburban phenomenon.
Today I want to talk about a sandwich that, though of South Side origin, may have become one of the better known of Chicago’s street foods,the breaded steak sandwich. This is in large part due to an article in USA Today by sports writer Ted Berg, published in 2015, that called the version served at Ricobene’s, a near-constantly-busy Armour Square eatery located a brisk walk north of Sox Park–currently called Guaranteed Rate Field–the world’s best sandwich.
A breaded steak sandwich has a lot in common with a veal parmesan sandwich, or a chicken parm, or eggplant parm–you might call it a Milanesa Parmesan in fact. It consists of thin slices of beef steak, usually cut like Milanesa from a leaner primal like a bottom round. The steak is coated in seasoned breadcrumbs and fried crisp, then served in a long roll with red sauce and, optionally, mozzarella cheese. As with many of Chicago’s sandwiches, additional condiment options include sweet peppers, which are roasted or sauteed bell peppers, or hot giardiniera, the salty, sour, spicy pickled vegetables packed in oil that feature also in the Italian Beef.
At the time of Ted Berg’s article I, along with several other of the Chicago area’s food writers–both bloggers and pros alike–all too predictably took it upon myself to clap back at Ted’s assertion. Who was this guy to tell us about our sandwiches? That very night, I went to Ricobene’s to try their version of the sandwich, that of which Ted Berg had raved…
When ordered with mozzarella cheese and hot giardiniera… the sandwich presents a combination of flavors and textures that bests every single one of the thousands of other sandwiches I’ve sampled…
Ted Berg, USA Today, “Chicago has the best sandwich in the world and most people don’t even know it.”
I didn’t have the same experience of the sandwich that Ted did.
The next day I went to now-defunct Johnny O’s in Bridgeport–suggested to me by friend of the site Michael Gebert, he of the weekly Chicago culinary buzz lists on fooditor.com–and tried both their breaded steak sandwich and their infamous Mother-in-Law.
While there I spent an entertaining hour sitting and chatting with Johnny O himself, the late John Veliotis, who never met a stranger and could talk the ears off a cornfield. It was a better experience overall than the frantic busyness of Ricobene’s had been, despite having had excellent company there as well, but more to the point: it was a better breaded steak sandwich. I wrote a piece responding to Ted Berg’s claim called “On Sandwiches And Hyperbole” and, while I still think it was a good piece, I can’t entirely stand by it anymore.
Hot takes are boring, it’s true. But while Ted’s piece may have been a hot take, it was at least a positive one. He was passionately talking up something he enjoyed without talking down anything or anybody else. And in defending what I perceived as my territory, sandwiches in general but specifically Chicago sandwiches–and swinging around my self-bestowed “Internationally Recognized Sandwich Expert” status–I did something that I have mostly avoided in this space, and broke a rule that I have since set for myself–I went negative. It was more snarky than hurtful but still unnecessary and rude.
Ted seems like a great guy, and he didn’t deserve the blowback he got. I’m glad he’s so passionate about a South Side Chicago sandwich! The good news is that though my response may have irked Ted initially, he’s over it and we are now online besties.
The bad news is, that I just went back to Ricobene’s hoping for a big redemption arc and… I’m sorry. The sandwich was still not great. The flavors were good but the proportions and construction excessive, with too much steak and too much cheese and too much sauce and not enough bread to contain it all. It’s the kind of sandwich that you end up wearing as much as eating.
Ted, next time you’re in town let me know and I’ll take you out for a breaded steak sandwich that I hope will open your eyes to possibilities outside Ricobene’s. Most of the best spots in town to get one are no farther from Sox Park than Ricobene’s is, and in fact a few are even closer.
Take for example this Italian deli in the South Side Bridgeport neighborhood where most of the best breaded steak sandwiches in town are served. In 2015 when I visited, a few months after the aforementioned foofooraw, the signage on the side of the building called it Soluri & Sons rather than Nonna Soluri’s but the latter name will more reliably point you to the place these days. It’s about a mile from Sox Park, same as Ricobene’s but west and a little north rather than due north. Their breaded steak sandwich was also quite sloppy, featuring an excess of sauceand sliced, rather than shredded, mozzarella cheese. The proportions were more manageable though, with a single layer of steak folded over rather than multiple, allowing the bread to close around the meat and retain the sandwich fillings more successfully. The brightness of Nonna Soluri’s sauce also seemed a more complementary accompaniment to the umami-heavy meat and cheese of the sandwich.
Nonna Soluri’s would be a pretty good spot to scratch that breaded steak itch. Even better, maybe, would be Kathy De’s, just west of the ballpark, practically next door, a mere 8 minute walk from the gate, a seemingly nondescript building on an otherwise residential block that would be nearly indestinguishable from the homes around it if it were not for the neatly umbrellaed tables out front.
Kathy De’s version of the sandwich had, on my recent inaugural trip, some passing similarities to the Ricobene’s sandwich. There are multiple layers of steak, plenty of a deeper rust-colored, well-simmered red sauce and shredded cheese. It, like Ricobene’s, comes double-wrapped, though in butcher paper rather than foil.
Yet Kathy De’s appears, at least to me, to be executed at a higher level than Ricobene’s. Perhaps this is an artifact of how constantly busy Ricobene’s is. Maybe the staff at Kathy De’s are simply afforded more time to treat each sandwich with due care. The cheese is melted. The sandwich is wrapped tightly, the steak folded and coiled in such a way as to be completely contained by the bread. It’s not exactly a *neat* sandwich but it is far more well-constructed and contained than most others I’ve tried.
Even down here in the sticks where I live, miles and miles from Sox Park in the South/Southwest suburbs, we have many a tasty version of the breaded steak sandwich. My personal favorite comes from a deli in Palos Park, IL called Frangella, where I can honestly say I’ve never gotten a bad sandwich.
Another nearby deli, Rubino’s, has had their rendition of the breaded steak sandwich, or “sangwich,” featured on Chicago’s Best, a local show exploring the area’s favorite street foods.
But if we were going to stay in the vicinity of Sox Park, I can’t think of a better place to go get one than this, recommended to me by friend of the site–and another one of those local food writers who pushed back on Ted’s article back in the day–Chuck Sudo. Chuck has a number of favorites in his neighborhood of Bridgeport, and if I’d tried every breaded steak sandwich he recommended to me I would not have been able to complete this article on time. But he seems to have a special affection for this place, Gio’s Cafe & Deli, which is just a block or two west and south of Ricobene’s, off the main commercial strips, holding down a quiet, shady corner in a residential neighborhood.
Gio’s combines a small market with a deli and cafe–drinks in a cooler and shelves of European dry goods for grab-and-go type sales, but also red-checked tablecloths, cruets of basil-infused olive oil for use with their bread service, a dine-in waitress to enhance what could otherwise be a window-order experience. I went there recently with Mindy and, on Chuck’s suggestion, tried both their fried mozzarella and the breaded steak sandwich.
The fried mozzarella, like any order of mozzarella sticks, comes breaded and fried crisp, served with a ramekin of marinara sauce for dipping. These are not sticks though, but thick triangular wedges of cheese, breaded with fine breadcrumbs rather than the coarser panko style, coated thoroughly but thinly and fried with a competence that leaves these greaseless and crisp, bursting with stretchy hot mozzarella, ready for their cheese-pull closeups.
As for the breaded steak, upon first glance I didn’t have high hopes. The shredded mozzarella was strewn in a solid layer atop the steak, with additional sauce ladled over it, but was still visibly unmelted. However, by the time I took a few pictures, divided the sandwich onto two plates–half for me, half for Mindy–and put the hot giardiniera I’d ordered on the side into my half, the cheese-which was room temperature rather than still cold–had begun melting and coalescing, pulling in thin strands out the end of the sandwich with each bite the way a mot sandwich with red sauce and mozzarella in it should.
The crusty baguette was crisp enough on the outside to provide satisfying crunch while being soft yet sturdy enough within to conform around the sandwich’s fillings and contain them. It was overstuffed enough not to completely close on top but reasonably-proportioned enough not to fall apart 2 bites in. It was not a neat sandwich–and I don’t think any breaded steak can be, not while remaining satisfying for the kind of South Side appetite that is its target audience.
So hit me up, Ted, and I’d be happy to buy you a sandwich and have a friendly chat. And maybe while we’re at it I can let you in on some of the other great sandwich secrets hidden on Chicago’s South Side!
I like sandwiches.
I like a lot of other things too but sandwiches are pretty great
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