Long Italian roll with meat, tuna etc. and lettuce, tomatoes, onions, oil, oregano, salt, pepper and sometimes hot or sweet peppers. Never pickles. That was invented by Subway. (They can't even cut the rolls right!). Other places have similar sandwiches but they are all slightly different. People claim everything is in the bread. Amoroso makes a lot of hoagie and steak rolls. In Atlantic City, the Italian bread is slightly crustier on the outside and more dense on the inside.

Many stories have circulated about the origins of "hoagies". Basically, shops that catered to the Hog Island and Navy Yard workers started to call the sandwiches "hoagies".

• Hoagie..Italian, Tuna, Cheese, Steak, Turkey, Roast Beef, Kosher..etc
• Sub... the same
• Submarine Sandwich...the same
• Hero...the same
• Grinder...usually with cheese that's melted under the broiler.
• Zep...only in Norristown. It does not have lettuce!
• Poor Boy..distant cousin. Soft round hamburger roll. Forget it.

These are soft pretzels. In fact, people in Philadelphia give their teething babies soft pretzels. Twisted in oblong shape and assembled in sheets of 10 or 12 wide. They're dipped in lye then baked and covered with kosher salt. They are made in oblong in shape, unlike the round ones they sell in New York and are made in strips. The vendors break off 3 or 5 and stuff them in a brown paper bag and sell them 3 or 5 for a $1.00. Late in the day you can negotiate a bargain.

Now this is the part the rest of America doesn't understand: Mustard!

You gotta smear mustard on the top of the pretzel. Cheap yellow mustard, not Dijon or Gulden's Golden mustard. Everyone has a little different style in applying mustard to their pretzel. Could be made into a personality test and I am sure the psychology department at University of Pennsylvania has studied this in depth.

There was an expose of the cleanliness of the pretzel vendors. They started to wear gloves, but that didn't last long. Don't worry about your health. The mustard acts as a anti-bacterial agent. If they individually wrapped the pretzels, it would be more sanitary, but it wouldn't be the same. Philadelphia pretzels are the closest thing to third world street food.

The frozen pretzels they sell all over America thanks to J&J Foods are barely acceptable compared to the street variety, but there's a price to pay for convenience.

Cheese Steaks

You can get them everywhere. And you can get it without cheese. That's just a steak sandwich. The "tourist places" are Pat's, Geno's (9th and Passyunk) and Jim's Steaks on South Street. Make sure you order provolone not Cheese Wiz and get onions and sauce (Pizza sauce). A pizza steak is one made with mozzarella cheese and sauce. Extras are fried onions, peppers or mushrooms. Here's the  basic recipe.

Scrapple..made from corn meal and pork trimmings. Order it "well done and hard" and eat it with ketchup If you like sausage, you'll like scrapple. Don't listen to the rumors..

Taylor's Pork Roll

Grill it and serve with ketchup. Serve on a hamburger bun.Or serve with eggs for breakfast. Lot's of food stands "down the shore" sell Taylor Pork Roll sandwiches. There is also Case's  Pork Roll. Here's a link to the Pork Roll Express!  And here a story by Rick Nichols about Pork Roll that appeared in the Philadelphia Inquirer Jan '05.

Trenton Oyster Crackers

Little round crackers that they serve in bowls in restaurants with horseradish. Not like the flat oyster cracker they serve in Boston. You can barely get the horseradish to stay on top and then they hardly fit in your mouth. Make sure you have a glass of water or beer ready.

Tastykakes

Little snack cakes and pies.

Pies...they're oblong not round. Fit in lunch boxes and your hand better. Try the lemon, french apple or peach.

• Krimpets...three little sponge cakes. Jelly Krimpets are filled with jelly or with Butterscotch Krimpets are iced with butterscotch icing. Incidentally the cats love to lick the butterscotch icing off the wrapper.
• Kandy Kakes...little flat cakes with a layer of peanut butter and enrobed in chocolate coating. They also make Chocolate which have a mint flavored filling. Blah.
• Chocolate Cup Cakes. The richest tasting devil's food cake with the best icing.
• Coconut Juniors...two layer vanilla sponge cake with icing. They also make chocolate juniors and lemon juniors.


Tastykake has a gift pack
that ships anywhere for around $25.

Regular pretzels (80% of pretzels eaten in the US used to be made and eaten within 100 miles of Philadelphia) enrobed with chocolate. There's dark chocolate, milk chocolate and white chocolate (which is really vanilla flavored compound). I used to market Scrumples Frosted Mini Pretzels.

Bite sized pieces of peanut candies which are chocolate covered. These have been around for a million years. I could live on Peanut Chews and halvah! 

 

 

We found very old Peanut Chew box when we were renovating the Keswick Theatre. Looks like it was from the '40s.
 

Pepper Pot Soup. Made with okra and tripe. Don't ask what tripe is if you don't know!

Chip Beef on Toast. Also known as SOS. Served with home fries. The Melrose Diner knows how to make this perfectly.

Levis Champ Cherry Soda. So delicious, I bought the company!

Frank's Black Cherry Wishniak. Philadelphia is the only area where they know was this is. Other Black Cherry soda are the same, but they're not "wishniaks".

The Combo at Levis Hot Dogs

Hot Dog and Fish Cake on a bun. The poor man's surf and turf.

Not be be confused with the French restaurant. Another hot dog place that's out of business. Used to grill the hot dogs and have a great orange drink with little pieces of orange pulp.

You have to go to 9th Street and buy them at Termini Brothers.

I like egg bagels! (the bagels that everybody else makes are water bagels) And I buy mine at Gold Medal bakery on 3rd Street at Brown. Brown street is about 2 blocks north of Fairmount Ave. Make a day and go to Tapas, a restaurant a few blocks further north at Girard Ave. They have valet parking and will make sure you car is not messed with.

Stock's is an old fashioned neighborhood bakery in Port Richmond. Beautiful and delicious birthday and wedding cakes and big pound cake loafs are their specialty. It's about a block off Richmond Street on Lehigh Ave. It's the best pound cake you'll ever have!

Located on 3rd Street at Poplar (Between Fairmount and Girard). This is within walking distance of my grandmother's old grocery store at 309 Fairmount Ave. One day we went to Marshall Street to get chickens and the next day we went to Gold Medal. Real Egg bagels! Real Black Bread and of course rye bread "mit kimmel". It's hard to spend $10 here.

Little company makes Polish Kielbasa (It's not "i") Located off I-95 at the Allegheny Ave. exit. They're on Tilton Street which is a little side street. Expects lines at Easter.

If you want a real 50's experience, this is the place. Waitresses with starched white uniforms. Little rolls with pats of butter. Real food like hot apple pie with vanilla sauce and rice pudding with raisins. How come all these Greek owned diners don't put raisons in their rice pudding. Located on Frankford Ave. a few blocks north of Cottman Street. (Rt. 73 west of I-95)


 

No wisecracks- Just don't ask what- but here's someone who knows more about food in Philadelphia: