Talk:Italian Beef/Archive

message: Replying .... (my responses, line by line, are indented and placed behind
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Makes it a little easier to keep straight who said what
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Whoever wrote this article was a total asshat. 6/29/2005 -(Edit by 65.207.129.252)
  > Fuck you too, deep and hard.
:: I am going to do a re-write shortly. First off I often see cheese on Italian Beefs as an option.
  > Comment: Live in Chicago, have gotten well into adulthood without once
  > ever hearing somebody call one of those "an Italian beef". It's a mistake
  > that brands the person making it a poseur; a non-local trying to pass
  > himself off as a local.
  > It is called "an Italian beef sandwich". Never "a beef", or "an italian
  > beef" or "the Italian beef" (darned pretentious, that one, for something
  > that never rises above the level of comfort food; one almost pictures
  > a maitre d dropping by with a bottle of French's)
In addition to lots of small corner dog and beef places that serve it, most of the big chains like Portillos and Rosati's in the Chicago area also serve cheese on their beefs. Who is disputing that this is common? 
  > Answer: I am. Local boy, grew up on the real thing, which is not to
  > be confused with what you're going to get at a chain restaurant.
  > You really thought that you were getting traditional home cooking
  > at the chains? Well, why not, I suppose. If you idiots think that
  > ad copy is an authoritative source of information, then this really
  > isn't any more ridiculous. It's equally ridiculous.
Second ,the article shouldn't be about what an Italian Beef isn't, but what an Italian Beef is.
  >  The article will be about what the most persistant people decide it's
  >  going to be about, which is the whole problem with Wikipedia. But if
  >  one's goal is to inform, instead of to stake out turf, then correcting
  >  misconceptions is a part of the job.
:::Adding in edit: http://www.rosatispizza.com/store_menu.asp?State=IL&StoreID=1602 There is the Italian Beef with cheese listed as a cheef on Rosati's Menu, http://www.portillos.com/portillos/menu/items.asp?SID=35&MID=23 is the beef and cheddar croissant, a beef on a crossant as opposed to french bread with cheddar.
  > which ought to tip you off, right there, that you're seeing something
  > a corporate chef made up, and not the traditional item. Croissants?
  > Have you ever even been to Chicago?
  > *GROAN* I'm guessing that if you ever get to Rome, you'll
  >  try to go look up where the Olive Garden got some of its recipes,
  >  right? I know you guys are a few slices short of a loaf, but
  >  how hard can it be for you to grasp that a commercial product
  >  is not the same thing as a traditional dish?
  >  Jesus Christ. What's next? Going to Taco Bell to find out how
  >  Mexican food is REALLY made? Please tell me that this is a put on.
A lot of the mom and pop stops don't have menu's, but suffice it to say Italian Beefs with cheese are common and far from unheard of.
  > Is so - is not. You're full of crap, and anybody who lives here can see
  > that with his own two eyes, in a manner which will leave little room for
  > doubt. But this was the problem with Usenet in its heyday, and as
  > Wikipedia seems to be a concentrated form of Usenet, not surprisingly,
  > it's a problem on this site as well - there is no remedy for the damage
  > done to the process of discussion by the pathological bullshit artists
  > who drop by. In the end, kids, you either turn off the fucking computer,
  > and check these claims out in the real world, not to be confused with
  > the Web, or the whole thing becomes one giant exercise in cooperative
  > solipsism, with the group defining its own reality into existence,
  > and the members citing each other's claims as evidence in support of
  > their own. But getting out of the house and seeing the truth for oneself
  > would be "original research", wouldn't it?
  > Enjoy your 15 minutes of semi-anonymous fame, chilluns. People
  > eventually figured out that Usenet had become a huge pile of steaming,
  > politically driven crap, and sooner or later, they'll figure out the
  > same holds true for Wikipedia, only more so.
                - the noneditor
-(Edit by 67.167.117.10)
:Yeah, where are you getting you information?
:"topped with the vegetables it was cooked with."
:I've never seen a place top an italian beef with vegtables it was cooked with. BTW, I've lived in Evanston my whole life. Reub2000 3 July 2005 13:06 (UTC)
     - Wonder how many times I have to write this, you incredible nitwit?
       I'm a local. Firsthand experience.
       As the Italian Beef sandwich is poor people's food from the South
       Side, yes, I could easily believe that somebody from the North Shore,
       aka "rich anglo saxon central", would never have seen the real thing.
       Nevertheless, the authentic item is what it is, and you're not going
       to get it from a fast food franchise.
When can I remove the vfd template? Reub2000
:Nobody has said anything, so I'm removing it.Reub2000 22:00, 5 Jan 2005 (UTC)

message: If it's not on a restaurant menu, it doesn't exist? Having read the comments
from somebody who thought that claiming lifelong residence in Evanston, of
all places, established him as an authority on working class food, I guess
I can understand why you might thing that.
Hard as it may be for some of you to understand, poor people tend to do this
thing called "cooking their own food", because going out to eat costs a lot
of money by their standards, even at relatively cheap places. So, where would
you suggest that I look for "documentation" of what working class people did
in their own kitchens?
As for your own sources, I repeat astonishment at what some of you consider
to be authoritative sources. A traditional Chicago specialty specifically'
calls for Vienna Beef products, and has since the 1930s. "How do you know that?",
I ask. "The Vienna Beef people said so, in their advertising".
God help us all. You can't really be that stupid, can you? Do you think maybe
the Vienna Beef people would have a slight vested interest in getting the
suckers to fall for that one? But of course we already had somebody claiming
to be a Chicagoan who carelessly announced that his bedtime was coming up,
forgetting that the archive would record the time of his remarks - about
3 in the afternoon, Chicago time.
Stranger and stranger. Interesting to notice how much of the earlier comments have been cut, including that rather embarassing slip up by that alleged local. Afraid to let people see the truth?
:Did I ever claim to be an authority on Italian Beef? Also, last time I checked, Chicago is walking distance from my house, so what's wrong with Evanston? Reub2000 02:44, 17 July 2005 (UTC)
thread_title:  sigh