Italian Beef At The Dog House

My fascination with the Italian beef sandwich stems from a PBS documentary called Sandwiches That You Will Like. In it, the author travels all over the country looking at local sandwiches that make each area tasty and unique. Maine has the lobster roll, Philadelphia has the cheesesteak, Buffalo has the beef on weck, and Chicago has the Italian beef. Originally started by Italian immigrants as a way to use cheaper, tougher cuts of meat in the first quarter of the 1900's, this sandwich has been feeding hungry Chicagoans for quite some time. At its simplest form, an Italian beef sandwich is composed of a nice Italian sandwich roll, thinly sliced cuts of tender beef, topped with either a mild sweet pepper mix or spicy giardiniera, and is optionally dipped in the jus in which the sliced beef sits waiting for service.

It's an intoxicating mixture of textures and flavors and once you've had the real thing, impostors are easy to spot. Soon after moving back to Akron several years ago, I learned of a place called Nicolino's on Route 91 in Tallmadge that had brought several Chicago classics to the area. It wasn't until I actually stopped in one time to pick up a deep dish pizza that I learned that they also served Italian beef sandwiches, too. The next time I stepped in, you can guess what I ordered. Being a tad on the pricey side, I was disappointed with what I received. Essentially a salt lick on soggy, disintegrated bread topped with peppers and onions, this sandwich was a disaster. It wasn't until I traveled to Chicago back in August 2007 that I finally had a chance to try the real deal. And it was GOOD. The bun, while dipped, still held together. The salt level was much more controlled and the balance of spices and heat were spot on.

I recently received a tweet from another Cleveland foodie, @kyleroth, who mentioned in passing about a place serving Italian beef in Cleveland. We messaged back and forth a bit and I quickly learned that The Dog House located near the intersection of Coventry and Euclid Heights Boulevard was serving not only a selection of hot dogs (as the name would imply), but also Italian beef sandwiches. While I had @kyleroth's assurance that it was a good sandwich, I continued to put off a visit for a while until I could stand it no more.

I charged up the battery on the cellphone, grabbed the $1.00 off coupon for Grum's and headed up to Cleveland. The Dog House was located at 2767 Euclid Heights Boulevard, Cleveland, OH 44118 and can be reached at 216-321-0717. At the time of this writing, there appears to be no website associated with the restaurant. Parking was whatever was available on Coventry Road. I choose to park in the parking garage located across from Big Fun. The first thirty minutes were free and the addition of a quarter extended your time by another thirty minutes.

Here was a shot of the exterior of The Dog House:


Once inside, I quickly looked around to discover a quaint little shop with two small two-top tables and a bar seating area along one wall with stools that could seat another five to six guests. Fortunately, at 2 PM on a rainy Sunday afternoon, the place was pretty quiet. As I walked through the front door, I noticed a wall menu posted on the left wall:


This menu was repeated on the right wall, although individual hot dogs were also advertised, some classic, some made up specifically for the store's location (Case Dog, John Carroll Dog, Coventry Dog, etc.). For me, however, the menu was almost irrelevant as I knew why I was standing inside the restaurant. I placed my order for an Italian beef and a bottled water. The man working the counter asked if I wanted it sweet or spicy. Good sign. I ordered it spicy. He started to assemble the sandwich in front of me. The second good sign was that the beef was already ready to serve in the jus. At Nicolino's, they actually reheated the beef from cold for each order. After filling the bun with slices of beef, he topped it with the spicy giardiniera. I was beginning to wonder whether or not he was going to ask me if I wanted it "dipped." Fortunately, he gave me a variation of dipped, "wet." Of course I agreed. Sadly, here was where things started to go south. Instead of quickly dipping the entire sandwich in the jus, he ladled about a cup of broth around the sandwich. I innocently asked him if they made their own gardiniera. He looked at me a bit quizzically and stated that they don't make anything from scratch except the barbecue sauce. As is so often quoted from the Star Wars movies, I had a bad feeling about this.

I took my tray to the tiny table by the front window:


Here was a close-up shot of the Italian beef sandwich itself:


Notice how dry the bun is? That's because all of the jus was at the bottom of the styrofoam container:


The implication of this was that only the spine, or the bit of bread holding the two halves together had touched the jus. And even in the relatively short period of time between him ladling on the jus and me picking it up to eat it, the spine completely disintegrated. This meant that each time I tried to pick it up and take a bite, I had pieces of meat and giardiniera falling out every which way. Fortunately, these pieces fell back into the waiting styrofoam below. As for the bread itself, it wasn't the sturdy Italian roll I had eaten in Chicago. It was more like the Orlando Italian Hoagy rolls you can find at your local supermarket.

The beef was tender and juicy. The giardiniera was good and spicy. However, the same problem that had plagued Nicolino's version from several years ago also seemed to beleaguer this sandwich, too: WAY too much salt. There was so much salt, in fact, that it was hard to taste anything else. From first bite until last, all I could taste was salt and heat. I normally don't drink an entire bottle of water with a single meal, but in this case, it was a requirement.

I threw away my garbage, returned the tray to the front counter, thanked the gentleman who took and filled my order, and walked out into the still rainy and gray Sunday afternoon. While I would probably be curious enough to return and try one of the specialty hot dogs, one thing I am sure I will not be returning for is the Italian beef. I'd rather wait several years to have the real thing than a pale version I could get more often. I would hate for someone who had never actually tried this sandwich to eat this one and think it was representative of what you receive when you order this in Chicago.

Dejectedly, I walked away from the restaurant towards Coventry Road until I remembered that I still had that $1 off coupon for Grum's in my pocket. I might not be hungry now, but I certainly would be later and a Turkey Ridge might very well just hit the spot.

Experiencing The Big M At Tommy's Restaurant

I have been fortunate to have had the opportunity for the last couple of weeks to help out a good friend, Diane, with her stand at the North Union Farmers Market located on the main campus of The Cleveland Clinic. While I occasionally got to take a nibble or two of food in between helping customers, for the most part my focus was on selling as many of Diane's wonderful pies as I could between the hours of 10 AM and 2:30 PM. By the time the market was over and we had repacked Diane's car, I was feeling somewhat famished. Being so close to the Coventry Road area, I decided to head over and satisfy two needs. The first need was to gain immediate sustenance. The second was to stop in at Grum's and purchase a whole Turkey Ridge to bring back home with me for later.

After parking my car in the garage directly in the middle of the Coventry area, I walked out of the garage and took a picture of Tommy's exterior from across the street:


Located at 1824 Coventry Road, Cleveland Heights, 44118, they can be reached at 216-321-7757. You can also check out their website by clicking on this link. I remember going to Tommy's for the first time when I started attending college at Case Western Reserve University. It has remained virtually unchanged, even after all of these years. Tommy's has always served a wide range of customers, from meat-eaters to vegans with a very tasty menu. Their prices are a bit higher than I remember from twenty years ago, but whenever I have a chance to check them out, I take the opportunity. I will warn you, gentle reader, that Tommy's is as popular a place now as it was back then. If you intend to show up on a Friday night at 6 PM for dinner, expect there to be a lengthy queue.

Today, however, I showed up around 2:45 PM and was rewarded with a mostly empty restaurant. I was seated by the front window and handed a menu. Here were some photos I took of the menu:






There are a few signature items for which Tommy's is known: Spinach pies, meat pies, hummos, French fries, and of course, thick and rich milkshakes. Fortunately and unfortunately, portions are large at Tommy's. Fortunate if you happen to be in a large group and want to share the 12 ounce serving of French fries. Unfortunate if you are just looking for a side of fries to accompany your meat pie. The hummos appetizer is very good, but at more than $7 for this plate of food, this would be more like my entire meal than a warm-up to the main event.

After seeing that the only side available on the menu was the 12 ounce serving of French fries, I asked my server if I had any other options. Sadly, even though she ha recommended to management time and again that they offer smaller portion sizes on the menu (only to be rebuffed), she pointed to a small rack of pre-packaged potato chips and suggested I might want to pair a bag of chips with my lunch. At a cost of only $0.99 with a portion size that looked normal for an adult, I quickly agreed and picked up a bag of Dirty's All Natural Sea Salt and Cracked Pepper chips:


While I have been known in the past to order one of Tommy's fantastic spinach and onion pies, today I decided I wanted something a little heartier. After considering my options, I decided on ordering the "Big M." Containing a combination beef and lamb patty, my Big M also came with lettuce, tomato, onions, green peppers, mozzarella cheese, and their unique barbecue sauce. After about fifteen minutes, my Big M arrived at my table and after I added some of the salt and pepper potato chips, I took a photo of my lunch platter:


Here was a close-up shot of the front of my Big M:


And the back of it:


Overall, I really enjoyed the flavors of my Big M pie, although the notion of it being a pie in the traditional sense of the word was a bit convoluted. Yes, it did have a top and bottom crust and it was filled with a cooked meat patty, melted cheese, fresh vegetables and sauce. But this pie wasn't shaped like a cut wedge from an entire pie. Each portion was it's own complete entity. I'm not sure exactly how they cook these because the vegetables were nicely crisp and fresh while at the same time the patty was hot, the cheese was melted, and the top layer of "dough" was nice and crispy.

After cutting into my Big M, I decided to take a side shot of the pie, revealing the meaty interior:


The combination of flavors was excellent. The lamb and beef played well together, neither of which overpowering the other. The barbecue sauce was excellent, as always. The sauce that Tommy's uses has a very muted flavor, and is neither overly smoky nor sweet. It added a nice cooked tomato flavor and mild acidity to compliment the fresh tomato that garnished the meat pie. Overall, the Big M was a hit except for one little minor detail. The crust on the bottom of the pie sort of alternated between being soggy from the meat juices of the patty resting on top of it and, well, um, burnt in other spots:


The soggy I didn't mind so much. The burnt wasn't very pleasant at all. Fortunately there were only a few pieces of burnt crust, so I was able to remove them pretty easily. That being said, with how busy the restaurant was on a Wednesday afternoon at 3 PM, there really shouldn't have been anything wrong with my pie.

Finally, the potato chips:


These were lovely ... crispy, not oily, and a lovely balance between salt and cracked pepper. I was a little taken aback when I read the list of ingredients on the back of the package to find that they had several forms of sugar in them. I can only imagine that the sugar was added to help balance out the saltiness of the chips, because the chips certainly didn't taste sweet. Looking at the amount of sodium in a single serving may help to back up my assertion. Because the flavor of the cracked pepper was so prominent, perhaps they needed to use a more aggressive hand when it came to the salt (460 mg of sodium per serving). To balance the saltiness, they added a touch of sweetness, too. Either way, it was a nice compliment to my Big M.

My hunger now sated, I paid the check, collected my coat and cellphone and headed down Coventry Road to purchase my Turkey Ridge for a late dinner. Apart from the bits of burnt crust on a small portion of my meat pie, everything was tasty, well balanced, and I felt like I was doing something healthy for my body. Since everything is a la carte, the check can start to get a little pricey if you go nuts with appetizers, sides, and milkshakes. Eating with a group can help to minimize those costs and spread them around. I heartily recommend Tommy's for breakfast, lunch, or dinner, especially if you have anyone in your dinner party with food restrictions. With lots of very cool shops within walking distance from Tommy's, you could make an entire afternoon of eating and shopping.