It was midnight and I was starving. There was no food in the room and the vending machine only had candy bars. Where was I supposed to go if I wanted some real, big, juicy food? The university’s student underground of course!
Every college has got one of these places, I’m sure. It’s the overpriced, dank little store in the student union that carries over processed foods and Powerade. I stumbled down the Underground’s aisles looking at all the bright wrappings and bags, trying to find the perfect meal to satisfy my hunger. It was a long and perilous journey, and I picked up and touched dozens of items of food before I finally found one to my liking.
The New York Deli Style Philly Cheesesteak sandwich. I found this sandwich in the freezer next to the hot pockets and mini pan pizzas. It looked like it could be tasty, so I picked it up and brought it to the cashier. The entire time I was wondering how bad it would be on my arteries.
HOT SANDWICH. Meaning it’s no good cold. Meaning you’ve got to eat it RIGHT AWAY. And that is what I hastily prepared myself to do.
It turns out that it is really, really simple to prepare this cheesesteak. You unwrap it slightly, then put it in the microwave for four minutes, and that’s all. Two years of college has taught me that any food which can be prepared this easily is usually very unhealthy for you. Surprisingly, the sandwich is only 420 calories (but I think it had 75 grams of fat or something like that….but no one really knows how much a gram of fat is anyway). To summarize, it wasn’t the unhealthiest thing I have ever eaten.
My stomach growling, I unwrapped the sandwich.
This thing was frozen solid. It was like a cold brick. I could have thrown it through a car’s windshield or bludgeoned somebody to death with it. It was like a snowman’s turd, it was. I tried to lift the top piece of bread so I could inspect the cheese, but it wouldn’t budge. I’m pretty sure the sandwich had been constructed at some factory in Pennsylvania about seven months ago. Would this deep freezing affect the taste?
Also I read the directions wrong. I unwrapped the sandwich all the way, and I wasn’t supposed to. I was only supposed to tear a little slit out of the wrapping. I did my best to tie the whole thing back up and I slipped it into the microwave.
Microwave for four minutes! Sure I can do that!
This microwave had a rotating plate in it so I didn’t have to turn the food myself. Unfortunately, the wrapping of the sandwich unfolded while cooking and wedged against the top and bottom so it stopped turning after a minute. This made the sandwich cook very unevenly.
After four minutes it was still cold, so I put it back in for an additional three minutes.
After three more minutes, the sandwich was STILL frozen so I put it in for two more minutes.
After two more minutes of microwaving, there was STILL ice in the middle, so I threw it back in and punched in a very admirable time of four minutes.
After that ended, I decided to just eat the thing and not worry if it was cooked all the way through. It had already microwaved for a solid thirteen minutes and I wasn’t going to wait any longer. Maybe my microwave just stinks.
I’ll be honest. I didn’t think the Philly Cheesesteak looked very good. I didn’t think it would be worth all the hassle. I lifted the top piece of bread to finally get a good look at the cheese.
That cheese looks pretty good I mean OH MY GOD IS IT STILL FROZEN?!? In this picture you can clearly see little ice crystals covering the meat. My microwave never had a problem microwaving stuff before, so I put the entire blame on the sandwich. I cursed the sandwich rather loudly out of frustration. I wanted to rip it apart with my teeth (eat it basically). I also found it ironic that this Philly Cheesesteak, advertised as a HOT SANDWICH, was actually impossible to heat up.
Here is what the other side looked like. It was rather unevenful. Just frozen meat and bread. And some little black specks of unknown origin, but hey, whatever.
I lifted it to my face. The cheesesteak looks pretty good in this picture actually. Almost like a real sandwich.
I took a very large first bite, and I burned my tongue. The ends of the sandwich were really, really hot because of the long microwave time. I had to spit out the bite into my hand and keep it there until it cooled, and then I put it back in my mouth and ate it. And you know what? It was actually pretty good!
The cheese and steak mashed together perfectly, and it made all of my un-burned taste buds tingle with delight. It tasted pretty authentic (not that I’ve ever had a real Philly cheesesteak from Philly).
The sandwich got cooler temperature wise as I ate down to the middle. I got one rather nasty bite that tasted like a meat snow cone, so I switched and started eating the other end. It was very tasty and satified my hunger in a most formidable way.
Here is the part of the sandwich I couldn’t eat due to ice. I thought about microwaving these remnants and eating them, but for some reason I never ended up doing it.
The whole room stunk of cheesesteak for three days. It was a good thing at first, but by the afternoon of the second day it turned into a bad thing. I had to use a lot of Febreeze to get rid of the smell.
Jack’s Take
The New York Deli Style Philly CheeseSteak was a very delicious late night snack. Although it was a little greasy, and a little frozen, I very much enjoyed it and will eat it again some day. I recommend you try it out.
Grade: B
]]>
And here is a picture of Val Kilmer:
Now imagine Val Kilmer fighting those lions, and that is what a great motion picture looks like.
