September 1, 2011 | Author: Jeffrey Lant | Posted in Dr. Jeffrey Lant’s Article Archive
By Dr. Jeffrey Lant
Author’s program note. Let’s get something sorted out right from the get-go. Whether you call them Philadelphia cheesesteak, Philly cheesesteak, cheese steak or steak and cheese, you are a member of a cult. You are a person who not only eats these concoctions, you have decided (often violent) opinions on which establishment makes the best and which ones are just grease pits. And, yes, you know the official cheesesteak song… of course there is one!
This not-quite-top-forty production appears in the collection known as “Songs Inside the Park.” I figure its unknown creators spent about the time it takes to order and cook a cheesesteak to craft this not-quite the-toast-of-the-nation-(but) peppy little number. Still, how many sandwiches have their own beau-ti-ful anthem? Exactly! So, show some respect…
You’ll find the official Philly Cheesesteak song in every search engine. Go find it and give a listen now. Oh, yes, I forgot to tell you: less than Mozart it may be… but it’s got that insidious quality that differentiates a mere song from an invasive little bugger that you can’t get out of your head once you hear it. It goes without saying it was Joey Vento’s favorite song; always a part of his luggage… sung at anniversaries, engagement parties, at weddings… even on one notable occasion at the funeral of a (shall we say) overweight (actually tubby) gentleman whose passion for cheesesteak may have contributed to the sad event.
Joey Vento didn’t care. He was a Zealot, and for such folk everywhere, absolutely anywhere, is the best place — just as now is always the right time — to drive home the message: that you’re nothing without your cheesesteak, and that’s a fact. Cordon bleu eat your heart out…
History of cheesesteak.
No less an organization than the prestigious Historical Society of Pennsylvania, whose journal pages are more usually devoted to Philadelphia’s pivotal role in the American Revolution, no less an organization, I say, has reported that the cheesesteak was developed in the early 20th century “by combining frizzled beef, onions, and cheese in a small loaf of bread.”
Philadelphiains Pat and Harry Olivieri are often credited with inventing the sandwich by serving chopped steak on hoagie rolls in the early 1900s. They began by selling this variation of steak sandwiches at their hot dog stand near south Philadelphia’s Italian Market. They became so popular that Pat opened his own restaurant which still operates today as Pat’s King of Steaks; it’s right across the street from Joey Vento’s place, “Geno’s Steaks.”
Ironically, the cheesesteak was originally prepared without cheese; zealots tell you this because they feel better telling you the truth, no matter how painful that might be. Yikes! A cheesesteak without cheese. Jeeeeze……
But Pat Olivieri says provolone cheese was first added by Joe “Cocky Joe” Lorenza, a manager at the Ridge Avenue location. As you may imagine from his sobriquet, Cocky Joe wasn’t inclined to keep his invention to himself… For one thing, he asked for — and got — a nice raise for coming up with this crucial improvement. The whole cheesesteak industry and every satisfied cheesesteak muncher that ever existed thank him, too, not least because provolone is a universal favorite and a cheesesteak without cheese is just too awful to contemplate.
Joey V ento arrives on the scene.
Joey Vento was to the meat industry born. He learned it from father who had opened Jim’s Steaks in the early 1940s. Joey wanted his own place, too… and so in 1966 witih $6 in his pocket, two boxes of steaks and some hot dogs he opened “Geno’s Steaks”, right across the street from Pat’s King of Steaks. It was a provocative gesture to the already well established Olivieris… but it ensured him a steady stream of new customers who wanted to taste what the new establishment and its in-your-face owner had to offer. They liked what he dished up… and Geno’s Steaks is here to this day, a place where Rocky Balboa and his need for mouth-watering protein always feel at home.
The ability to create this feeling was very much Joey Vento’s skill and talent.
First off, he made a point not just of knowing his customers’ names. He knew little things about nearly all of them and, of course, about every regular. He knew their wives and children, the vicissitudes of their often turbulent lives; he knew where they liked to sit and what special cheesesteak they particularly craved. Joey was a whirring, never stopping action figure at “Geno’s Steaks.” Longtime friend Domenic Chiavaroli summed up the padrone thus, “I’ve been coming here since 1967. Joe was a good guy. He always tried to help everybody.”
Given that this was pretty much the universal feeling about Joey Vento, it is ironic that he got Andy Warhol’s few minutes of fame by posting a couple of signs with strong, even offensive messages on them, messages which affronted and angered some of the new non-Italian residents of South Philadelphia. Joey had located his restaurant business there in the first place not just to cock a snoot at his arch rival at Pat’s King of Steaks but to be right smack dab in the middle of steak and cheese loving Italians and the meat industry they dominated.
These congenial folks, all known to Joey, were being replaced by immigrants from Asia and Latin America, folks who understood neither America’s values nor America’s language. And this really ticked off Joey for whom America was the greatest country on God’s green earth… love her or leave her. This meant America’s language, too — English. Joey got irritated that so many of these new folks just wouldn’t learn the language of the nation that generously took them in.
He posted two small signs reading “This is America: When ordering ‘please speak English’” It only took about 5 minutes but Joey Vento and his message became the flash point for angry Americans who flocked to his restaurant and ate his cheesesteaks as a vote of approbation… and the new non-English speakers who immediately filed a discrimination complaint against this most congenial and welcoming of men.
Philadelphia’s Commission on Human Relations began looking into whether Vento was in fact guilty of discrimination and found probable cause. The case went to a public hearing where the Commission’s lawyer argued that the signs were not about political speech but intimidation. In March 2008 a three member panel voted 2-1 that Vento and his signs did not violate the ordinance.
So Joey Vento won a great victory… in what may well be a losing war. The plain fact is cheesesteaks, with all their carbs and flavorful fats, may well be on the way out, killed by a nation slowly awakening to their nutritional damage and punishing effects to the body. If so, Joey checked out just in time, the victim of colorectal cancer and a massive heart attack which you’ll never convince me had nothing to do with eating a lifetime’s worth of cheesesteaks. The sign Vento should have put up was simply “caveat emptor,” though it is written in Latin.
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