When: March 24
The cheesesteak was invented in Philadelphia around 1930 by Pat Olivieri. The cheese debate — Cheez Whiz vs. provolone vs. American — is genuine, regional, and surprisingly revealing about American food culture.
Philadelphia's most contested sandwich was invented in the 1930s, and the argument about how to order it correctly has never stopped.
The cheesesteak was invented by Pat Olivieri, a hot dog vendor in South Philadelphia, around 1930. The story: Olivieri cooked some beef on his grill for his own lunch, a cab driver smelled it and asked for one, and a sandwich was born. Olivieri and his brother Harry opened Pat's King of Steaks in 1930, which still operates at the same corner of Passyunk Avenue and 9th Street in South Philadelphia — directly across the street from Geno's Steaks, which opened in 1966 and has been its chief rival ever since. The original cheesesteak had no cheese — it was just thinly sliced beef on a roll. Cheese was added in the 1940s, allegedly by a Pat's manager named Joe Lorenzo who added provolone. Cheez Whiz — a processed cheese product introduced by Kraft in 1952 and made primarily from whey protein concentrate, vegetable oil, and sodium — entered the picture in the 1950s and became the "traditional" cheese for many Philadelphia purists. The correct ordering protocol at Pat's and Geno's is local...