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Comment by lchengify | Hacker News Reader

Lived in Philly for a few years and my family is from there.

Makes sense that the Cheesesteak would be a popular export. Its origins are Italian, and like other Italian foods you can make it anywhere if you get the prep and the ingredients right. It's also heavily customizable and can last a while like pizza.

IMO getting the bread right is the hard part, but I imagine a good chef will recognize that quickly. Philly has special bakeries that supply a lot of the steak places (Amorosos, etc).

Also I'm sorry but cheese wiz is disgusting. Get Provolone :).

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> IMO getting the bread right is the hard part

Do you have a good recipe? I've been wanting to add a really authentic Philly Cheesesteak to our menu at our bakery here in Vietnam but I don't have a lot of experience with that particular sandwich.

I know the American expats here would appreciate if we get it right though.

I'm not from Philly, but my mom is, and every time I went back east I ate plenty of cheese steaks. To me, the essense of the bread is a chewyness, a toothiness. The crumb is substantial, the crust is minimal. If you bake bread in Vietnam than you must have a good understanding of a french-style baguette, right? That's a bread where the crust is shattering-crisp and the internal crumb is light and pillowy, yeah? The roll for a cheese steak is the opposite.

My grandmom's theory was that it was the water from the Schuylkill that made the rolls inimitable. I wish I had a recipe I could share with you, but instead I can only wish you luck.

Ah man, despite baking a lot, I've never tried to make the bread myself.

You're going to want a hoagie roll [1][2]. They are shaped like a baguette and have the same ingredients, but way softer, chewy-er and denser. It's a process with multiple rises, then it's baked in steam to keep it soft.

This [3] seems to get the details right, but I haven't tried it. Conshohocken is a suburb outside of Philly known for microbreweries and baking so it's legit if that's the source.

[1] https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Hoagie_roll

[2] https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=rR8oA5ACqPg

[3] https://www.thefreshloaf.com/node/21448/real-italian-hoagie-...

It sounds like Italian ciabatta might work. It is a great cold sandwich bread with many of the same properties that you describe. I've seen smaller ciabatta rolls in a wide variety of sizes. It should be possible to create the "hoagie" shape.

Ref: https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Ciabatta

Ciabatta is great but it has nothing to do with a Philly cheesesteak roll. Like so far away as to be from another dimension. A Subway roll would be closer.

You want a soft roll, not actually dense, despite GP’s statement but not airy like sourdough. In texture it’s closer to a hamburger or hotdog bun. In size and shape it’s like a sub or a hero.

Traditional ciabatta is a very wet, kinda shapeless dough; hydration level is high enough that it can't really hold a shape outside of flat blob. High hydration makes it easier for the yeast to eat the carbs, and allows the loaf to absorb more air.

Hogie rolls are long and soft, closer to baguette but with softer (less protein) flour and some light steam during the bake.

You could probably hack it with a baguette recipe subbing some AP flour, and baking at a slightly lower temp with a pan of water under the baking sheet.

edit: I also had some success in the past with a naan recipe that I didn't have time to cook w/ a flat-top, and rolled into vaguely hogie shapes. It had yougurt and a small amount of canola oil, which kept it soft -- that might be an option.

A banh mi roll would work pretty well.

Yeah the banh mi roll is a modification on the french roll with the exact same goal that you want for a philly cheesesteak I bet.

Good call. I love philly cheesesteaks, but honestly I don't find the roll all that special (and yes I've had it at the classic places in philly). I think a typical vietnamese banh mi roll is probably going to be honestly better and work great for the sandwich.

Disagree. I've had them in Saigon in addition to here in the States, and a good banh mi roll is much crispier on the outside. That's not the texture you want for a cheese steak -- it has to be really soft.

No. Banh mi is too crusty. The best cheesesteaks have a mushy roll, NOT a crusty one.

I live near Philly and the Vietnamese grocery stores in town all sell hoagie rolls relabeled as bahn mi rolls. So if it works one way it probably works the other.

Edit: Forgot to mention. Steaming the roll is essential to a good cheesesteak. Even more than the bread after you've met a certain floor.

Apparently there is 1 Subway restaurant in Vietnam. You can go there to get an idea of what a hoagie roll is. Also make sure the steak is in strips. I ordered a cheesesteak in Helsinki recently and they used cubes of steak. It was weird.

The quintessential Philly cheesesteak bread is the Amarosso roll. There’s even a place in SF that imports them as well as tasty kakes for the PA “expats” in California.

https://www.amorosobaking.com/

>Amoroso’s bakery products can be flash-frozen and shipped worldwide

Cool, I didn't know that.

>a place in SF

Maybe you are referring to The Cheesesteak Shop (est. 1982) which has 20 or so locations in the SF Bay Area.

Incidentally, I find the default cheese when you order in person (white American cheese) is better than provolone.

That's the one! My favorite memory of SF was getting cheesesteaks and kandykakes from there and eating them on ocean beach while watching the whales breach at sunset with my wife. Perfect day.

+1 white American melts better than Provolone, and definitely works better in a cheesesteak. Both are preferable to "wiz" which is honestly pretty gross.

I think we can all agree amoroso roll + white American is where it's at. But what about the rest? For me, it's mayo + fried onions (white or red) + green peppers + mushrooms. Hold the lettuce and tomato. And for the love of god no red sauce -- if I wanted sauce I'd eat spaghetti!

Drop a link to your bakery, I'd like to come visit!

Thom's Sourdough Bakery by the beach just outside Hoi An. Come say hi if you're in town.

https://maps.app.goo.gl/J6zaGxcYAh3RJm788

this guy (charlie anderson) is currently trying to replicate the philly roll (for a philly cheesesteak, his prior take was ny style pizza):

https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=DvgurFUheY8

I'm originally from Philly, and I've had a cheesesteak on banh mi roll a few times. It makes a very good approximation at least to me. The Philly rolls tend to be tougher and ready to handy the sheer amount of grease that pours off the sandwich. Stick to provolone and caramelized onions as the only default toppings. Ketchup and such should be added by the eater, and realistically only if it's a bad steak.

> heavily customizable

I like cheesesteaks every once in a while, but the green chile versions around the US Southwest were my absolute favorite. I wish I could get them where live now. The tikka version mentioned in the article really piqued my interest though.

There is a restaurant that makes Indian spiced chicken cheese steaks in Philly that’s gotten very popular. Try this recipe with your choice of meat, it’s not a tikka version but it’s delicious!

https://thechutneylife.com/recipes/dinner/spicy-chicken-chee...

I love this. When reading the article about people using south asian spices for cheesesteaks, I thought, gee that sounds amazing possibly even an improvement, I'd like to try that... and now I can get it philly too!

Humans can't resist mixing food cultures. And music. Always where the best stuff comes from.

Agree about cheese wiz being gross, but American cheese is fine too. I do like provolone + marinara sauce ("pizza steak"), though.

(I've had better steaks in Philly suburbs and NJ than in the city itself, too.)

It's wild but true, the best steaks are out in the suburbs

how often should one eat a philly cheesesteak? i feel like the answer is “almost never” given the high amount of beef + cheese (calories, fat, etc.)

typical philly cheesesteak is like… 800-1600 calories from what i can tell and not very much nutritional value. am i being dramatic?

As often as you feel like.

Isn't there strong evidence in obesity + heart disease cases that this is a poor decision?

Cheesesteaks don't happen in a vacuum. What's your breakfast look like? Dinner?

Wake up and shovel donuts into your face, and then pack a bunch more carbs and fat at dinner and yeah that cheesesteak will definitely help kill you.

Eating mostly veggies and reasonable choices + a couple of cheesesteaks a week and you'll be alright.

Depends. Do you sit on your ass all day long, or are you working physically hard outside?

very dramatic.

An occasional cheesesteak won't kill you.

When I worked in old city Philly, I'd get one (a pizza steak for me tyvm) probably twice a month - in between the halal cart, pizza, wraps & frites from European Republic, and a nicer lunch from nearby restaurants on Friday.

You can have a large meal every once in a while without large negative health effects. Just limit your calories the rest of the day and don’t do it all the time.

Also, I wouldn’t say it has little nutritional value…it’s full of protein and carbs (which are nutrients).

I guess my question was from a stance of, Philadelphia is famous for their cheesesteaks. How often are the residents that live there truly having a cheesesteak? Once a month? Three times a week?

I would say Philly is famous for it's food generally. Philly is one of the best places in the northeast to get high quality food at reasonable prices. Especially sandwiches.

Speaking strictly for myself, it's like a game day thing, but when I was younger it was up to twice a week. If you get full you can eat half and stick the other half in the fridge. Now a days if I'm doing a steak later in the day, it means I'm skipping a meal beforehand. I'll also ask them to add vegetables so it makes you feel full faster.

The big differentiator isn't really the calories but the cost. Like other Philly food, it's very affordable for not being fast food. It also gets cheaper if you order it in batches for parties, and it keeps super well so there are always leftovers. Because of this you just see it around Philly a lot.

Depends how old you are and what you're doing with your life. The construction workers might eat one several times a week from a cart. An office worker might only eat one late at night as 2 am food after the bars closed. When I was in college there maybe once a month. The under appreciated chicken cheese steak is probably worse for you.

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