Fried egg sandwich with Frenchs mustard. They were commonly found at drug store lunch counters.
Patty melt, made with buttered bread, and American cheese. Another drug store lunch counter item.
I tried Sonic’s patty melt. It’s not as good.
I’m not sure why but the lunch counters were always good. You could see your food cooking on the hob.
Years ago I would have said Surge or Ecto Cooler, but they came back and I tried them as an adult. Yech.
Sure, but it’s going to vary widely by brand.
Coleslaw on a turkey sandwich, on rye bread, is a Grilled Rachael, a regional thing AFAIK. It may also have a slice of Swiss cheese on it.
My old hospital had the very best ones in the cafeteria.
I’m pretty sure Chicken Tetrazzini and Chicken Cacciatore peaked somewhere between 1965 and your mother’s last Tupperware party. My mom made both when I was a kid, but I could never remember which was which. So every time she said, “We’re having Chicken Cacciatore tonight!” I’d get all excited… until I saw some retched stewed tomato monstrosity on my plate (I hated tomatoes as a kid). The disappointment was real. It was like opening a Christmas present and finding socks instead of the GI-Joe you asked for.
My mom got the recipe for golabkis—Polish stuffed cabbage rolls—(which we pronounced “glump-kees”) from an old lady she roomed with in the hospital for some procedure. Apparently golabkis were popular mid-century, but faded by the ‘80s. I loved the name, but hated the dish—and mom made it often. Was it evil of me wishing that old lady coded before she gave my mom that recipe?
Culvers and Freddies both have them although they are rye bread and Swiss. That’s the only way I have had them and they are both excellent.
Our neighborhood pub serves an excellent Patty Melt, a Tuna Melt, and a Reuben with sauerkraut and custom Russian-esque dressing, on a hearty rye bread.
I believe @Saint_Cad is referring to what is typically known as a hot roast beef sandwich.
I like pot roast sandwiches too.
I can’t remember how long its been since I saw it on a menu.
I cook pot roast at home and use leftovers for sandwiches. French bread soaks up the juice and makes good sandwiches.
Hot roast beef sandwiches on cheap white bread covered in gravy are amaaaaazing. The classier version is the French Dip. I recall recently reading about some American chain (in Texas?) specializing in this, using high end gravy, and apparently doing very well.
Maybe this? But the cafeteria version on cheapest white bread is very good too.
I thought the French Dip sandwich–ala Philippe’s in LA–was roast beef sandwich dipped in au jus, not gravy?
and roast beef sandwich covered in gravy sound like an open-face sandwich
The cheap and cheerful cafeteria version was two pieces of white Wonder bread, out of the package, with thick roast beef slices or shreds between, and generous amounts of a thick brown cheapish gravy liberally covering everything.
no mashed potatoes?
Probably. The nice thing about mashed potatoes is even in crappy places, you can turn it into a gourmet food by adding enough butter (eight or more of those little tubs).
Anything on two slices of bread, drowned in gravy and flanked by mashed potatoes and a token pile of peas (for color, not consumption), tastes fantastic. Turkey? Yessir! Roast beef? You betcha! Mice? Only if it’s the blue-plate special.
Although reading the first link made me hungry, the second link was what I was talking about, which is equally good open or closed.