Cheesesteak 2.0: Welcome to the New Era of Philly’s Iconic Sandwich
The Philly cheesesteak is all grown up. Photograph by Gene Smirnov
For decades, the cheesesteak went virtually unchanged: soft roll, beef, cheese. Sure, there were a few adaptations here and there — chicken and Cheez Whiz, most notably — but for the most part Philadelphia’s iconic sandwich remained comfortingly consistent.
Then, a few years ago, a funny thing happened. The bread started getting a little crunchier, its pillowiness replaced by a seeded crackle. Lines started wrapping around the block at new steak shops, elevating simple sandwiches into destination dining. And do we spot a little … cilantro?
This is the new era of cheesesteaks, where once-sacrilegious adaptations are now the norm and there seems to be some new tweak, some new wrinkle, every week. And you know what? We’re better for it. Grab a stack of napkins, roll up your sleeves, and dig in.
Generation Next: Meet the Chefs Reimagining the Cheesesteak
Sahbyy Food’s lemongrass cheesesteak (left); Taste Cheesesteak Bar owner Kevin Dolce/ Photography by Gene Smirnov
Culinary innovation often starts with a touchstone, something eaters can keep as a frame of reference to anchor their brains as their palates are introduced to new flavors. Cheesesteaks have been a staple in this city for nearly a century, and now, with the help of immigrants and first-gen Philadelphians, they’re finally getting interesting. Keep reading …
Whiz Wit Wine?
Illustration by Alyssa Nassner
At Barclay Prime, beverage director Marcello Cancelli pairs the restaurant’s notorious $140 sandwich with a half bottle of champagne, because, as he puts it, “there’s nothing more luxurious than champagne for the most luxurious cheesesteak in the world.” Besides, he says, the effervescence in your flute helps cleanse the palate after each bite. But he realizes that most people aren’t picking up wagyu/foie gras/truffle cheesesteaks on their way home. For the common man, whether you’re going white or red, Cancelli stresses that acidity is key. “You need something to counterbalance the richness and the umami,” he explains. “A lot of people think meat equals a huge cabernet, but a cheesesteak is not simply meat.” Cancelli says a chenin blanc from France’s Loire Valley would pair nicely or, should red be your thing, a red zinfandel. “But if you want a more upscale option” — and who doesn’t, right? — “certainly a red Bordeaux is up to the task.” As for the rest of us, the old standby of Snapple iced tea works in a pinch. — Victor Fiorillo
The Unexpected Rise of Cooper Sharp
Cooper Sharp / Photograph by Gene Smirnov
More than a decade ago, on November 23, 2013, Danny DiGiampietro posted a photo to Instagram that would forever alter the “cheese” in cheesesteak. The image showed a spread-eagled roll, smeared with Whiz, on the griddle at the original Haddonfield location of Angelo’s. Alongside the bread, a heap of shaved beef, veiled in overlapping ivory squares of Cooper Sharp, which DiGiampietro shouted out in the caption.
“My wife and I used to make cheesesteaks in the house with it, and I always told her, if we ever open a spot, I’m gonna use Cooper Sharp,” says DiGiampietro, who first got to know the cheese on his old bread delivery route, dropping loaves to Cooper carriers like Pal Joey’s Deli and Primo’s. “I just used it because I liked it.”
But it wasn’t until Angelo’s relocated to Bella Vista in 2019 that Cooper, thanks to the shop’s massive social media following, would crack the cheesesteak consciousness and ascend from an upgraded American cheese — it gets its sharp, nutty edge from aged cheese blended into the mix — to a cachet-carrying emblem of quality. Keep reading …
One Roll to Rule Them All
Rolls from Del Rossi’s in Northern Liberties / Photograph by Gene Smirnov
For the entire history of the cheesesteak, every debate, innovation, and personal hill to die on has hinged on what goes in the roll: fresh versus frozen ribeye, fineness of the chop, Barclay Prime’s truffled exploits, is mayo a permissible condiment or unholy smear? Until 2019, that is, when Danny DiGiampietro opened Angelo’s with a cheesesteak on seeded bread in the dark-’n’-crusty style of his Sarcone in-laws, and the entire conversation pivoted to the roll itself.
“There’s magic in that bread,” says Mike View, the sandwich evangelist who runs the Pancakes and Protein Shakes Instagram account. Influenced by Angelo’s success, “more people than not now are doing a special loaf and putting more work into their bread.”
From Bar Jawn’s house-baked loaves in Manayunk to Café Carmela’s seeded Carangi’s in the Great Northeast, we are in the golden age of the crunchy cheesesteak. And while Angelo’s is its undisputed godfather — and serves our personal favorite steak in town, mostly because of its mahogany-crusted, sesame-paved, unparalleled bread — the evolution away from the squishier Liscio-Amoroso school exists within a greater context of changing tastes and attentions. Keep reading …
Fake Steak? Not So Fast
Vegan cheesesteak at Triangle Tavern / Photograph by Gene Smirnov
At Triangle Tavern, the vegan cheesesteak is not a substitute — it’s the only cheesesteak on the menu. That may sound blasphemous considering that Triangle sits just a block away from Pat’s and Geno’s. But East Passyunk neighbors have embraced this seitan-and-vegan-whiz version, making it one of the bar’s top-selling items. “One of my cooks has got four on the flat top right now,” chef Mike Schwartz tells me over the phone. Impressive, considering that it’s 3:45 on a Friday afternoon.
Before joining Triangle nine years ago, Schwartz worked for Blackbird Pizzeria, where he learned to make the seitan he now uses as the base for his cheesesteak. He prefers Blackbird’s seitan to any other brand for its meat-like texture. “You can pull the strands of it, and it looks like animal protein,” he explains. To achieve maximum meatiness, he slices the seitan thin and tosses it in steak seasoning before searing it on the griddle with caramelized onions.
Next, the whiz — an amalgamation of Daiya vegan cheddar, Tofutti cream cheese, a sprinkle of nutritional yeast, and miso paste to replicate the funky umami of dairy cheese. According to Schwartz, the key to any cheesesteak, vegan or otherwise, is the whiz. With the gusto of a municipal worker greasing the poles before an Eagles playoff game, he slathers the whiz onto a Carangi roll before stuffing it with the seitan and onions. To top it all off, more whiz, just for good measure.
Melded together in a cheesy, gooey mess, Schwartz’s take on the Philly classic tastes like the original. But it feels wrong to draw that comparison. This is a cheesesteak that happens to be vegan. Just like the first cheesesteak, it’s its own thing: a Philly original. — Kae Lani Palmisano
The Angelo’s Line: A Study in Cheesesteak Devotion (and Patience)
The line at Angelo’s in South Philly / Photograph by Gene Smirnov
Angelo’s Pizzeria is famous for a few things. Its cheesesteaks, of course, oozing Cooper Sharp and fried onions. Then there are the pizzas (which reached blockbuster status after Barstool bro Dave Portnoy’s rave review in 2019), and its affiliation with Bradley Cooper (Angelo’s owner Danny DiGiampietro and Cooper opened a cheesesteak restaurant in New York earlier this year).
And then there’s the line.
Angelo’s opened in 2019, and since then the line has had a life of its own. It snakes out of the tiny storefront and goes up 9th Street. It winds around the corner onto Fitzwater. It breaks up into knots of people who lean against street signs and sit on stoops to rest their legs, even though a sign taped to Angelo’s door asks them explicitly not to do that very thing. Sometimes the line is directed by an employee to change directions, to twist the other way, down to Catharine. But no matter which direction it’s heading, if Angelo’s is open — which it is from 11 a.m. to 7 p.m. every day except Monday and Tuesday — the line is most likely there. Keep reading …
5 Spots Putting Manayunk on the Cheesesteak Map
Cheesesteaks in Manayunk: A map / Map by Alyssa Nassner
For decades, the cheesesteak has been synonymous with South Philly. Today? The finest collection of steaks in the city is a bit farther northwest. Keep reading …
Maybe The Best Cheesesteaks Aren’t in Philly: The Wild Ride of Nicky’s and Ant’s
From Mangia Mobile to Nicky’s and Ant’s / Photography by Gene Smirnov
Freezing cold, standing in the hard, bright midwinter sunlight in the gravel drive beside a Gilbertsville brewery, Anthony Billetta and I are talking about cheesesteaks.
Talking shit about cheesesteaks, really. Who we like, who we don’t, why. We’re philosophizing about cheesesteaks in the way that only people from here can, because only people from here — Philadelphia, its suburbs, this region — have that kind of context. The almost rabbinical immersion and investment of daily study, of opinions hammered out across years of debate.
“Look,” I tell him. “I’ve eaten a lot of cheesesteaks. And these? They’re the best I’ve ever had.”
And I mean that. I wouldn’t lie. Anthony and his partner, Nick Moccia, run a food truck called Mangia Mobile that has sat here beside Sunset Hill Brewing on Leidy Road for months. Their sandwiches are monsters — huge, heavy, stuffed with rough-chopped meat and gooey cheese on seeded rolls that take two hands to hold. They’re the kind of cheesesteaks you dream about: that Platonic ideal of warmth and generosity, sweating inside a plastic bag in the passenger seat on game day. And standing there, waiting for my steaks, talking through the truck’s little window with Anthony while Nick works at the other end? That’s when Anthony tells me that Mangia is closing.
Okay, moving, really. Not closing-closing. But this has happened before. Mangia started as a thrown-together catering operation from two friends who’d grown up together in the unglamorous end of the restaurant industry, working in family restaurants (Nick’s parents own Moccia’s Train Stop in Schwenksville) and local joints. Nick went away to study marketing at West Chester. Anthony played football at Albright in Reading, but dropped out. He wanted to do his own thing — open a gym, maybe. Or a food truck. He was dating Nick’s little sister, came home one weekend and was talking to Nick’s mom, told her about his plans, and she said he had to talk to Nick because Nick was thinking the same thing. Not a gym, obviously, but a food truck. A really good food truck.
On the phone later, Anthony tells me the whole story: how catering turned into a food truck at WCU in 2023, how collabs and nonstop hustle turned into a partnership with the crew from Sunset Hill that was so successful (like sell-out-every-night successful, like questionable-overflow-parking-behind-a-barn successful) that one weekend turned into every weekend and, eventually, into a full-time thing that, briefly, had the best cheesesteaks anywhere (and some really good fries, chased with Sunset Hill’s excellent day-drinking beers) being served daily at a small brewery at the top of a hill in Gilbertsville where Suloman’s Dairy used to be. Where Nick and Anthony used to go as kids, cutting through the woods and climbing the hill for ice cream and milkshakes in the summer. Keep reading …
In Defense of Pat’s & Geno’s
Geno’s, in all its neon-lit glory / Photograph by M. Edlow for Visit Philadelphia
If you’ve made it this far, you’ve read about all kinds of newfangled ways to eat cheesesteaks, some that certainly make purists like me shudder. (You can keep your papaya salad away from my steak, thank you very much.) But when you first think of a cheesesteak, what comes to mind? It’s likely the red-and-white awning of Pat’s, or the orange Vegas glow of Geno’s. Keyboard warriors on social media love to hate these joints. And, well, I don’t really understand why. Are there better cheesesteaks out there? Sure. Are they the worst popular cheesesteaks in Philly? Far from it. (We’re looking at you, Dalessandro’s.) The location is iconic, an absolute must-visit for any tourist. And there’s simply nothing wrong with these sandwiches — they are perfectly good for what they are: greasy messes of carnivorous, artery-clogging delight. Plus, is Angelo’s open at 1 a.m.? I thought not. — V.F.
Published as “Cheesesteak 2.0” in the April 2025 issue of Philadelphia magazine.