15. Phillipe

It was one of this Sundays where you slowly open your eyes, picking out flecks of regret and remorse as you feel the impending hangover settling in. I awoke on my friend Brian's floor at noon realizing that the prior nights activity's had left me in a place of contempt for life, friends, and fun. I located my pants and rolled to the couch to play Xbox baseball. 

Saturday nights fit of hedonism left my stomach full of beer, whiskey, vodka, and Zima. Unfortunately, no food. So even in my putrid state, food was tantamount. Visions of pizza dancing merrily in my head and began to make me salivate.

Brian came out of his room and I greeted him. "Man, what a night. We should get Pizza."

"Yeah," he replied, "Last night was nuts."

"I feel like pizza."

"The Sharks game is on." Brian remembered.

"Hey we should just order a pizza and watch this game." I tried again.

"Nice," he stated, Giants are up 1-0."

"Are there good pizza places in Brentwood?" I asked.

"Adam McKay is one big ass dude" was his response.

At that point Brian's Roommate Billy arises from bed to greet us in the living room.

"Man, what a night, "Billy said. "Brian can you give me a ride to downtown to get my car? I'm super hungry too, we should eat at Phillipe."

"Good idea," Brian said. "Let's go there."

"Fuck." was all I could think.

And that's the story of how we ended up at Phillipe. A staple of downtown Los Angeles located adjacent from Union Station. Phillipe (not Phillipe's) is famous for it's French Dip Sandwiches and boasts that it even invented them. Their story is that a police office named Officer French ordered a sandwich and the worker accidentally dropped the bread into a conveniently located open bucket of Au Jous sauce. French said it was fine and to make the sandwich with the same bread. The rest was supposed history. Bill, Brian and I all deemed this story to be marketing hogwash and proceeded to hypothesize what actually happened. (I suggested that Officer French was actually the local pedophile.)

Inventor of the French Dip Sandwich.

Anyway, not unlike most landmark restaurants, this place was packed. The offered mainly French Dip sandwiches with a small selection of alternatives. Meat choices included pork, beef, ham, lamb, and turkey with like 4 or 5 cheese options. I went with turkey because I'm trying to passively lose weight while Billy got lamb and Brian got pork. The Sandwiches were reasonably priced around 6 bucks each. I only say reasonably because I didn't feel entirely full at the end. But they offer lemonade for 45 cents, iced tea for 65 cents and coffee for 9 cents, so that was an absolute steal.

They also offer a super spicy mustard to douse your soggy ass sandwich in, which I deemed fantastic. This place is cash only which  normally isn't a problem, except I'd emptied my wallet drinking the night before so my whole meal cost an extra $2.50 per the ATM surcharge. I just don't understand how a consistently packed, world famous restaurant still  tries to duck the IRS and not take cards. This was a major issue for me on principle. 

Overall this place is good, but plan on waiting in a long ass line. Also, you can order double meat, or betteryet just play it safe and order two sandwiches to genuinely feel full. But police officers and pedophiles agree, this place is pretty good. Also, parking is ample.

Name:  Phillepe

Genre: Sandwiches

Value: Great!

What You'll Need to Enjoy Your Meal:  Cash money, baller.

Rating: 4 / 5