(I get mine “sweet and hot, dipped”-both kinds of peppers, plus a full-sandwich dunk in the beefy broth in which the meat has braised for hours.) There’s a smell these restaurants share that’s found in no other place on earth: a layered, rough, masculine perfume of meat and garlic and fryer oil and Formica laminate and sweet, yeasty bread. I can summon in an instant the sense memory of stepping inside the doors of Johnnie’s Beef or Al’s on Taylor, and the newborn-like heft of a warm, paper-wrapped beef sandwich. The color scheme is brown and beige the diverse, largely blue-collar clientele who line up for lunch every day are a glad-handing politician’s dream the menus rarely stray from short-order classics and local specialties. Not quite a diner, not quite a deli, not quite a fast-food joint, it is a storefront establishment with big plate-glass windows, grubby in a reassuring way, with illuminated signs that advertise Italian beef or gyros. The excellent new FX show “The Bear” takes place in a type of restaurant that only exists in Chicago.
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