For Christmas, I gifted my partner, Quinn, a cookbook written by a favourite YouTuber of ours, Andrew Rea. The book and channel both are called Binging with Babish, each episode recreating iconic dishes from our favourite movies and TV shows. Missing the holiday food you have come to know, love, and crave? Try Ross’s Thanksgiving sandwich from Friends! (Yes, that sandwich.) Or, for something sweeter, Buddy the Elf’s delicious (?) dessert pasta! Want to “leave the gun, take the cannoli”? This cookbook has you covered, Coppola fans. Buon appetito.
As part of a sort of fun, communal New Year’s resolution, Quinn and I decided to make one recipe from the book every other week. Sounds manageable, right? We love cooking! We might love cooking even more than we love Uber Eats (marginally)!
Not wanting to bite off more than we could chew, our first dish was one of the simplest recipes in the book: a Philly Cheesesteak Sandwich, a la Creed. We heeded the author’s advice from to skip the mayo as featured in the movie. Similarly to the author, we also used our artistic license to purchase a more moderately priced steak (the recipe called for ribeye).We popped those in the freezer, got in our PJs, and after 30 minutes began cutting the meat into thin slices, which is around the time I realized the preparation of this meal was more of a quick-and-dirty one-man operation, especially with our limited countertop space. While Quinn did a lot of the leg work on the meat, I laid out the toppings and convinced myself that I was Integral to The Mission. The whole affair took 15 minutes flat and it was one of the best sandwiches of my life. Here is a bad picture of it:
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