People are fickle sometimes, yet other times the souls of constancy. Philippe the Original has been serving pretty much the same thing since 1908, when it claims to have invented the French dip sandwich. It’s been at its present location on Alameda St. since 1951. When my mother and I moved to Los Angeles in 1971, she told me she couldn’t wait to take me to the place with the sawdust on the floor. I don’t recall if she mentioned the food.
Kathy and I went for lunch today. It was great to run into our Episco-Pals Leslie and Eric Miller from The Church of Our Saviour, who had had the same inspiration to enjoy the same sandwiches and sawdust. Though downtown was quiet, the restaurant was hopping. The clientele was diverse in almost every respect. It’s like the church at its best. If you do something worth doing really well, you can do it forever, and they will come.
Philippe’s is one of the three places Kathy and I ran into the late public television personality Huell Howser. The others were the restaurant at the Twentynine Palms Inn, where he looked in one night to get a piece of cheesecake to go, and the Nixon library when he taped a program about Mr. Nixon’s birthplace. David Eisen, my friend since college and our outside legal counsel at the Episcopal Diocese of Los Angeles, and I meet up there for lunch and political conversation. For the latter, the second floor dining rooms are good. David likes the Los Angeles Dodgers touches, including the historic collection of bobble heads.
The famous hot brown mustard, just a couple of notches shy of wasabi, was served from glass jars until the health department complained. It’s just as good in plastic squeeze bottles. The founders said the inspiration for the French dip came when someone noticed how good leftover gravy tasted soaked into French bread. You tell the friendly servers if you want one or two dips or a soak. I don’t believe there is a wrong choice.
Eric and I agreed on leaving that the sandwiches were always good but especially so today. Maybe it’s because we were there on a quiet afternoon with people we loved, enjoying and appreciating freedoms secured by the blood of the brave. Freedom and justice for all is also something worth doing. Let’s hope we can perfect it and do it forever.
