Philippe the Original is a spot I heard about a long time ago and just hadn’t tried before. They specialized in French Dipped Sandwiches and I figured this was a good spot to finally try one. Jake and I recently took a short road trip up to LA for food, a Dodgers stadium tour, and to look for suits for him for the wedding! And Philippe the Original was our first stop.
Philippe the Original specializes in French Dipped sandwiches. I love the signs here and I imagine the neon sign looks great lit up at night.
This is the front counter where you order. There are little signs that say “Open” or “Closed” for the lines. We were there early in the morning on a Saturday (just after 8am) so we didn’t encounter much of a wait. The case at the counter showcases a lot of various pies and desserts they have with other baked goods and cold items.
I got a kick out of the telephone booths inside.
From one of the displays showing off a few pins from Philippe the Original’s 100th anniversary in 2008.
I loved this little bobblehead and the tiny French dipped sandwich!
Philippe the Original was quite roomy and we found a spot in the back that had a bunch of tiny train cars on display. This is a rotating train museum maintained by The Los Angeles Railroad Heritage Foundation.
We had fun walking around and checking out the displays before we ordered our breakfast.
I noticed that there was sawdust all over the floor and I wondered why. We didn’t ask anyone but on the website it states that the sawdust “… is a tradition to Philippe’s and is used to help absorb spills to avoid slipping on the concrete floors.”
Before we made the trek up to LA, Jake called and found out Philippe’s starts serving the French dip sandwiches at 8:30am. I tried to get a beef dip and a pastrami dip, but that early in the morning they only had the beef available. Most other fillings are available after 9am (though I didn’t know that at the time). In addition to beef, they also have pork, ham, lamb, turkey, and the previously mentioned pastrami. We decided to get one beef dip [$8.50] and then get something more “breakfast-y”.
I would also like to note that a cup of coffee is only $0.46 cents.
We asked for it to be single dipped, but on our receipt it said “double dip”. We asked for it to be on a french roll, since that’s the most traditional type of bread to use. Other breads available are wheat, white, rye, or sourdough. You can get the sandwich as a single dip, double dip or wet.
Here are the differences:
Single dip = only the top half of the sandwich bread is dipped in jus
Double dip = both the top and bottom halves of the bread are dipped.
Wet = both halves are dipped, and remain in the jus longer than with a double dip.
I say “oh hell no” to “wet”! That sounds like it would just be a mushy mess!
On our double dip, the bread was definitely moist, but still maintained some of its texture and was not dripping wet. The bread was chewy and tasted terrific with the hot beef inside. Jake wished there was more jus but I thought it had right the right amount without causing it to be too soggy or mushy tasting. We didn’t try their famous mustard since they put the bottles out after we were done eating. I liked it as is with no additional stuff on the sandwich. The meat was juicy, flavorful, and delicious on the French bread.
I also got a side of potato salad [$1.65]. It had relish in it so I didn’t love it and abandoned it after a few bites. If it didn’t have the relish I would have loved it since it had a good creamy texture to it. But I just don’t like that sweet pickle relish!
For a more “breakfast-y” option, we chose to get the Biscuits and Gravy [$5.80]. The biscuits tasted like they were made in house and freshly baked. They were crunchy on the outside and light and fluffy in the middle. I liked the the gravy is served on the side so you can dip and put as much gravy as you want on top of your biscuit.
The gravy has bits of sausage in it and was amazingly good! Just the right thickness and it packed a lot of flavor into the gravy. Yum!
It was like 9AM but I couldn’t pass up some dessert. I got the Blueberry Pie [$4.90]. I wish they had a list of all of the pies available, which are on the website and I didn’t see before hand. Here’s the list of pie’s at Philippe the Original: high-top apple pie, pineapple, cherry, berry, blueberry, peach, pecan, chocolate cream, coconut cream, pumpkin cream, lemon meringue, banana cream, coconut meringue, pumpkin and custard. The pies are not baked here at Philippe the Originals. They are from Martino’s Bakery.
The blueberry pie was excellent. The crust was very flaky and the blueberry filling is thick and not super sweet. A perfect slice of pie!
Philippe the Original
1001 N. Alameda St.
Los Angeles, CA 90012
