Binge watching The Bear — the hit FX sequence now streaming on Hulu — is certain to trigger a yearning for an enormous juicy Italian beef sandwich. There’s a candy spot in Seattle’s Georgetown neighborhood that may assist scratch that nagging itch.
Smarty Pants, a preferred bar and sandwich store in Seattle’s Georgetown neighborhood makes an Italian … [+] Beef Sandwich that is going to avoid wasting you a visit to the Windy Metropolis.
Leslie Kelly
Chicago’s a good distance from the Pacific NW
It’s roughly 2,000 miles from Seattle to Chicago, however that’s the gap I used to be tempted to drive after devouring Season 1 of the heart-wrenching, humorous, completely entertaining sequence about life within the kitchen of a dysfunctional household restaurant within the Windy Metropolis. After the ultimate credit of episode 8 began rolling, I needed, no… I wanted a kind of sizzling mess sandwiches often known as Italian Beef.
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The seemingly easy creation is synonymous with the classics from that metropolis and it performed a starring function in The Bear, although it was extra of a sequence of teasing cameo appearances. No slow-motion meals porn right here. Key elements are skillfully assembled, cooked with care, completed in a mad sprint which may embrace a half dozen particular requests. There’s lots of yelling, each within the entrance of the home and within the again. However the prospects consuming these sandwiches? They’re quiet, virtually reverential.
When The Bear opens, viewers may surprise why a celeb chef is cooking at a spot that appears barely seedy, a spot the place payments haven’t been paid and the proprietor dedicated suicide. That’s the chef’s large brother who left the restaurant to his youthful brother, Carmy. It’s intense and unhappy and in the end hopeful.
The meals is what brings all these disparate characters collectively, and what pulls them aside, time and again. Anybody who’s labored in the same state of affairs will possible acknowledge some truths. Some cooks I do know are taking a tough move on watching as a result of they’re afraid it’ll set off their PTSD. I get that, however I couldn’t cease. And as soon as I used to be executed, I needed to have an Italian Beef Sandwich.
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LOS ANGELES, CALIFORNIA – JUNE 20: (L-R) Edwin Lee Gibson, Ebon Moss-Bachrach, Jeremy Allen White, … [+] Matty Matheson, Ayo Edebiri, Liza Colón-Zayas, Abby Elliott, Lionel Boyce, Chris Witaske, and Carmen Christopher attends the Los Angeles Premiere of FX’s “The Bear” at Goya Studios on June 20, 2022 in Los Angeles, California. (Picture by Amy Sussman/Getty Pictures)
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Welcome to Georgetown
The as soon as gritty neighborhood south of Seattle’s downtown has reworked over the previous decade, or so. It’s now residence to dozens of locations to eat and drink and hang around. Fran’s Chocolate moved its HQ to the outdated Rainier Brewery in 2014 and Charles Smith opened the most important city vineyard on the West Coast in 2015.
Smarty Pants is arising on 20 years in that a part of city. The house owners — Tim Ptak and his accomplice, Michelle Braasch, — are Chicago transplants, who have been trying to deliver some Midwest taste to their new stomping grounds. The scratch-made menu is sandwich-centric, although there’s an in depth brunch lineup on weekends.
The Italian Beef at Smarty Pants in Seattle is a tribute to that Chicago basic, a mixture of … [+] thinly sliced, house-roasted beef served on a french roll and topped with candy peppers, giardiniera, and juice.
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Leslie Kelly
The Italian Beef is described as “thinly sliced, completely seasoned house-roasted beef served on a french roll and topped with candy peppers, giardiniera, and juice.”
Ptak mentioned the recipe was developed by way of a sequence of trial-and-error tastings: “In Chicago, there are about one million variations, however we needed one thing that tasted like what we grew up consuming. I feel it’s fairly darned shut.”
Granted, I’ve no earlier expertise consuming an Italian Beef, so I can simply declare this model to be the very best I’ve ever tried. What made it so compelling was that mixture of the savory, slow-cooked beef and candy peppers. The pickled Italian relish jogged my memory of the olive salad on a muffuletta. And that juicy juice was seeping into the roll was paying homage to the French dip at Philippe’s in Los Angeles.
It hit the spot, but in addition left me hungry for extra. A buddy who lives in Chicago promised to take me on a tasty Italian beef sandwich tour the subsequent time I visited. Deal!
Within the meantime, I’m wanting ahead to Season 2 of The Bear. And in the event you haven’t seen it but… nicely, what are you ready for?
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Right here’s the official trailer:
MORE FROM FORBESIndie Resorts That Rock… And The place To Dine Close byBy Leslie Kelly
On Thursday night, it was announced that Seattle Mariners catcher Cal Raleigh had finished 12th in the American League MVP voting. This concluded an unbelievable award season for the M’s catcher. In addition to finishing 12th in the MVP voting, Raleigh was a finalist for the American League Silver Slugger. He also won both the Gold Glove at catcher and the Platinum Glove in the American League.
However, the MVP news wasn’t the biggest piece of Raleigh-related news on Thursday. According to Kiley McDaniel of ESPN, Raleigh dropped agent Scott Boras in favor Excel Sports Management.
Seattle Mariners Gold Glove catcher Cal Raleigh has switched his representation to Excel Sports Management, per sources.
Now, we don’t officially know the reason for the change, but some Mariners fans online took it to mean that the M’s have a greater chance of signing Raleigh to an extension now.
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Take @MarinerMuse for example:
Fine, I’ll say it out loud:
This is the move you make if you want to sign an extension and you have the free agency manipulation agent.
Fine, I’ll say it out loud:
This is the move you make if you want to sign an extension and you have the free agency manipulation agent.
Raleigh is headed into arbitration this season and is under contract through the 2027 regardless. The M’s certainly would want to lock Raleigh up long-term as he’s one of the best catchers in all of baseball, but it only gets harder to do as he gets closer to free agency.
Furthermore, he’s 27 years old now, making an extension that takes him to 32-33 more desirable than giving him a long-term deal in the future. He’ll be 30 when his rookie deal ends and any extension would likely take him deep into his mid-30s.
Raleigh hit 34 homers this year to lead all catchers. He drove in 100 runs also, in addition to his defensive prowess.
Continue to follow our Inside the Mariners coverage on social media by liking us on Facebook and by following Teren Kowatsch and Brady Farkas on “X” @Teren_Kowatsch and @wdevradiobrady. You can subscribe to the “Refuse to Lose” podcast by clicking HERE:
Seattle Sounders FC (16-9-9, fourth in the Western Conference during the regular season) vs. Los Angeles FC (19-8-7, first in the Conference during the regular season)
The MLB offseason is in full swing, but things have been rather quiet for the Seattle Mariners so far.
Seattle Mariners have a new TV situation, according to The Athletic
President of baseball operations Jerry Dipoto and general manager Justin Hollander are both on record saying the team is looking to add to its offense, particularly on the infield. But the team hasn’t been committal to how exactly they’ll approach that.
Seattle could look to upgrade in free agency. This year’s class isn’t very strong on the infield, but there are still a handful of options that seem to fit the club’s needs.
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The team also could go the trade route and offload some of its touted hitting prospects or a proven starter from its talented starting rotation to address its offensive needs. It seems more likely the trade route would include a package built around prospects rather than one of the team’s current starting pitchers. Both Dipoto and Hollander have said trading a starter isn’t one of their top options, with Dipoto calling it “Plan Z” during an end-of-season interview.
Seattle Sports’ Michael Bumpus is trying to read between the lines and figure out what the real plan is for the M’s this offseason. During Thursday’s edition of Bump and Stacy, he asked ESPN baseball insider Kiley McDaniel about the team’s offseason approach.
“They’re in a spot now where they have tried for, I guess, a couple offseasons now to shore up the offense while staying within their spending parameters,” McDaniel said. “There was that time four or five years ago (the 2019 season) where there was the quick reset where they underpaid relative to what they could have paid the payroll to then have more money to, then ramp up spending when the team was good. And that has now happened and they need an extra bat or two, but they don’t have the money to go on the free agent market and just pay $20-25 million per year to get the two bats they need.”
That puts the Mariners in a difficult spot decision-wise, McDaniel said. They could trade from the farm system and risk dealing away a future star for a shorter-term solution. Or they could go for under-the-radar signings of cheaper players, which hasn’t worked out in past seasons with the likes of AJ Pollock and Tommy La Stella.
“There’s no easy solution to this the same way that like (if) the Mets or the Dodgers want a hitter, they just get a hitter,” McDaniel said. “The Mariners have a puzzle and they’re missing a piece. So how do they manufacture that extra piece to solve the puzzle, which is basically spending $1 million on a guy that will be worth 20, or not trading a prospect that they think is good and getting a good player. They have to conjure something up kind of magically.”
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McDaniel said the easiest route for the front office may be one fans don’t want to hear after the past two seasons, which is being patient and waiting for the group of hitting prospects to start reaching the majors. Just two of the team’s top hitting prospects are projected to reach the big leagues this year by MLB Pipeline – second baseman Cole Young and catcher Harry Ford. Both played at the Double-A level last season, and Young is expected to start the 2025 season in Triple-A.
“They’ve done a really good job creating a good farm system full of young hitters,” McDaniel said. “So I think unfortunately … the easiest answer is to just wait a year or two until these guys come up and then you maybe have the homegrown solution, but then some of the veterans that are contributing right now, they might be gone, which then creates another problem. … There is not an easy solution to this issue other than raising payroll, which is obviously only up to the owner.”
A free agent fit M’s
McDaniel spoke about a few free agents who would fit the Mariners’ needs. Two were players McDaniel would advise teams not to sign: first basemen Justin Turner and Pete Alonso. Both were included as two of his free agents to avoid this offseason.
Someone who McDaniel thinks makes sense for Seattle to go after, though, is former New York Yankees second baseman Gleyber Torres.
“Gleyber Torres (is) coming off a slightly disappointing year, one of the youngest guys in the free agent market (at) 28. I think two or three years at $15 to 17 (million) a year is probably what it costs,” McDaniel said. “He’s the guy that I think makes a lot of sense to possibly get some upside, get him locked in for multiple years (and he) can play multiple positions.”
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Torres was an All-Star in his first two seasons (2018-19), slugged a career-high 38 home runs during 2019 and produced a 113 OPS+ or higher in four of his first six seasons.
He hit a combined 49 home runs in the 2022 and 2023 seasons, but saw his power numbers decline and hit just 15 last season. In 154 games in 2024, he slashed .257/.330/.378 with a 1.7 fWAR.
“You have a chance to spend less than $20 million a year and get a guy,” McDaniel said. “But if you miss on him, now you have almost no money left and you’re forced – if you need to find a hitter – to either get lucky on like a minor-league signing or a one-year deal, or to trades some prospects.”
Tune in to Bump and Stacy weekdays from 10 a.m.-2 p.m. or find the podcast on the Seattle Sports app.
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Seattle Mariners coverage
• Mariners make deal with Rays to reunite with local product • Drayer’s Rebuttal: Why Mariners shouldn’t trade a starting pitcher • Longtime announcer for Seattle Mariners’ Triple-A affiliate to retire • Legends Ichiro, Félix among new names on Baseball HOF ballot • What would a Roki Sasaki signing mean for Mariners?
/cdn.vox-cdn.com/uploads/chorus_asset/file/25739950/247386_Elon_Musk_Open_AI_CVirginia.jpg "Inside Elon Musk’s messy breakup with OpenAI")
