Hot Steak Plate

A little diner in town has one of those banners out front provided by the Coca Cola co advertising "Old Fashioned Hot Steak Sandwich". Well, those words have not been far from my mind since the day she put it up there and it immediately took me all the way back to the early 70's when we use to love going to a little Diner on East Morris St called Griffin's Drive In I believe it was and get what I think was the same thing and they called it "Hot Steak Plate", served with a large serving of slaw and mashed potatoes. I haven't been to the little place that has the ad up because the price is 8.99 and I'm pretty sure even if it turned out to be as good as it should I wouldn’t want to pay 8.99 for it. At the same time though I just could not get it off my mind and we fixed a close cousin to it last night without the slaw and mashed spuds. I cooked a small boneless chuck roast yesterday till falling apart tender and pulled it, so we had the nice broth the make the gravy with - which is key here - and subbed rice and early peas for the sides cause that’s all we had. Purdy good stuff but just not the same. I guess it's something kin to SOS or open steak sandwich with dark gravy and I’m sure it’s been made with a variety of meats starting with the Army’s super salty chipped beef or any number of other canned items, but even though I can’t swear to it, something tells me Griffin’s used some purdy good cubed beef steak – had to be – or me and old Randle Owens and many others would not have made a bee line from Constellation Finishing Co so many times for it. Anyway, next time it hits my table it will be cubed beef cut in strips cooked fork tender and served with the gravy, slaw, and mashed taters – and I can promise you I won’t be waiting too long either.