Last night I had a beef from Buona Beef with sweet peppers and dipped. As a long-time customer of Portillo's, going back to the early days when Dick Portillo used to work in his Addison location on the corner of Lake St. and Addison Rd., I have to say that Buona Beef has now overtaken Portillo's beef in quality of the sandwich. The texture of the Buona Beef is what Portillo's Beef's used to look like twenty years or more ago, where the Beef is sliced thinly and cooked well. When you get a Portillo's sandwich nowadays, like at the North Ave. location in Carol Stream, the beef looks like what you would see if you bought Italian Beef from the Grocery Store. It not so thinly sliced and the color of the beef is not a deep brown but more leaning toward grayish. That for me is a big turn off, that Portillo's would be serving grocery store quality beef. Both places are really skimpy on the peppers. I only got two peppers, the same as when I ordered a Big Beef from Portillo's the last time. The portion the Buona Beef was fine, not too much or too little, just proportionate the bread.

If Portillo's cannot maintain its staple Beef Sandwich, then the chain is done for. The chocolate cake is not going to save it. I don't see the big crowds inside the restaurant any more. Back in the day, the restaurant was always filled with people, like that old Addison location which is no longer there. Now it's located a little more west on Lake St and has the 50s Drive-In look to it. The Portillo's old-time or "Old-Chicago" image is no longer quaint.

Weird that both those places have been so hostile to unions. What's their beef?

Buona Beef is dogshit.

Portillos isn't much better.

_________________

Prison food.

You guys need to all STFU Be sensitive to us folks that can’t get any of it.

_________________
Elections have consequences.

Good one! Frank's gone so I'm the only one left who appreciates dopey shit.

You can get discounts on the app.

Exactly.

_________________
"He is a loathsome, offensive brute
--yet I can't look away."

Which one has the best Cajun rice?

_________________

There are tons of Chicagoland options that are better than Buona, but that doesn't make it dog shit. Buona is fine and certainly better than the option of "nothing". Portillo's may have been good once upon a time, but those days are long gone. The entire setup / experience of buying food at a Portillo's is a non-starter for me. I fucking hate Portillo's.

_________________

I ordered Portillo's off Uber Eats on Saturday and they sent me a plain hot dog when I clearly stated I wanted everything. What am I, an eight-year-old? I might try Buona next time just out of spite.

_________________

Al's is the best local Italian Beef chain.

The process of ordering a hot dog via delivery has got to be pretty miserable. Isn't it ice cold when it comes to you?

Like an eight-year old might do?

_________________
"I honestly don't see a good bet on the board here."

_________________

No, it was actually quite warm, just plain. I had to order $25 to get 60% off, so I tacked on a hot dog.

_________________

Stop spreading misinformation. Portillo's app doesn't get you shit for discounts. Buona's kinda does.

They just opened a Buona in my town and I tried it a few months ago for the first time. I thought it was alright, but I am far from an afficionado. Didn't grow up on them like MANY here. Thought the fries were really good. I got the Large Big Joey's and a small fry. For nearly $20 I was a little underwhelmed but it did taste pretty good and not very many options for that up here on the other side of the cheddar curtain.

_________________
Flew too close to the sun on wings of pastrami

exactly

_________________

You can save $0.30 on your first hot dog provided you agree to give Berskhire access to your internet search history, camera roll and location data in perpetuity.

_________________

portillos has sucked dick since dick sold it. buona is decent.

Portillos beefs fell off a cliff post-PE.

_________________

fuck you if I can't have a zippys cheezy beef.

Family brought me down some Portillos to go a few weeks back and that was awful. Threw half of it away.

Yeah, I’d say:

Al’s > Buona > Portillo’s > Pop’s

Johnnie’s is the best independent stand.

_________________

I always get a polish at portillos. It's just too good to pass up. Almost no one outside of maxwell street cook the onions to such perfection

_________________
O judgment! Thou art fled to brutish beasts,
And men have lost their reason.

Can't disagree with any of those thoughts. Al's downfall is its relative dearth of locations.

We once had an office event where one of our management types was in from NY.

My boss wanted to treat this guy to a Chicago favorite so got Al’s. By the time is showed up to the office the meat had a nice orange layer of congealed fat all over it.

This fucker - an Englishman built like a chinless lump of playdoh - was disgusted and demanded something different. That’s it, that’s the whole story. We all still ate it but this doughy little glasses-wearing freak got a salad or something gay.

_________________

God damn that’s a good story

_________________

That’s as close as I’ll get to being George Washington.

_________________

The best beef I've had was a place called Zippys in Schaumburg. Maybe that was a weird corner of Hoffman Estates. While there's some good ones out there, I'll always compare the. To Zippys

_________________
"Play until it hurts, then play until it hurts to not play."
http://soundcloud.com/darkside124 HOF 2013, MM Champion 2014