Cheap, you say? Comfortable, you ask? Yes. Those of you in District 2 will be pleasantly surprised to see that I have forsaken my usual Willy and Park Street tendencies this week. I nearly got fired this weekend and it set me to thinking about spending less money on food. No more jerking around with $20 bottles of wine and expensive ornate entrees. No more looking for the best, most elevating atmosphere. Who the hell am I kidding? I can't stop forever, but this week I decided to review somewhere cheaper. Luckily, I found a shop full of values all the way out on East Johnson Street.
ESSENTIALSMildred's Sandwich Shop827 E. Johnson 255-2460 Mon.-Sun. 11 a.m. to 9 p.m. (out of 5) Overall *** Food ** Decor *** Service ** Dateability ** |
I went to Mildred's on yet another hung-over Sunday (my best time for finding new places) and was quite pleased. I entered and looked at the big board covered with names like Cicero, Salina, Gramsci and Good Question. Order and sit down and wait; here you pay for your sandwich and sides when you get them. There are sandwiches as cheap as $1.60 (peanut butter & honey and lettuce & tomato) and as expensive as $5.85. Many sandwiches are served on white or wheat pita, but there are four types of regular loaf bread, including a light rye and a pumpernickel. You can create your own sandwich for about $2.50 plus $.50 for cheese and $.25 for vegetables. I highly recommend the pickled sweet red pepper to go with roast beef. I have had the Gramsci (pepperoni, mozzarella and the aforementioned peppers with mustard and mayo on a pita) and the Syrian (roast beef, ham, pastrami, swiss, provolone, mozzarella, lettuce and tomato with mayo and mustard on wheat pita). Both of these sandwiches are great, especially the Syrian. The lunch meats here are very good and they are shown off pretty well on the Syrian. Speaking of which, the Syrian is the most expensive sandwich, but hell, it's better than anything at Bialy Brown's, 564 State St., for the same price. The larger pita will actually hold the amount of meat that Bialy puts on its tiny bread. And, the soup here is also quite good. I had a bean soup and a cream of mushroom soup. The bean soup had very tender beans and a pretty creamy consistency. The mushroom soup was a little too chicken-brothy, but otherwise carried the flavor of mushroom well.
Anyway, I like this place a lot. There are large wooden booths to sit in with a group, but the backs aren't so high that you can't look around. They play good music, but not too loud. Loud music goes well in other sandwich shops, but this place is smaller and everything's a little quieter. So if your friends come down with a car, make them take you here for lunch. And if you live way out that way, I hope you have a fun time getting to school in the morning. At least you got your very own dope sandwich shop.
