Genos vs. Pats Philly Cheesesteaks

By Lee | April 7th, 2008 | 3 Comments »

I spent this past weekend in Philadelphia and I decided to engage in the age old South Philly argument of which place has better cheesesteaks, Genos or Pats. I have been to Philly several times before and have in fact made runs from college in DC all the way to Philly just to have an authentic Philly cheesesteak. It seems however, that each time I visit, I seem to forget which place I like more. Although many people from Philly will tell you they like Jims on South Street better or perhaps they have their own favorite-there is no doubt that Genos and Pats are the two most famous cheesesteak haunts in Philadelphia. And I have come up with my favorite…

And the winner is Genos.

For me, Genos was the clear winner. I thought that their meat was better and their cheese wiz was the perfect compliment to their buns which in my opinion buried Pats. Also, the meat at Genos was a lot less fatty and as Lauren my favorite spicy food fanatic found out-when there is a big caution sign for the hot sauce-they mean it, especially when mixed with numerous flaming hot peppers it could cause dancing!

Also, the cheese fries were killer at Genos. To be fair they were also excellent at Pats as well. However, the kicker for me is that the line also moves a lot faster at Genos it seems than it did at Pats which when you’re itching for a cheesesteak is a big plus. These places are both packed at all times so be ready to wait and dress accordingly as the wind tends to howl.

Basically, as you can see I had a really healthy weekend of eating my face off in Philly. One can only imagine why Philly is consistently voted one of the fattest cities in America but aside from cheesesteaks Philly also has some great restaurants as well and is very culturally diversified with many different ethnic areas scattered throughout the city. On Friday night we ate at Morimoto which was a phenomenal, albeit very expensive Japanese restaurant that I highly recommend.

Philadelphia is a fun city to visit for weekend and is only 90 minutes away from New York and is very easy to get to. It has a lot of what New York has but just a lot different with a Baltimore meets Boston feel to it. I personally love to go there and eat at the great restaurants and of course the cheesesteaks and water ice don’t hurt either. And if you’re a total movie geek like me then don’t forget to run the steps just like Stallone did in Rocky-just one of those things that everyone has to do at some point!