cole's french dip

according to carvers at cole’s, henry cole first dipped the frenchbreadin jus at the request of a customer who had had recent dental work. the frenchbreadwas too hard and it hurt this customer’s teeth, so henry dipped thebreadin order to soften it. other customers, with perfectly good teeth, saw henry dip thebreadand requested that he do the same for them – and thus the french dip was born.

the sandwiches here are okay. i couldn't really tell if the ingredients were fresh or not, and thebreadgot a bit soggy after a few minutes. the wait during lunch is really long: up to 30 minutes. unfortunately there are a lot of other great sandwich places in the area like tartine.

not very good. i was excited to try the original french dip at cole's since it was supposedly the "first" and was invented there. turns out i was very disappointed in the experience.

the limited menu pretty much has french dip sandwiches (with beef, pastrami, turkey or lamb) for around $6. cheap, yes, but you get what you pay for. the beef in my sandwich was very, very tough, and while the sandwich was loaded with cheese, it didn't melt. thebreadwas as hard as a rock, and the fries were nothing special and were cold.

the worst part of the meal was the au jus with the sandwich - it had this really funky taste to it . it was so bad that i asked for another cup, thinking that the one i got was old or spoiled. nope, guess not! the second cup tasted the same. bleh.

the restaurant has a sort of "dumpy" charm to it as it feels like you are eating in the basement of an old speakeasy.

the bottom line is that the food just isn't that good. skip this place.