Bull market
For five decades, the North Shore has been a hot spot for hot beef sandwiches
REVERE BEACH -- The seagulls here make a quiet lunch by the water impossible. The summertime crowds of people are gone from this waterfront strip just north of Boston, but hungry gulls still patrol the sand. Kelly's Roast Beef is across the street, and if the birds are lucky, some newbie might try to eat her sandwich on the beach. ''Turn away for a second and they'll be on top of your food," says Lenny Orlandello, Kelly's general manager.
More seasoned customers will head for their cars or a bench away from the bullying gulls, whose fierce squawks seem to demand a bite of the famed hot roast beef sandwiches. These sandwiches originated in 1951 when a local chef, Frank ''Mac" McCarthy, opened a summer sandwich shack on the beach. Thinly sliced roast beef, served warm and rare on a grilled bun with barbecue sauce (cheese and mayo are popular additions), has become a fixture of North Shore eating since Kelly's opened. From East Boston and Lynn to Beverly and Ipswich, hot roast beef sandwiches are as familiar north of Boston as fried clams and lobster rolls are all along the coast. At most of these shops, the counter service is quick; sandwiches are served on disposable plates with stacks of paper napkins.
Although Kelly's sold the first hot beef sandwich as this region knows it, other entrepreneurs set up shop to offer their versions of the well-liked sandwich. One early store was Bill and Bob's Famous Roast Beef on the Lynnway in Lynn. In 1968, Nondas Lagonakis bought the shop from the original owners and has since expanded to four locations. ''A lot of the people who have roast beef shops up here have some connection to Bill and Bob's," says 20-year employee Kosta Prentakis, whether they worked there or were a family member or friend of the owner.
Dozens of these shops are Greek-owned. Many of the Greek immigrants who came to Lowell at the turn of the 20th century to work in mills wound up in the food business. In the 1960s, new arrivals to towns such as Lynn and Peabody landed jobs in North Shore diners, casual restaurants, and sandwich shops owned by more established Greek immigrants.
Many of the Greek-Americans who worked for Bill and Bob's went out on their own, and now that second tier of shops also has offshoots. Eleni Koudanis owns Nick's Famous Roast Beef with her husband, Nikos, her brother Nick Markos, and his wife, Georgia. ''My brother Nick was working for Bill and Bob's," says Eleni. ''And we thought it sounded like a good idea to do our own thing." The family opened Nick's in 1975. Over the years, both couples' children have worked at the busy shop, as have siblings, cousins, and friends.
Their staff, too, branched out with their own roast beef joints. Over time, ''a lot of ex-employees went on to open their own places," says Eleni.
One Nick's graduate is John Kalantzis, who owns King's Famous Roast Beef in Salem. But Kalantzis, 39, a Lynn native, modeled his business after Royal Roast Beef in East Boston, where he worked for six years after high school. ''Royal is a Greek shop -- they were family friends," he says. Kalantzis employs his brother, his father, a cousin, and a few old friends at King's, which he opened in 1993. He credits his success to the store's small size, his presence in the shop, and the friends and family he employs.
The North Shore isn't the only place in the country famous for its roast beef. Philadelphia, Chicago, and Buffalo all boast their own versions. Chopped grilled steak and Cheez Whiz make up the Philly cheese steak. In Buffalo, beef on weck is similar to the North Shore sandwich, but the beef is served with grated horseradish on kummelweck, a hard roll studded with caraway seeds. Chicago's Italian beef is ''thin, thin roast beef, sopped in natural gravy in Italian bread, which is also sopped in gravy," says ''Roadfood" author Michael Stern, who has written extensively about regional dining in the United States. The Second City sandwich is topped with hot pickled veggies. Most hot beef sandwiches haven't migrated far, says Stern. The exception is the French dip. This Los Angeles favorite, beef on a French roll served with a cup of beef juices for dipping, has traveled east and can be found on menus in the Boston area.
If a few generations of mom-and-pop places passing on jobs and training to family and friends help explain the presence of small, Greek-owned North Shore sandwich shops, the popularization of the roast beef sandwich is another puzzle. For a regional food to become an institution, like clam chowder or baked beans, for instance, ''you have to cultivate an audience," says Stern.
Perhaps that's why the sandwiches stayed largely on the North Shore, where they've had a thriving audience for 40 years. ''We grew up eating roast beef," says John Kalantzis of King's. ''In fact, that's all we ate." Kalantzis says places like Bill and Bob's, and Big
At Kelly's on Revere Beach, the '70s and '80s ''were the heyday," says manager Orlandello, an employee of 44 years. There were beach crowds all day, and by night a ''phenomenal" after-hours bar crowd. With its decadeslong presence in the area, it has become part of a collective local memory.
While some of the old hangouts have changed hands, grown tired, or faded away, the vibrant places maintain their old audiences while grabbing new ones. Nick's in Beverly has customers who have come in every day for years on end, says Eleni Koudanis. Some people make weekly trips from Boston; others have moved away and make Nick's their first stop on a visit home. Of the hundreds of customers Orlandello greets each week in Revere, he thinks he knows the names of half. Meanwhile, Kelly's business has expanded to four stores, including an enormous and busy Saugus location that director of operations Manny Paula calls ''the Taj Mahal of fast casual."
And with Bostonians so loyal to local institutions, it's unlikely that hot roast beef sandwiches and the best places that serve them on the North Shore will lose status. They'll still boast what they've always claimed: The sandwiches are famous. 