Primanti Bros. voted ‘manliest’ in the Mid-Atlantic

John Eshenbach sits at the bar, intensely gripping his Miller High Life as he watches Pitt’s… John Eshenbach sits at the bar, intensely gripping his Miller High Life as he watches Pitt’s homecoming game on Saturday afternoon. He’s been coming to Primanti Bros. restaurant nearly every week since he first visited in 1994 on a middle school field trip. A 2008 Pitt graduate, Eshenbach returned to

the Oakland location for homecoming festivities and fine manly dining.

The Primanti Brothers’ almost-famous restaurant has become quite famous over the past few years, and has recently been voted “Manliest Restaurant in the Mid-Atlantic Region” by readers of Men’s Health magazine.

In March, the magazine asked readers to nominate the manliest restaurant in the country, using criteria such as portion size, protein content, cocktail and beer choices and overall manly dining experience to narrow down the top nine most-manly restaurants in the U.S.

Paul Kita, associate editor of Men’s Health and founder of the magazine’s Guy Gourmet blog, said that the magazine purposely did not define what a manly restaurant should be,

“We got thousands of responses with a large variety of definitions of what a manly restaurant is. We asked ourselves, were these places we would go to or we would recommend to our friends? Then we turned the voting back to the readers,” he said.

Primanti Bros. was ranked one of the manliest restaurants in the nation for its sandwiches, which can come with their side dishes stuffed inside them. A July article by Men’s Health magazine called the restaurant’s iconic dish a “bicep-buster of a sandwich.”

“It’s mostly chicks that run this store,” said Meghan Powell, one of two female managers at the manliest restaurant in the Mid-Atlantic. “We’re considered a ‘manly’ place because we have the biggest sandwiches in Oakland. I mean, we’ve always been pretty famous. We’re definitely a tourist stop for anyone that comes into Pittsburgh.”

A typical Primanti Bros. sandwich is stacked with sliced meat, cheese, french fries, coleslaw and tomato, which all comes slapped between two pieces of fresh Italian bread.

Powell hustled around behind the counter on Friday as she handled the cash register and took orders from the swarm of customers before shouting the one-word selections to the cooks.

“You have to be able to handle an intense work environment,” she said.

Out of the top nine nominees, one will receive a national title designating it the manliest restaurant. The final decision will be announced in the December 2011 issue of Men’s Health, which will be out on newsstands Nov. 22.

Primanti Bros. has also been voted “Best Late-Night College Food” by Playboy Magazine, and was featured in an episode of the Travel Channel’s Man vs. Food when host Adam Richman feasted on one of the mega-sized sandwiches.

At the Oakland location, a masculine milieu fills the room, which is decked out with Pittsburgh Steelers paraphernalia and gleaming Blue Moon, Coors Light, Miller Lite, Yuengling and Bud Light Cup World Champion signs. Whether you’ve ordered a Pitts-burgher cheesesteak or a knockwurst and cheese, there’s no need to use any kind of silverware. Customers scarf down sandwiches using both hands.

“They know my order, I can just come in and ask for my usual,” Eshenbach said.

Eshenbach’s “usual” is a kielbasa and cheese sandwich, no tomato. And he’s got to have hot sauce. Nothing is good without hot sauce, he said.

“This place is no-frills. Like us or hate us, we don’t care. It is what it is. There’s nothing special about this place other than its sandwiches,” Eshenbach said. “There’s something about the sandwiches here. You get all the food groups in one. It’s a balanced diet.”

Every Sunday morning around 11 a.m., Eshenbach comes to Primanti Bros. in Oakland with a group of his college buddies.

“Sunday is my cheat day,” Eshenbach said. “There are about four or five of us that come back. Usually they’ll already know all our orders. I came today because I couldn’t find a place where they’d have the Pitt game on, and I knew they’d have it here.”

Ria Knasiak, another restaurant manager, poured beers and delivered sandwiches to the tables as she dealt with the rush of customers.

“The best part about it is that I get to yell at people. This isn’t a fine-dining establishment, so I don’t have to kiss ass,” she said.

Although it might be ranked one of the manliest restaurants in America, there’s no question that both men and women enjoy a trip to Primani Bros.

“I don’t feel manly at all,” said Marie Jackson, an Oakland resident and librarian at Shaler North Hills Library, as she ate her cheesesteak on Sunday. “It’s phenomenal, because everything is between two pieces of Italian bread, which is my favorite. It’s genius.”

Jackson used a fork to eat the coleslaw that has fallen out of her sandwich.

“I know it’s sacrilegious to use a fork, but I have to eat the coleslaw somehow,” Jackson said. “It’s my favorite part.”