Midtown Lunch

It will probably surprise nobody to learn that there was a time, before my lunching was professionalized, when hot roast beef sandwiches served with fries from a beachside shack was one of my once a week go-to lunches. Kelly’s Roast Beef on Revere Beach was about a ten minute drive from the radio station I worked at, on the north shore of Boston.  And we made that drive often.  Not just for roast beef sandwiches of course. On the days you were feeling particularly rich there were also lobster rolls, whole fried clams, and pretty much everything else you’d expect to find at a New England seafood shack. Some days it was cold and windy, and keeping the pelicans away from your fries was a constant struggle.  But sitting out on the beach on a work day eating a roast beef sandwich is still probably one of my top 10 weekday work lunches of all time.

So imagine how excited I was to hear about Top Round Roast Beef, the new roast beef sandwich place on La Brea and Olympic.  In the month or two since they’ve opened I’ve heard a lot of talk of it being a “better version of Arby’s”.  But I have no love or nostalgia for the bologna of roast beef.  I was hoping it would return me to the beach.

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Sick of turkey?  Me too.  But you’ve still got to eat lunch today, so can we recommend… a roast beef sandwich?  Here are 3 new ones that have surfaced in L.A. over the past few months. 

Situated in the shadow of Brentwood’s branch of Lemonade, I probably wouldn’t have ever thought to eat at Roast if it wasn’t for this post on Unemployed Eater.  Despite how good it sounds in theory (deli and meat market FTW!), in actuality it’s kind of a strange lunch place for the neighborhood; with an aesthetic that could only be described as bush league or DIY- depending on how generous you were feeling that day.  In other words, don’t look for Roast to take too much business away from their neighbor anytime soon, or expand into some kind of local chain.  That being said, their roast beef sandwich- which comes in slider or sandwich form- was surprisingly good.  Perfectly rare, and deliciously tender and moist, it only gets better when you use their horseradish sauce and au jus. Not something I’d drive out of my way for, but it’s one of the better lunch options in Brentwood.  The only downside?  The french dip is $12.  Roast, 147 S Barrington. Brentwood Village. 310-476-1100

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