Whether it’s U.S.C. vs. U.C.L.A., the Crips and the Bloods, or Mötley Crüe brawling with Guns N’ Roses at the V.M.A.’s, Los Angeles is infamously factional. But its most aged beef is about beef. For more than a century, the two oldest restaurants in the City of Angels—Philippe the Original and Cole’s Pacific Electric Buffet—feuded over the true provenance of the French-dip sandwich, which (this much is undisputed) was first served in 1908. In Cole’s version, the eureka moment occurred when the original house chef soaked the bread in savory broth to soften it for a sore-gummed customer.
This month, the quarrel will be settled by forfeit, as Cole’s makes its last dip in the au jus. The restaurant’s imminent closure was first announced this past summer in a statement from owner Cedd Moses (son of the Ferus Gallery artist Ed), who blamed the lingering aftereffects of the pandemic, the Hollywood strikes, bureaucratic regulations, and the exorbitant costs of labor, food, and rent.