Our sandwich of choice at Citizens Bank Park and Lincoln Financial Field is the Schmitter, known as Philadelphia’s Big League Sandwich.  But for a taste of the Big Leagues outside of the stadium, you have to head to Chestnut Hill, where McNally’s Tavern grills up hot and fresh Schmitters to order.  And if you think you can handle it, get the double Schmitter on a long roll and hang on for the ride.

When McNally’s Quick Lunch opened in 1921, Chestnut Hill was a wooded wilderness at the end of the trolley line; and for co-owner Anne McNally’s great-grandfather Hugh, it was a long way from his Port Richmond home.  Trolley operators, conductors and rail workers would find themselves out there with nothing available to eat or drink, to which Hugh’s wife, Rose McNally, responded by cooking up a special of the day.  The original McNally’s was little more than a corrugated shack serving coffee, pie, soup and some snacks.  Later moving across the street to its present location, and passed from generation to generation, McNally’s has become a neighborhood institution and its sandwiches have become legendary, headlined by the one-and-only Original Schmitter.

McNally’s added the Schmitter to the menu in 1964, named for Schmidt’s beer which often accompanied the sandwiches.  The secret to a Schmitter is cooking the ingredients together on the grill, intermingling the flavors.  Flats of the house-trimmed roast beef are sliced fresh every day and grilled with onions; Hatfield cooked salami is grilled with cheese and Jersey fresh tomatoes.  All of the meats and cheeses are plated on a fresh kaiser roll from a local Conshohocken bakery and smothered with McNally’s own Russian dressing.  The thin-sliced meat is juicy and tender; the caramelized onions are soft and sweet; the salami is smoky and salty.  An original Schmitter comes on a soft kaiser, the double comes on a toasted long roll.  Both come smothered in sauce, so be prepared with some extra napkins.

Family is at the core of everything that happens at McNally’s.  Five family members currently work there full time and three more part time, but many nieces and nephews have spent time in the kitchen, behind the bar and in the front of the restaurant over the years.  The restaurant famously went smoke-free long before it was law because Anne was pregnant.  Colin McNally, who spent 6 years in the kitchen at the Four Seasons Hotel, came back home to cook at McNally’s.  Anne’s husband, Joe, runs the Schmitter concessions at the stadiums, which they admit are not quite perfect reproductions of the original, limited by the nature of a mass operation (though they did get Aramark to agree to use the same bakery fresh kaiser rolls.)  And when asked where she likes to get sandwiches outside of McNallys, Anne named John’s Roast Pork, Sarcone’s and Bassett’s Turkey, but she said that the very best sandwiches are still a product of her father’s hands.

McNally’s is running a summer special: a visit on Sunday (open 12:00-8:00) earns guests a free ticket to Morris Arboretum.

McNally’s Tavern
8634 Germantown Ave, Philadelphia, PA 19118 (