Steak Escape in San Francisco, California: A Restaurant Review

I've been to a few different Steak Escapes in a few different malls all over this fine country of ours. I know that we're constantly experiencing inflation and what have you, but that's not enough to account for the difference between normal Steak Escape prices and the $12+ that this location in the San Francisco Westfield mall wants for a large cheesesteak, fries and a drink.

The place is simply charging what they think the market will bear, and the market here is a lot of clueless high-income shopaholics who seemingly don't care about tossing away ten to fifteen bucks on a mediocre lunch, even in the midst of a recession.

The menu is your standard Steak Escape fare. You've got the regular Philly Cheesesteak, the Chicken Philly, and the Turkey Philly to choose from, all with red peppers, onions, mushrooms and provolone cheese. Other sandwich options include the Meatball, Italian Sausage, Classic Italian (made with capicolla), Wild West Barbeque, Ragin' Cajun Chicken (basically just plain grilled chicken with some "cajun seasoning"), Barbeque Ham and Cheese, Turkey Club, and the Portabello Mushroom sandwich.

Sides include a number of salads, which can be had with meat for a makeshift salad meal. Also, regular or "loaded" fries, "loaded" meaning you get a choice of piling them down with either bacon and melted cheddar or ranch with bacon. There's also the Smashed Potatoes, which is basically mashed potatoes with some skin left in. These too can be "loaded" down with more artery clogging greatness in either the cheddar or ranch variety.

If you really want a cheese steak in the downtown area, I suggest you escape SoMa and the Financial District and hit Buster's in North Beach, which is about the closest really decent one that I can think of. What's on offer here is passable in a pinch, I guess, but passable doesn't cut it for something that is priced this astronomically high. This may be a semi-swank food court in a swank mall, but let's try to keep some perspective here, this is greasy fast food that you'll be passing swanky gas to later in the night. Price appropriately, please.