Joe's Steak Shop — Restaurant in Phillipsburg

Warren County may not have the overall food culture pedigree of other northern New Jersey counties like Passaic, Bergen, and Hudson Counties for example, but having grown up in Hackettstown, I can tell you with certainty there’s some hidden gems to be had, and at least two places that are downright New Jersey landmarks. One of those two places is the statewide iconic Hot Dog Johnny’s, and the other is the subject of this review, Phillipsburg’s local legend, Joe’s steak shop.

Joe’s has been around since the 30s, and it is without a doubt, the most well known cheesesteak spot in North Jersey (obviously, Trenton and farther south is where the real Jersey Cheesesteak heavyweights are). Make no mistake though, this is not a Philly style cheesesteak with cheese whiz and onions, but rather, it is of the Lehigh valley (which stretches from Lehigh & Northampton Counties in PA into western Warren County, NJ) regional variety with white American cheese and laced with onions and a peppery Italian-American tomato sauce. I like to put banana peppers and or cherry peppers on mine, but some like to put pickles on theirs, and you know what, it works. The sauce at Joes is awesome, and they give you a good amount of meat that’s well seasoned and juicy. The onions are perfectly caramelized, and they have an overall good selection of condiments to put on your sandwich. However, they use very soft rolls, which personally, I’m not the biggest fan of and much prefer a sturdier hoagie/sub roll, and if you put too much stuff on these rolls, they will fall apart, so be gentle with toppings if you don’t want to have your cheesesteak turn into a oversized sloppy Joe (pun intended). It might help if you order it to go style so the sandwich gets properly wrapped and sealed in tinfoil to keep it tighter together. Now with all that said, I know some people do love soft rolls, and when you factor everything else I said about their cheesesteak, it’s no surprise Joe’s has been in business as long as they have been. My uncle used to love Joes when he lived in Phillipsburg.

Is Joe’s the best cheesesteak I’ve ever had?, probably not, but it’s definitely a unique one, and something you should try at least once if you live in this part New Jersey. Overall, a solid 7 out of 10. They also have other New Jersey staples on their menu like Taylor Ham sandwiches, boardwalk style Italian sausage & peppers subs, and deep fried ripper style hotdogs. I recommend their corn nuggets and pierogies as sides.

Beyond the food, Joe’s has a great classic Americana atmosphere. The women that work the counter do a great job keeping the place relatively clean and get your orders out in a timely matter. They also host car shows fairly frequently, which is worth the...

Joe's finally got their Famous Steak Sandwich back in order. Reason for saying- past year or better the sandwich meat capacity was half. So you had a roll not a sandwich. Onions and hot peppers when you ordered them or what Joe's was known for was a wet one. When getting it home for the family to enjoy, you were lucky to have received what was ordered. Very disappointing to not get what you were looking to eat. This was multiple times. Sounds like a management issue. Been a patron since 1970 enjoying a good steak at Joe's or another place called Toby's. These were the places to get a steak sandwich that you always talked about. Needless to say knowings things do change. My wife and I stopped for a sandwich which we haven't for some time now due to the quality as we enjoyed. The steak sandwiches were hot peppers, onions, triple cheese and WET. 4/7/21 now that was a sandwich as we've known to have remembered. Hope our orders from this time on will be as we always enjoyed Joe's for. When the sandwich is right, this is the place to...

It used to be a fantastic Phillipsburg landmark The car shows and cruise night is excellent but as far as the food goes over time the steak sandwiches have gotten a lot smaller and the prices have gotten a lot larger mind you they're still excellent in taste but for $9 you're not getting much so if you're grown man it would probably take at least two three steak sandwiches to fill you up or two with a side of something such as onion rings or mozzarella sticks can't really speak for any of the burgers or anything like that I strictly went for the cheesesteaks mozzarella sticks boardwalk onion rings actual onion rings not like the Burger King onion rings but like a lot of businesses they changed with the times and the food still tastes the same it's just gotten a lot smaller and more priceier other than that if you're looking for a place to eat would recommend it I would go on a cruise and I throw to check out all the old cars Joe antonello did a good job good fifties music awesome and beautiful cars although it is mostly the same...