Posts Tagged ‘Philadelphia’
Talula’s Table Pop-Up Restaurant
t says: Via her connections with Stephen Starr, Aimee from Talula’s Table (one of our fave places to go, ever!) will be returning to the city for a three-day dinner event at Washington Square. Read here.
Yes, the reservations were all gone in less than 2 days.
Yes, we got one: table for four between 8-9pm on July 1 (I don’t want to give away too many details – we might compromise our anonymity). Boo-yah. On one hand, we are super-super excited for the event – we kind of hope that everything goes splendidly and Aimee decides to open up a Center City outpost. On the other hand, we’re a little bummed it’s not BYO and no definite pricing can be found ($20-29 is quite a range). Well, we’ll let you know how it goes …
PS While I haven’t seen/heard about this yet – I suspect that there has to be some reservation-scalping going on somewhere. I wonder how much the reservations are going for? I don’t quite know how much someone would have to pay me to give up such a precious reservation …
Raw Fish Day: Pod and Morimoto Deliver the Goods
t says: I had the opportunity to visit both Pod and Morimoto recently. Rather than do a full-on review of each, I figure it’d be fun to compare-contrast the two.
I went to Morimoto with cm for lunch (6/2010). The inside was as swanky as I remember, but for some reason, it was quite empty! Who knew that lunchtime would be so dead? I hope this is not a sign that Morimoto is on the decline!
We sat at the sushi bar where we observed some cookery of a squid – very interesting stuff. After staring at it staring at us for a bit, we decided it was time to eat. We each ordered the chirashi sushi. On one hand, this was a little lame, ordering the same thing, but who can say no to ordering sushi when you’re sitting at the sushi bar? I had originally had my eye on the far less expensive pork belly ramen, but I figured that I ate enough pork belly at Percy Street to last me a month; in the name of health, I went for the raw fish. It came with miso soup and a salad that was quite tasty. Neither of us could really identify the components of the dressing, but it had a nice salty and sour flavor. The main dish featured layers of sea-weed, rice, and assorted raw and cooked seafood (the shrimp was cooked). What surprised me the most was the size – there was a lot of fish, and there was a lot of food! I thought I was still going to be hungry, but I was not – I even left some rice because I wanted to avoid food coma! There’s not really much I can say about the dish aside from it tasted like deconstructed sushi. The fish was spot-on, the rice was wonderful (and was studded with small bits of mushrooms). There were these delicate shreds of egg that I’m still not sure how they did. In any case, it was a satisfying meal that made me wonder if I could somehow eat there for lunch every day.
Pod was a little different. Whereas Morimoto’s interior was chic yet edgy, Pod’s was … gaudy. There were a lot of colored lights, which was somewhat distracting given that they do keep the place a little on the dark side. I will admit that the loungey red leather sofa-esque things looked intriguing (I kind of wanted to sit on them), but the rest of the place looked like a cross between Continental and Morimoto. Or maybe that’s what it’s supposed to look like? Cheesy? As we walked to our table, I was reminded of my personal mantra: “I’m never going to Pod unless someone else is paying.” But tonight was different …
The built-in seats (we were seated against a wall, so the seats were built-in like booths) were moderately comfortable. The atmosphere was … “energetic” (fortunately, g and I could lean in so we heard each other just fine). Does this sound like it’s going to be a horrible time? It sure does. But the story took a turn for the better – and there are two reasons why … The first was our server who was very nice and had a great attitude. He made multiple trips to ensure that we were happy with our food and that we didn’t need anything more – I like that. The second, more important factor was the “special” of the day: all-you-can-eat sushi for $25. There were 8 or so hand rolls, 8 or so nigiri, and 8 or so maki rolls that you could choose from; you could choose as much as you like of whichever you like. Me – I’m a big fan of nigiri – rice, fish, and wasabi – that’s all I need (and maybe a half-a-drop of soy sauce)! So that’s what I went for. I tried some salmon, some tuna, some yellow-tail, some eel, some fluke, some sea bass … thirty-eight pieces of sushi later (that’s 34 pieces of nigiri and 4 pieces of rolls that g needed some assistance with), I came to the conclusion that the quality of sushi was pretty good (obviously good enough to eat 38 pieces worth). Furthermore, it’s kind of a “deal”, if you think about it. At Pod, one order of nigiri is two pieces and costs around $6. Of nigiri alone, I consumed approximately $100. Of course, Pod is ridiculously expensive (which is why I refuse to eat there unless someone else pays for it … or if it’s all-you-can-eat night), so perhaps a more reasonable estimate of the damage is $70 (and tack on a few bucks for that roll I helped g with). Still, I think that I made it worth it.
So, what’s the conclusion? If I’m picking out a place to go to eat, I’m going to choose Morimoto nearly every time. The atmosphere is better. The food is great. And really, for $20, I had a very nice lunch – the kind of lunch you could bring home to mom … Be that as it may, even the mighty Morimoto may have trouble if faced against a Pod all-you-can-eat night. The fish at Pod, while maybe not quite as awesome as Morimoto (I had some fluke that was a little dry, but the yellowtail and salmon were great!), was still solid. The volume of fish consumption is just so much larger at Pod, and unfortunately, size matters. Consequently, Morimoto and Pod hold two special, yet different, places in my heart. One, I’ll go to when I’m looking for great-tasting food – it’s the food that I actually wouldn’t mind paying a lot of money for. The other, I’ll go to when I’m looking for the ability to eat myself into oblivion … on a budget.
GTC: Pasta Challenge
t says: We went to GTC again this past Friday as a follow-up to the last time we went. You see, last time, we went with a bottle of white and opted for some white-friendly dishes, vowing to go again to sample those items that escaped our wrath. This time, we went with a red and sought some red-friendly dishes. I’ll tell you right now: it was quite the tasty and educational experience.
6/2010, 5pm, Party of 2. We showed up with a bottle of Spanish red and went straight for the margherita pizza and the pappardelle with lamb ragu. The pizza was great – thin and delicious (and the red sauce wasn’t too sweet – hooray!). But forget about the pizza – let’s talk about the pasta. Now, this pasta dish had beautifully thin, wide, and al dente noodles. The lamb ragu was also cooked superbly, with plenty of soft shreds of lamb amidst a sauce that had some unique other ingredients (e.g. sunchoke). But, something was … missing. It seemed that the noodles and sauce were winners on their own – but there was something about the dish that was a little lacking. The pasta dish as a whole was not quite at the level of Melograno‘s pastas. I think it has to do with the way the pasta absorbs the sauce. At GTC, the pasta, itself, didn’t have much “taste” to it – it actually tasted just like plain pasta, thus, the pasta was a vehicle to transport sauce. Meanwhile, at Melograno, the pasta takes on the flavors in the sauce, meaning that every strand is preciously delicious. It was amazing to me how such a seemingly small difference could lead to such a large impact on the dish. Don’t get me wrong, though- we ate every last noodle, shred of meat, and drop of sauce (seriously – I used the table bread to search and destroy any drop of sauce that remained).
In conclusion, the meal was great, the service was great, and the price was kind. Yes, I am being overly critical about the pasta, but really, it was quite good overall!
Max Brenner: Chocolate Pizza and Chocolate Soup
t says: We went out looking for some place in Center City with drinks and dessert. Naked Chocolate is wonderful, but they have no liquor license. West Philly was too far away, otherwise we would have considered Capogiro. Instead, g, kp, and I went to Max Brenner. Here’s the short-and-sweet tale …
6/2010, 9pm, Party of 3. It was melting outside (stupid humid summer nights), so we were relieved that the inside was well air-conditioned. Of course, they also opened the windows to the joint – so we were confused. Do they want the chocolate to melt? Do they like stressing their air conditioners? Do they like paying PECO a ton of money? Or maybe they just hate the environment? Or maybe they wanted to mock me as they sat us in the warm part of the restaurant after we knew quite well that they were capable of cooling the place sufficiently …
The ambience … in a word … dark. We could barely read the menu. It was definitely someone’s idea of a joke to have those tiny candles on the table be our sole source for lighting. It was also super loud … which is weird, because the space is quite open (and the windows were open), so we’re not sure why it felt like we were in a shoebox BYO at peak dinner time. Maybe everyone was experiencing a sugar-high?
kp and I split the half-order of the chocolate pizza with “the works” (marshmallow, peanut butter, and bananas). Holy crap. It was great! Of course, it was unbelievably rich – but because of this, it was also very economical as we were barely able to finish it (kp had to abandon some of the crust). But, in reality, I guess we could make this at home. As a matter of fact, kp now has possession of two pizza stones, so we might just go ahead and try it one day. Ok, so it wasn’t an ingenius invention … but it was tasty.
g had some sort of “euphoria sundae”. On one hand, it had similar components to what was on our pizza … except it was supposed to be on top of ice cream. Well … much to g’s discontent – ALL of the ice cream had melted! She was basically eating a cool soup. This was a major disappointment for her, as she was expecting a cold, refreshing dessert because it was so warm in there! Good flavors (she really liked the caramel sauce), but poor execution.
For drinks, I had the chocolate milk … it was “ok”. It wasn’t as nearly as cold as I would have liked (it was supposed to be over ice, but there was not a single cube in it!). kp had the tiramisu cocktail. The Courvoisier was quite potent in it, but I’m not sure if he’d ever really complain about too high an alcohol content (ask him about his “Grape Monster”).
In conclusion … If you go, the best dessert in my opinion is the pizza, as it is quite filling and inexpensive. If you get ice cream, make sure it’s cold. Alternatively, if you just stock up on chocolate, peanut butter, caramel, bananas, and marshmallow, you can open up your own Max Brenner in your living room.
GTC: A Flammenkuche by Any Other Name …
t says: g has “summer Fridays”. Basically, every Friday between Memorial Day and Labor day is a half day at her workplace (the idea is that you work a little extra Mon-Thurs, and then earn the ability to cut out early on Friday). Crazy, right? Well, wanting to never look a gift horse in the mouth, we decided that it would be good to go out of our way to celebrate!
Today, I had first suggested going to Tweed – it was new and offered small plates of roasted chicken and a wild boar pasta (these have g’s name written all over them) as well as a variety of burgers (i.e. hamburger, lamburger, duckburger) that I thought held great promise. I made the reservation and was all set to go. Then I noticed that opentable said it was “business casual”. Wondering what this meant, I called them up to inquire more …
t: “Hi, what’s your dress code?”
tweed: “We’re casual … jeans are ok -”
t: “Oh, great … that’s -”
tweed: “with dress shoes and a blazer …”
t: “Ummm … ok … see you later tonight …”
Not more than 10 minutes later, I cancelled our reservation. Who in their right mind is going to wear dress shoes and a blazer to dinner consisting of a burger, pasta, and chicken on a night like this? Yea, we’ll go to Tweed … in the fall … Instead, we wanted comfort (I wanted to wear shorts). We wanted BYO, so we could bring a bottle of chilled grenache gris. We wanted to not break the bank – we were considering eating burgers for crying out loud! Where to go? Vic Sushi? Nah, too hard to linger there. Melograno? Nah, we needed to go to someplace new … or maybe someplace kinda-new.
We chose to go to Garces Trading Company. Yes, we went there for lunch once, and they have been in the news lately, but today we were in the mood to try out some of the more substantive dishes. Dinner was going to be new … to us.
So, we put our wine into the neoprene sling, grabbed our keys, wallets, and cellphones, and headed out the door. About 25 minutes of walking in the beautiful weather (with the not-so-beautiful angry traffic on Locust), we were finally there. Having just come off a dinner at Distrito, it was time to test Iron Chef Garces’s more casual dishes …
6/2010, 5pm, Party of 2. We were seated immediately – 5pm is a great time to go on a Friday. Trust us. At 6pm, it was completely full. As we stared at the menu, we were faced with major problems. Everything sounded good. The only way to make a decision was to promise ourselves that we’d be back tomorrow (whether or not this actually happens, we’ll see). So we chose what we felt were warm-weather foods (and would go well with our white wine). We ordered the Tarte Flambee pizza and the linguine and clams.
Our first dish was the pizza, which sounded very similar to Flammekuche we had at Cochon. When it arrived, it turned out that indeed it was very similar, but there were some noticeable differences. The cippolini onions weren’t caramelized, rather, they looked like they were sweated. There was no mysterious orange sauce, but there was more bacon and parsley. It was also shaped more in an oval (it reminded me of a super-sized flatbread at Amada). The crust was thin with a nice balance between crust and give. And it tasted … the same, but different. Yes, you get sweet onion, creaminess, and salty bacon, but it tasted more “subtle” than Cochon’s. It was creamier, the bacon had a milder taste, and the parsley worked beautifully to brighten up the dish. It was a more mature version of the pizza. But then, it came down to the critical question …
t: “So … someone tells you you’re going to die tomorrow, and you have to have pizza between now and then … which would you choose?”
g: “Hmmmmmmm … I think it’d be Cochon … but it’s really close …”
Our second dish was the linguine and clams. The clams were tiny, but there was an additional plop of crabmeat atop a bed of pasta, peas, and bacon. Another delicious dish. To me, it tasted a bit creamier than what I think of when I think of “linguine and clams” – it was also far more buttery – unctuous even. g loved it. I thought some aspects were great (I’ll be adding bacon and peas to the next time we make spaghetti and clams), but I felt the dish to be a bit heavier than I’m used to – kind of like a carbonara. g felt the lemon added enough zip to make it feel light and summery. This was interesting because normally I’m the one with the higher tolerance for rich foods – I guess you’ll have to go and try it yourself!
I do want to mention, however, that after we demolished our pasta (we shared the large order), I then found the perfect use for all of that buttery sauce … the table bread!!! I sopped it up and it added a nice creaminess to the sourdough that they gave us when we first sat down. Beautiful.
For dessert, we went for their chocolate peanut butter mousse “bomb”. The chocolate ganache shell was divine, and the chocolate cake was moist and delicious. The peanut butter mousse was very light and tasted only faintly of peanut butter. I kind of wanted a big peanut butter punch like in Tastykake Kandy Kakes, but this was still very good, because that ganache easily carried the dessert to awesomeness.
As we finished up our bottle of wine (one of our “missions” for the night), we realized that the meal, in its entirety, was great! In the end, it cost us a bit more than eating at Melograno, but the same as eating at Melograno and Capogiro (for dessert). As we walked/hobbled home, we were full … and happy … and looking forward to tomorrow …
Distrito: Better than Tinto?
t says: I had the great fortune of going to Distrito yesterday. I had even greater fortune in that because the meal was for work, it was being picked up by my boss. While I cannot reveal the nature of the business taking place (makes it sound mysterious, right?), I can reveal that the five of us were given free reign to order whatever we wanted. That, my friends, is a recipe for disaster … a good kind of disaster …
6/2010, 7pm, Party of 5. When we arrived, we were informed that our table was being cleared. Not more than 2 minutes later, we were escorted upstairs by a hostess and shown our seats. We were in one of those circular booths along the wall on the upper floor. On the way I noted that even though I knew the inside of this place was pink, I apparently forgot just how pink it was. Yea – it’s pretty pink in there!
Because it was the first time at Distrito for some of the members of our party, we listened to the server’s spiel; she recommended 2-3 plates per person. That sounded like not enough food, but we listened to her instructions and everyone picked out 2-3 plates, and I ordered some guacamole and the vegetarian nachos for the table (someone else ordered that as one of their dishes, so we got two).
I’ll talk about the food in a second – first let me talk about this drink: “honeysuckle”. This drink is not a very manly drink. The name isn’t manly. The ingredients aren’t manly (Bluecoat gin, muddled mint, lime, and honey). The taste isn’t manly. But manliness be damned – it was so good. I’m not sure if it was my sweet tooth or if it was because I had a rough day at work – but that drink was delicious. The sweet, rich honey was livened up by the mint and lime and citrus flavors of the gin. I didn’t get any of the burn from the gin, either. This made me suspect that perhaps there was very little alcohol in the drink. My suspicion was wrong. When I stood up at the conclusion of the meal, I found that this drink was kind of like sake … the alcohol sneaks up on you like a ninja.
Now, we had a lot of dishes of food on the table. It’d be incredibly boring to describe them all. The highlights were the nachos (trust me – these aren’t just “nachos”), the queso fondido (who can say no to cheese and meat?), the ceviches (we had the hiramasa and the lobster – Garces makes great ceviches), and, from what I could see, the kobe beef tacos (I didn’t have any – but they looked amazing). The surprise awesomest dish award of the evening goes to … the steamed corn! That’s right – steamed corn. You know – I can’t explain it – but just go there and order it yourself, and, as you dive into the warm parfait cup, mixing the layers of corn and some sort of orange-colored cream, I dare you to try and tell me that you’ve had better corn at a restaurant. Also – because you don’t have to eat it off the cob – no corn in your teeth!
Unfortunately, there were a few misses. The shrimp ceviche wasn’t as bright and lively as the other two – it was muddled in a tomato-based sauce that, even though it was layered above a puree of avocado, took over the palate completely – maybe some lime and cilantro would have helped (or using slices of tomatoes instead of a puree). The carnitas taco was also a disappointment, as the meat was a little dry, under-seasoned, and lacking the porky punch I was desiring. Of course, we had a lot of other dishes that I can’t currently remember, and they were all at the very least a notch above “good” – I only remember the highs and lows.
In the end, we actually had to reduce the number of Kobe tacos from two to one, because we were just too full – I give mad props to the waitress for letting us do that (she could have said, “I’m sorry, the chef had already made it … here it is”). Unfortunately, I take away the mad props because the person who came to clear our tables gave me only half of the leftovers to take home. Had I been paying for the meal, I would have felt extraordinarily robbed! At least he didn’t give me the carnitas tacos – that would have been a double-whammy.
So what was the disaster? … I was so full that the walk home was fairly uncomfortable. But it wasn’t all that bad, as the happiness courtesy of the honeysuckle allowed me to travel care-free! The flavors in most of the dishes were bold and inviting – so much so that I feel that Distrito’s food has surpassed Tinto’s. I believe that it is now the new #2 – just under Amada. And, you know what, the pink is growing on me …
Tria: Never a Bad Time
t says: Yesterday, I wanted to go to 500 degrees. I really just wanted to bite into a juicy burger. g wasn’t super-enthusiastic about it, but was willing to give it a whirl because it was a new place. But then, as we were walking to 500, we realized that it wasn’t quite burger weather (well, unless you were at a barbecue). It was warm, but not yet oppressingly hot, so we wanted to dine outside … perhaps with a light summer dinner (I had eaten a late lunch) … and some refreshing, chilled wines. In short, it was rose weather. But I had no rose! So where could we find one? Duh … Tria. We decided that if they could seat us soon, we’d stay. We were promised a 15 minute wait, which at Tria, translated into a 5 minute wait. We got seated and were ready to eat and drink.
6/2010, 8pm, Party of 2. The first matter of business was to choose the wine. We were going to find rose. Interestingly, there weren’t many options. g went for some NV pinot noir bubbly from Albequerque (never had a New Mexican wine before) – it boasted that it was made in in the traditional Champagne method (i.e. bottle fermentation), so it had some promise. g was very pleased, happy with the mouthful of cherries that it resembled. I went for a still Pinot Noir rose whose origin I can’t remember (although it was mis-listed as a “white” on the menu). It had some cherry up front, but changed over to a strawberry jam on the finish. It was so good – exactly what I wanted.
We went for the grilled asparagus, bean, artichoke, and pine nut salad. It seemed so simple, but it was wonderful. The beans and asparagus were the perfect textures, while the artichokes lent a bit of zing. I just can’t say enough about this salad … except “go there and try it!”. For cheese, we went for the triple creme from Burgundy. It was like a buttery cream cheese, which is both good and bad. It was good in the sense that it was rich with wonderful mouthfeel and velvety creaminess. It made us want to sit back and slowly indulge in it. But, it really didn’t have much depth of flavor. The allagash cherries it was served with were quite powerful and easily overtook the cheese in my mouth. That said, the cheese’s mild flavors were a nice foil to the “bam” of the salad. However, ultimately, I think if I had to choose again, I would have gone with one of our favorite Tria cheeses: Tete-de-Moine.
I guess we weren’t that hungry because we were full by the end of the meal (although we did go through an extra serving of bread with our cheese). The food was great, the wine was great, and the service was great. Really … we’ve never had a bad time at Tria.
after dinner sneeze 