Posts Tagged ‘Philadelphia’
pancake-off: cochon vs. honey’s
t says: There are two kinds of brunch spots in Philly … the kind that everyone knows about and waits for religiously every Sat/Sun morning … and the kind that, for some inexplicable reason, go unnoticed. (Actually, there’s a third kind, too: the expensive kind like at the Four Seasons or Lacroix … but who can afford that regularly?) For this post, I’ve put adsz fave Cochon vs. everyone-and-their-mother’s-fave Honey’s for Battle Pancake …
Challenger: Cochon’s Banana and Chocolate-smothered Pancakes – just as fluffy as it used to be, but now served on a plate so you can behold it’s massive height! It features this banana-nut-laden bread (that’s different than before when the banana and walnut were just on top of the pancake) – and I know that it looks burnt (I was about to complain when I first saw it), but when I tried it, it actually added this really addictive toasty flavor and a super-light crunch to the outside – it’s more like a burnt sugar than a burnt bread – very weird. I’ll dock them the points for the appearance as it looks a bit dark, but I’ll leave the points alone for taste, as the pancakes were truly delicious – I can almost finish the entire plate!
“Champion” (by wait time): custom concoction of banana-chocolate-PB pancakes at Honey’s. Ultimately not as fluffy and loses points for undercookedness in the center of one of the pancakes – likely due to poor distribution of stuffings causing concentration in the center, thus making it more difficult to cook … sorry guys – i can’t take the blame if you’re a little sloppy. I ate around the undone area – it was fine, but at +1.50 per topping, the bill racks up so it’s as expensive as Cochon’s.
Winner: definitely Cochon. And that’s not to say that Honey’s was bad – aside from the uncooked part, it was quite delicious. But I think the problem is that it’s not remarkable; I could make the same exact pancake at home … actually … I could do it better. However, Cochon’s fluffy pillow of love is something that I know that I can’t make at home no matter how hard I try (if someone gave me a recipe, I could give it a whirl). Consequently, I have to give Cochon the nod for better pancakes. Because of this, I just don’t foresee us waiting in line for Honey’s on the weekends, ever. Plus, Cochon has other little “perks” of going … like this:
“Widowmaker” … no – that’s not what it’s called on the menu … but it should be! This guy probably has ~2500 calories, 2473 of which are from fat … it’s totally crazy (and crazy-delicious! it’s sr’s favorite! and i think that v even tackled it once!)
sbraga: taste of the south
t says: What follows is a blow-by-blow account of a dinner kp had at Sbraga. It is rare to hear kp gush about a restaurant like this. So now that’s twice that Chef Sbraga proves that he can cook (for the first time, see here)…
kp says:
Duck Fat Biscuit with Bell Pepper Jam (no pictures): The biscuit looked nice and fluffy with multiple buttery layers. It was definitely nice and airy on the first bite with a nice subtle hit of duck fat. The bell pepper jam was delicately sweet with small amount of heat at the end; I wish though it had a been a little more heat like a jalapeño jam. For a Southerner this was a nice way to start off the meal.
Pimento Cheese Stuffed Jalapeño: Now I was happy they were taking a Southern Staple and stuffing it into a jalapeño- something I have always wanted. So on first cut the cheese comes oozing out. It was warm and gooey with nice heat of paprika too. The outside crust was perfectly crunchy and not too heavy. It was served with some creme fraiche that was a great cooling element after the warm heat.
Collard Green Oysters Rockefeller: I love oysters and these crunchy delights were just amazing. They had this beautiful parmesean bacon crumble on top that was perfect to the salty ocean water flavor the oysters. The substitution of collards for typically spinach was money because that mild bitter taste was just perfect.
Eggs over Easy and Grits with Benton’s Bacon Crumble: By far the standout of the meal was this grits dish. I am very particular about grits (t interjects: no seriously – taste kp’s grits one day and you’ll find out why) and these were perfectly cooked. They used broth from poached bacon to start the grits. They were perfectly creamy and seasoned to perfection. The eggs and bacon were a nice cut of salt into the grits. The romano cheese and prosicutto on top were a nice cold contrast to the hot eggs and grits. You could tell a lot of love was put into this one.
Crab Fritter, Pickled Green Tomatoes & Hominy: I really liked the fact they switched up the classic fried hushpuppy into a crab fritter. I loved how they resisted frying the green tomato too. The crab fritter was nice and crispy on the outside and then interior was nice a soft. The tabasco mayonnaise as the dipping the sauce was a nice subtle heat with meal. The acid of the pickled tomato was nice cut into the heaviness from the fritters. I do wish though that fritters were a little more crunch and browned a little more for my tastes.
Tennessee Hot Chicken, Cole Slaw, White Bread, Pickles: WOW! So this a traditonal Nashville fried chicken dish. Typically fried chicken with paprika and cayenne in the flour and after being fried the whole thing is dowsed in hot sauce. Now the most drastic thing about Sbraga’s version was NO sauce. But I won’t harp on him for doing this because the crunchy batter was perfectly seasoned with the right heat and even a little bit of tang too. The first was a heavenly mix spicy crunch crust with juicy meat of the guinea hen. Each bite had great heat (I wanted more but I like spicy) that didn’t set your lips on fire. Now the coleslaw and ranch dressing was a lot of cream to accompany the chicken and I think a little overpowering for the chicken. I wish they had put a little less ranch on the plate and made the coleslaw with just vinegar and no mayo. There take on white bread was amazing, a simple crustless small piece served with the pickle was nice and simple and a good contrast to the slaw and chicken.
Smothered Pork Chops, Brussel Sprouts: So these were a delight, typical of Southern “smothering’ which means onions, tomato gravy that a meat is baked in. There version was just beautiful the meat was perfectly cooked and the gravy was nice and fatty with sweet onion taste. The gravy had the right thickness and salt and just really brought out the mild pork flavor.
Pecan Pie, Bourbon Ice Cream: Now I love pecan pie, probably my favorite dessert after red velvet cake. The portion size was perfect after such a large meal. The crust was nice buttery flakiness. The filling was just the right amount of sweet with the pecans. But the real star of the plate was the bourbon ice cream- just phenomenal- sweet caramel and honey with nice bold smokey bourbon flavor.
Fitler Dining Room
t says: g and I have been psyched about the Pub & Kitchen expansion for quite a while; Meme wasn’t bad (for dinner), but it just wasn’t thrilling enough. And as the P&K crew moved in, set up shop, and painted over Meme’s yellow, g and I have been peering in windows and open doors (when we could – they kept stuff under wraps for a while), hardly able to contain ourselves. For the record – it’s not because we think P&K is actually all that good in terms of food, rather, just because the new Fitler Dining Room is physically the closest restaurant to our front door … so of course we were hoping for deliciousness!
February 2013, Sunday Dinner, Party of 3. We got together with bw to celebrate FDR’s opening. The menu looked a little pricey, but we just had to try it. I have to say that the person on the phone wasn’t particularly nice to me when I asked how much corkage would be, addressing me with a tone of superiority as if it would be unthinkable that a patron would want to bring their own wine to their establishment. Look. I’m sure your wineguy/gal did a very nice job on your wine list. I’m sure that your wines taste fine. All I’m saying is that the emotional connection I have to a wine that I went out of my way to hunt for and acquire (and in some cases, transported thousands of miles on a plane) might make something taste more-better than something I know that I’m paying a 100-200-300% markup for … (As a former neuroscientist and human being, I can safely say that state of mind dramatically affects perceived tastes … why else does “every table wine in every restaurant in <insert French or Italian city here> taste way better than those in the US”? It’s cuz you’re frickin’ in that French/Italian city on vacation! duh!). Ok, stepping down from my soapbox: I did find a cab franc on their list that was actually quite delicious – almost worth the amount that I paid for it! And g sipped on Gruet – an old-time standby in our home for bubbly wine. bw had some other sparkling which I’m not recalling …
Now for the the pictures!
the inside of the place is dimly lit (in a good way) and featuered nice dark tablet-tops, plenty-big wine and water glasses – it really looks quite nice in there – like a good date spot. Also, the servers are clad in Japanese selvage denim aprons (but they couldn’t tell me more about them – I was quite intrigued! I might want to acquire one of those!) It has the feel of a small-cozy Brooklyn restaurant but with a nice clean aesthetic and a dose of nonchalance (real nonchalance – not contrived hipster nonchalance). That said, the servers were spot-on with a polite attitude, constant attentiveness, and precise execution – it was like they’ve been doing this for months, not days …
pillow-soft gnocchi and tender escargot. no – the escargot on their own were not as nearly as good as Bibou’s, but the glory of this dish is that they are not the star – they contribute one component of flavor that is so deftly combined with each and every single other item on the dish. I went hunting so that each fork could have a little bit of everything, and boy was I happy when it worked out. Who knew a toasty hazelnut, a wondeful gnocchi, a tender snail, some herbs and carrot would all come together into something so delicious? True, the combination is a little “fussy”, but boy is it worth it.
salad: fresh, crisp, nicely dressed = delicious. simple and to the point … like a sharp knife.
Shortrib: deciding to see what FDR would do with an already-awesome cut of meat, I ventured the shortrib – I didn’t care if it’s “soooo 2008”. It was the most expensive thing on the menu, coming in at ?$28?, but hey – I’m worth it. Well, the hunk of meat was ginorous. Seriously – look at it! The bone reminded you of what exactly a cow rib looks like. The meat was cooked perfectly with a beautiful glaze/jus, and it balanced beautifully opposite the Cab Franc I had ordered. If I might make one request, it would to have ~20% less meat and give me a little more starch for balance. Every single thing on the dish was perfectly cooked – but I would like a counterpoint to the meat that’s a little more substantial.
“special”arctic char: precisely cooked on top of a sweet butternut squash puree. It was a beautiful piece of fish, but the skin was impervious to the butterknife that g was given – but that’s not a negative of the cookery, rather, an issue of useless knives – don’t hold back on giving fish-eaters an actually sharp knife! (PS if you were really baller, FDR, you would have non-serrated steak knives – I haven’t seen a restaurant with these yet as they necessitate hand-cleaning, but I would give you such mad props if you had these and selvage denim aprons)
carrot cake: solid dessert item – the ice cream really stole the show, but the cake and obnoxiously-splattered sauce tasted good as well – I have no beef with this dessert aside from its presentation …
bw had an assort of items as well, however, I suspect that he was a little less thrilled. For his main, it featured a few versions of pork, including a boudin blanc (aka sausage). He, too, felt that a little more counterpoint to meat would have been nice – be it a starch or vegetable – as otherwise it was a plate of meat. The cheese selection was a little on the wimpier side, but you can’t expect Talula’s Garden’s cheese-person at every restaurant, right?
So, in summary, I have to say that we saw a lot of things we liked at FDR, including a high level of cookery and a lot of good flavors. Going forward, I think striving for a bit more balance in the components of the dish is going to be key in those meat dishes. The tariff is quite high – between the $25+ entrees and the no-BYO+no-corkage-allowed, meaning that I fear that this place is going to be more of a “date” place for g and me (kinda like Valentine’s Day occasion). That’s sad because g and I were hoping that this could be “our” place – but it’s not allowed to be if you can’t afford to go there at least twice a month. Oh well – it was delicious, and now we know we can go, so we’ll keep it in our back pocket … in case of forgotten holidays or last-minute-out-of-town visitors.
P.S. if anyone knows where I can get one of those aprons, hit up our email!
P.P.S. yea – Philly Mag is going to <3 this place … which is sad because they also <3 Meme, too, and look what happened there!
#biwinning @ BLM
a says: Vday Dinner 2013, Party of 2. We had heard many good things about Bistro La Minette (BLM) and were very excited to try it. A cheesy Hallmark holiday like Valentine’s Day seemed like the perfect opportunity. With a bottle of French red in hand (corkage), we trekked toward South Street to see if they could rock our romantic socks.
We were seated promptly (in the back, event room) and quickly transported to a French state of mind. BLM does not have the kitschy, Parisian feel of Parc but it does feel decidedly French bistro via Philly BYO (though it’s not). I started with the foie gras special and v the poached egg with mussels. The foie was lovely and comes in a close second after Fond’s. The bread crumb crust added a nice crunchiness/texture and the blood orange cut through the richness of the fat – a well balanced dish. The mussels were also rich, but complex and balanced. It reminded us both of a Cochon brunch dish (not a specific one, just in execution).
We then split the Bibb lettuce salad to pace our meal and get some greens on our plates. The dressing was perfect, very refreshing. Our waiter then surprised us with their escargot dish. (I had mulled it over against the foie while ordering.) The plating was innovative – little ceramic containers just big enough to fit butter, one escargot, and a toast bite, in that order! The contents, poured on their homemade bread was very satisfying. While they weren’t Bibou caliber, they were very good and an innovative interpretation.
Both entrees were well portioned and less delicate than one might expect at a French bistro – hearty without being excessive. v had the beef cheeks, which were tender and tasty, with (French) gnocchi that could stand with many-an-Italian style. However, the accompanying jus was off, a flavor slightly out of place. I had the rabbit and tagliatelle which was also very good. The meat fell off the bone and exceeded my expectations but the tagliatelle was lacking. The dish needed something to bring it together (More jus? A sauce?). It being Vday, we ended our meal with a shareable dessert, puff pastry with cream and raspberries. The presentation was clean and it was a nice balance of sweet/savory, crunch/cream, and freshness from the raspberries.
We thoroughly enjoyed our meal and actually became more excited when the check came (Say wha??). Our very competent waiter didn’t charge us for the escargot (#obvi), mussel appetizer (#winning), or corkage (#biwinning)! I guess amour was in the air for everyone at BLM that night. We will definitely return to try more of their bistro riffs and specials, hopefully with g & t in toe!
several new openings on our side of center city!
t says: So g and I are really pumped with the new additions to the neighborhood:
Fitler Dining Room is opening!
And on the other side of the city, Talula’s Daily is coming!
With so many new options, I’m sure we’ll be broke in no time!
Sbraga surprises
t says: g had been wanting to go to Sbraga for some time. We had wanted to go with a and v, but couldn’t quite get our acts together (and Sbraga’s always too busy on Fri-Sat nights!). So on one Monday, we ditched a and v (actually, we did invite them, but they were indisposed) to go and celebrate g’s new job. What better way than a surprise Monday night dinner? Let’s just say that g and I were in for a wild ride …
February 2013, Monday Dinner, Party of 2. We entered Sbraga after getting fooled by the side door on Pine street and were greeted by a host who, while nice enough, needs to learn how to button up his shirt a bit more – there is no need for anyone to be showing off that much chest … well … unless you cross into d-bag territory, which I’m hoping no restaurant actually employs to be their front of house. So that was first of many surprises that evening …
The atmosphere in Sbraga is very interesting. Half of it is rustic, as one might expect from a Philly chef like Sbraga. But the other half is fancy, with white tablecloths, turned-way-down lights, and ridiculously large dishes (you’ll see below). But there are other elements need to be called out. For one, I’m not sure who designed the Sbraga logo, but what’s the deal with the typography? There are all kinds of spaces between certain letters and not other ones. It’s like SBR_A_GA … what is that? But, as I have no formal graphic design training, I asked g, who confirmed that it is indeed cringe-inducing. Whew! First I thought I was just simply not cool enough to “get it” – at least now I have company! This leads me into another, but related, cringe-inducing item of the evening: I’m pretty sure I saw t-shirts and hats bearing the Sbraga name for sale … Now maybe it was a joke, and maybe the bar wasn’t really displaying merchandise for sale, but if it was, I have no choice but to hang my head down and shake it back and forth in a disapproving manner. For real? Come on guys! Now if the shirts were funny or a “shtick” like at Le Pigeon, I’d be down for it (I have often thought of buying the foie gras one, but fear that I might be a target for projectiles from friend and foe alike). But a shirt just to milk the several-years-old Top Chef victory is a bit much. At least make them buy something food-related, like a chef’s spoon, or a wineglass or something …
Ok, and then the final problem of the evening …
g and I brought an Oregon Pinot Noir along, knowing full well that there’s a $25 corkage fee – but we brought it “just in case” we weren’t able to find suitable options (better to be safe than sorry!). We were happy to see that there were actually lots of wine options at Sbraga. First off, there’s a +$35 supplement where you can add EtOH pairings to your tasting menu ($49 for 4 courses), which sounds like a deal! But because some included carbonated beverages, which I cannot tolerate, I took a peak at the drink menu to see what “else” could be substituted in its place … then I got distracted by their red wine list. At first, I thought, “gee! that’s cool, they have zwiegelt and a Greek red on the menu!” So that was a plus. But then I started reading the rest of the entries … and was shocked …
red wine list
As you can see, I looked at their wine list for Oregon Pinots, thinking that maybe I’d not disrespect their sommelier/wineguy by not asking them to open ours and just going with theirs. But Trisae? Really? $135? Allow me to illustrate:
yea … and this is me not even googling for cheaper prices …
That’s right, it’s a 300% markup (almost). Holy crapballs. Not to mention it’s even cheaper elsewheres (the bottle I had cost me $28). And it’s not even that good of a wine – check our review here (look at the 12/19 tasting note)! With a bad taste in my mouth, I eschewed the winelist, realizing that I could no longer have faith in the wine program if they were going to consider Trisae to be one of their most expensive red wines … So we pulled out our own wine: Adelsheim’s 2009 Boulder Bluff. Damn – now that was a great bottle of wine!
Ok … self-back-patting aside … let’s talk about the really surprising occurrence of the evening, as poor design, weird atmosphere, peculiar merchandise, and horribly-overpriced wines are, in actuality, not all that surprising …
carrot soup: this carrot soup is g’s new flavor of the month – it looks like a puddle of orange-yellow, but was so full of flavor depth that we’re pretty sure that it involves animal somehow – maybe in the “marshmallow”? for real, this was the best soup we’ve had in years (GTC vichysoisse included)
pork belly appetizer: truly surprising, with just the right combination of spice and sour pickles and sweet – it was a masterful way to play around with pork belly and give it the lift of a crudo or ceviche – beautiful!
truffle risotto: in this example of a ridiculously over-sized dish, there’s a black truffle risotto that was so full of flavor (and not just truffle) that g demolished it. I completely forgot what I had because g’s was so good
pork sandwich, with broccoli rabe and cheese: this was the absolute-best-thing-we ate that night. One taste and g completely forgot about her Meatloaf, which, while good (and apparently something they’re known for), was completely outclassed by this dish. It tasted exactly like the absolute best pork Italiano sandwich that Tony Luke’s could ever make … but clearly was fork-and-knife-worthy. It made me pause and reflect on how the flavors could be so deep, when it was just a slab of meat, a slab of ?bread pudding?, some green, some cheese, and some sauce … but it was. As I breathed in and let the flavors dance on my palate, I was reminded of Talula’s Table ca 2008-2009 – the duck-and-beans dish! It had this supreme sense of comfort, but a finish that just kept going on and on – it was like a fine wine (if only wine could taste like a pork sandwich).
It was after the 3rd course when g and I realized that the food here was crazy-good … like old-Sikora-good (i.e. the guy who made those first Talula’s Table diners so awesome). We were kinda-sorta-ready for a letdown of over-hypeness when we first walked in, so this was shocking. Sure, there were two dishes that we are kinda-sorta-neglected, but the other ones were just so awesome that I’m not sure if that’s fair to say the other ones were unremarkable. I will say, though, that the weakest parts of the meal was the dessert; the cheese plate cheese plate and a deconstructed banana split were fine, but definitely not near the level the rest of the meal was at (and nowhere near Talula’s Garden’s offerings).
So, in sum, g and I find that this place is totally worth $49 for the food, which I think is a huge accomplishment, when a four-bell, critically-adored place like Zahav is barely worth the $42/pp price in our eyes. Thus, Sbraga joins the ranks of other “worth-it” fixed price menus, like Sundays at Little Fish and Bibou. I think that going forward, their biggest challenge is going to be the “everything else” aside from the food (i.e. all the stuff I slammed them for in the beginning of this post). I wish them the best of luck – you know we’ll be around for sure … with our own bottles of wine in hand, but around nontheless …
kanella kwietly kicking ass
t says: There are some restaurants that we here at adsz have done a disservice. How? Well, there are some really great ones out there, and, while we tell people about them all the time, we have so few reviews! Furthermore, press like Philly Mag (a suggests: in an attempt to be relevant?) disses them by placing them somewhere on the back 25 of their top 50 list, behind snooze-fests like Stateside, Il Pittore, Le Virtu, and Jamonera … I’m talking about Kanella. Helmed by crazy-piercing-eyed Chef Konstantinos Pitsillides, Kanella has, over the years, cranked out some super-delightful dinners with flavor combinations that are still interesting and novel. And while the servers all seem to have a dash of weirdness, we at least appreciate their enthusiasm/energy. As a matter of fact, g and I ate there with v and another friend (a was MIA) just the other night …
February 2013, Friday Dinner, Party of 4. We arrived to an all-too-familiar experience when visiting Kanella: the wait. It seems that dinner reservation times are always met with some kind of wait. This time wasn’t too bad – about 5-10 minutes. Fortunately, we were allowed to wait inside and not in that super-dinky-ante-room-thingee where we would have surely frozen. Is a wait forgivable? No, not really, but I did see the patrons hanging out at the soon-to-be-ours table, with the check paid, just lingering, so I can’t really blame the restaurant (can I?), rather, other people. But what was cool was the opportunity to greet Chef as he walked around the room, as for all the press he gets for his crazy memos outside his kitchen window, I had never once heard him actually talk. He was a little stiff, but I can’t say I was much better at trying to get a conversation to flow – it’s just his piercing blue eyes!
After we sat, we were greeted by our server, who, also typical of the Kanella experience, was just a little weird. There was something in his verbosity that had us all chuckling, albeit a little uncomfortably – but that’s ok because we warmed up to him nicely. Furthermore, he was very attentive, well-informed, and made everything sound wonderful, so he gets an A+ for the evening.
Now on to the food …
If you eat at Kanella, the “Dips of the Day” are pretty much obligatory. Made of whatever vegetables they happen to have on hand, the spreads are always so lively and fresh that you wish you could just pull out an ampule of dip at work to spruce up your ho-hum lunch (it’d make “baked potato day” a whole lot more interesting … that’s right – some of you know what I’m talking about). The octopus and [free] salad (Kanella very frequently realizes diners are waiting and will send out food) were both nice starters to the meal, waking up our palates with smoky tentacles and bright greens. And after that, Kanella churned out three ridiculously good dishes of food (it was actually four dishes, but two of us got the same thing), just the kind to warm you up on a frickin-freezing-cold night.
oxtail
What you see above you is a LOT of [most-likely-braised-and-then-]shredded oxtail, with a few dumplings and a lot of cilantro. And it was AWESOME. It was the most uplifted/bright/agile dish of braised meat I have ever had (imagine if you will a cow doing gymnastics), most likely courtesy of lemon and cilantro and one other unidentified green stalk (?celery? ?rhubarb?? chard?). My mouth was so sad when it was over (but my tummy was full). I would have liked a few more dumplings to balance against the meat (there were only ~4), but our server graciously gave us more bread (his idea! we didn’t even ask for it!), so I was happily starched for the evening.
I did not get a chance to snap pics of the goat stew, which I’m told was a winner last night (I was so “in” to my dish I didn’t bother tasting anyone elses). While I don’t quite have specifics about their experiences, I can say that with nothing left on their plates, they were very much satisfied. g went for their porkchop which, as she had once before, was scrumptious. Really, I have a lack of words here because no one had an ill word to say – and I think that‘s saying something. Everything had this feeling of warmth and home and comfort that you’d almost forget you’re in a very-busy, loud Philly BYO …
pistachio creme brulee and lemon ice cream in the foreground, baklava and something else in the background
The desserts at Kanella are often in the head-nod-and-say-“pretty good” realm. And that night was no different. The pistachio creme brulee was perfectly executed, and when pit against the lemon ice cream that was dynamite (no, really – their ice creams are always wonderful), it was a fantastic combination. The baklava was chocked full of nuts, which some people might enjoy (I prefer a little more sweet and layers in my baklava), and that other thing (the thing that looks like it’s covered with cheese in the photo), while interesting, was just a little dry. It’s hard because I am probably completely unqualified to judge these desserts (maybe these are exactly how they’re supposed to be? I’m no Greek), so I guess you’ll just have to try it, yourself!
And the bill? It was $42/pp (with tax and tip). That’s not bad at all! We did bring our own wine, so that was wonderful (thanks, a, for the Riesling!). It’s a little pricey for a weeknight, but well worth the tariff on the weekend. So go to Kanella! I don’t know if it’s “cool” or not, but it’s reliably tasty!
after dinner sneeze 