Fit to Be Fried

What is American food? 707 has one answer.

by Trey Popp

REUBEN-ESQUE: 707's playful appetizers include corned beef and sauerkraut in a spring roll wrapper. (CLICK IMAGE FOR LARGER VERSION)

When it comes to slippery adjectives, pinning down the meaning of "American" is about as easy as playing a fiddle with your feet. The culinary realm is no exception. Is "American food" the squash and corn that European explorers brought back to the Old World? Local inventions like cream cheese and shoofly pie? Homegrown fusions like crawfish gumbo and chop suey? Or should we just throw up our hands and embrace the hamburger and paper bag of fries that pigeonhole us abroad whenever a new McDonald's comes to Jakarta or Shanghai?

From a Chestnut Street perch so close to the Liberty Bell that you could barely manage a game of hopscotch in between, a new restaurant called 707 throws its lot with the stereotypes, in all their lowest-common-denominator glory. It's a concept restaurant whose theme might as well be cognitive dissonance. The wonderfully airy space is decorated with the kind of minimalist sensibility that combines with white tablecloths and plush upholstered semicircular banquets to set your expectations for haute cuisine.

Then the menu arrives. 707's idea of American food starts with a "petit hot dog trio" and ends with a choice of chocolate, vanilla and strawberry ice cream. There's also funnel cake, and customers are invited to "add chocolate sauce to any dessert, no charge!"

If there's any doubt that 707 is dishing out high-calorie kitsch, that exclamation point gives away the game.

Befitting a place that serves its full menu all day long, 707 breaks down its offerings into a variety of categories that overlap to some degree. "Bites" are about the size of a typical appetizer; "small plates" weigh in a little heavier; sandwiches and pizzas are another step up the size ladder; and then there are entrée-portion salads and ample main courses.

The creativity — actually, playfulness is a more fitting word — is most evident on the small end of the scale. The restaurant's take on a reuben is wrapping up the corned beef and sauerkraut in a spring roll, frying it and providing Russian dressing as a dip. Fried green tomatoes feature an olive tapenade and bits of mozzarella atop heavy breading that overwhelms the mild flavor of the vegetable within. The aforementioned hot dog trifecta is served in those iconic paper baskets commonly found at swimming pool snack bars. Half-length franks from Reicherts butchery in the Northeast come in plain white buns beneath 1) tangy relish, 2) chili and 3) uncommonly mild sauerkraut.

Each of those things is executed fairly well, but like most of 707's fare, they're rather heavy. Slightly lighter is a bowl of mussels that pick up a lot of flavor from the India Pale Ale in which they're steamed, but the bacon and jalapenos mixed in transform the dish into something more like shellfish nachos. It sounds like an unholy combination, but if subtle mussels bore you, this might be just the ticket. Slices of prime rib and tomatoes topped a daily special pizza whose crust was so crispy it almost seemed flash-fried.

The main courses are conservative enough to please the ranking senior citizen at a Southern country club. Pork chops come with apple compote and green beans. Steak comes with potatoes and corn on the cob. There's meatloaf. The crab cakes are heavy enough on crab that they want to fall apart rather than stick together — a plus in my book — but they come with a cole slaw so heavy on mayonnaise and/or cream that it could practically be served as soup. Then there's dessert, which isn't terribly exciting to eat or muse about, except to say that the funnel cake is fried to order and tastes every bit as sinful as the ones at the Italian Market street fair.

To be clear, there is nothing wrong with the food at 707. Each dish came to the table as it was intended to be, and although the kitchen leans a bit heavily on frying, most were reasonably tasty. It's also fairly priced for the most part. But it's hard to get excited about food that's afraid of challenging your expectations — or your tongue. The chefs could be talented enough to win a James Beard Award, but 707's repertoire is too reductive for anyone to know. It would be like judging the Pennsylvania Ballet according to their performance of The Nutcracker.

Nevertheless, it bears mentioning that the service at 707 was easily the most congenial, relaxed, pleasant and effective that I have encountered in Philadelphia in months. It was helpful without being deferential and responsive without being pushy. Every restaurant should treat its patrons this way. Not long ago, I took a visiting Dutch friend to Tria, where three different servers tried to remove a single plate from our table no fewer than five times — while it still contained food. I watched my companion, who is quite the lover of America for an old European leftie, struggle to contain the irritation that would have exploded if he'd been similarly badgered at home.

Come to think of it, maybe I should have taken him to 707 instead. They may treat a certain kind of American food with too much reverence, but they treat their customers just right. And if that's one possible meaning of "American," I'm all for it.

(t_popp@citypaper.net)

707 Restaurant & Bar

707 Chestnut St., 215-922-7770Lunch and dinner, Mon.-Thu., 11:30 a.m. to 10 p.m. and Fri.-Sat., 11:30 a.m. to 11:30 p.m.; Dinner only, Sun., 5 p.m.-10 p.m.Appetizers, $5-$10; Sandwiches, $8-$12.50; Entrees $12-$19Wheelchair accessible.Credit cards accepted.Reservations recommended.