Does four stools qualify as a bar expansion? At meticulous La Minette, yes.

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Does four stools qualify as a bar expansion? At meticulous La Minette, yes.

POSTED: Thursday, February 24, 2011, 4:33 PM

Filed Under: Chef Salad | Food Events | Food News

Photo l Peggy Baud Woolsey

La Minette's cassoulet

Right about now, chef Peter Woolsey is laying down a marble slab that will add four spots at the charming little bar that anchors the front of his red-and-gold restaurant, Bistrot La Minette (623 S. Sixth St.). "We've been working on it for days," says Woolsey. "Now its just a matter of screwing and nailing and laying it in. Should take us about an hour to get it in." That's what she said. "Us" is Woolsey and his dad, John Woolsey, a retired scientific illustrator and amateur (but hardly amateurish, judging by the craftsmanship of the private-dining communal table, for example) carpenter. "I never took a real interest in carpentry until we got the restaurant," Woolsey says, "but my dad has always been the guy who was like, Im building flower beds outside the house today!'" The new piece of marble continues in original counter in an L around the front of the bistro, giving drinkers there a straight view into the dining room and open kitchen. It might not sound like much, but every spot counts at Minette, especially with more of mad-popular chefs collabo dinners up for March. Next month (date TBA) Woolsey is hosting Dave Katz (Mémé), Pierre Calmels (Bibou), Terence Feury (Fork), Mike Solomonov (Zahav) and possibly Monica Glass (10 Arts) for a Duck Dinner you wont want to miss. (The same month, frequent co-conspirator John Taus and Scott Swiderski will have Woolsey over for a collaborative dinner at their restaurant, The Corner.) Later, in April, big-deal Lyonnaise chef Joseph Viola will cook with Woolsey at La Minette as part of the Philadelphia International Festival of the Arts, which will bring a boatload of French chefs into town to cook alongside their Francophile Philly comrades. Sacrebleu! So much to do, so little time. If you cant make it to these events, may we suggest tucking into a pot of extraordinary cassoulet, the one DL recreated not long ago with Woolseys recipe. As is always our unfailing recommendation, we suggest sitting at the bar.

rory

Posted 2011-02-24 12:17:04

ummm...duck dinner? YES!!!

Posted by Adam Erace @ 4:33 PM Permalink | Post a comment

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Founded in October 2008, Meal Ticket is a City Paper blog about food, drink and assorted other things that make you go mmm. We do recipes, interviews, restaurant news, commentary and much more. We don't do restaurant reviews here — those are handled in print, mostly by our critic (and Meal Ticket contributor) Adam Erace. Got a tip, question, thought or concern? Just want to say hello? Please shoot a note to caroline@citypaper.net.

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