Notes from the Weekend: August 23

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Notes from the Weekend: August 23

POSTED: Monday, August 23, 2010, 11:42 PM

Filed Under: Notes from the Weekend

Notes from the Weekend is a Monday feature that sees the members of Team Meal Ticket compiling all the food/drink highlights uncovered during prime eatin time, Friday to Sunday. Consider this a place for good deals, great dishes, wicked cocktails, recipe triumphs (and tragedies), bizarro conversations and more. Were eager to share our notes, but especially excited to read yours. We encourage you to leave notes from YOUR weekend in the comments. Have at it! (View past NFTW installments at citypaper.net/notes.)

Adam Erace: AE Drew Lazor: DL Anthony Sica: AS

Photo | Drew Lazor

Friday: Was honored to lend a hand to Philly Cupcake Warz, an extremely well-organized taste-off organized by Barry Eichner (presiding, right) of FoodRulez.com. He got five prominent Philly-based cupcake purveyors Brown Betty, Buttercream, Call Me Cupcake, Flying Monkey, Philly Cupcake and Whipped Bakeshop to drop him chocolate-chocolate, vanilla-vanilla and "wild card" 'cakes to be judged by a panel of sweets enthusiasts in multiple categories. Check out the full results on Barry's blog. DL Friday: Dinner of the year at the garden chef's table at Fond (1617 E. Passyunk Ave.). The weather was as perfect as the service, food, and wine (thanks to former CP food critic David Snyder for the recos). Got a great taste of the new menu, as well as some off-menu surprises nine courses in all. Highlights included the foie gras, pate, and a lobster dish chef Lee Styer put together with the preferences I shot over to him when setting up the reservation. Jessie Prawlucki's desserts were ridiculously good, the lemon cannoli being a big standout, in addition to a palate cleanser of strawberry lemonade sorbet. This is now a summertime staple for me as long as they do it. AS Made excellent time jetting down to Cape May (1 hour, 28 minutes, bitches!) for a late-summer Friday night feast of steaks on the grill, baked potatoes, corn on the cob and strawberry shortcake with g/f and her fam. Washed it down with a four-spot of Dogfish Head Saison du Buff she picked out from the local liquor emporium, one of many reasons I love her. AE

Photo | Drew Lazor

I had a Manhattan (OK, several) and she had a Cosmopolitan (OK, several) at the Secret Late-Night Spot That Shall Not Be Named on Friday. It's never crowded and there's never anyone I know there and they have ample alcohol and it is brilliant. And the bartender (above) wears shirts that feature phrases like that. I will perjure myself before revealing its coordinates. DL For the first time in years, I had McDonald's breakfast on Saturday morning. Hotcakes and Sausage. Love that they still call them hotcakes, and one of my guiltiest pleasures is mass-produced, chain breakfast sausage. Whatever chemicals Wawa uses to replicate sage are still the best, but Mickey D's is no slouch in the test-tube sausage game. AS Saturday: Dinner at the always-awesome, always-mobbed Angelo's Fairmount Tavern (2300 Fairmount Ave.) in the historic Ducktown section of Cuidad de Atlantico. They only take rezzies for parties of 10 or more, so weekends typically means waiting at least half an hour. Fortunately, there was plenty of house wine dispensed from wall-mounted spigots behind the bar to hold me over for their epic veal parm. AE

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Saturday: Headed to my hometown of Baltimore for the evening, which meant a trip to the excellent Woodberry Kitchen (2010 Clipper Park Road), a restaurant so damn popular that the entire bar area was filled with anxious diners, their feet quivering in their local/sustainable starting blocks, before they even began serving at 5 p.m. We grabbed two bar stools (this is the way to go, reservations are war here!) and got to eating a diagonal across chef Spike Gjerde's very unfussy menu. Highlights for me included housemade pasta with tender pig trotter meat and a break-and-mix egg yolk, and lightly fried softshells stacked up alongside a big pile of mustard-heavy potato salad. Their coffee service is serious, too the restaurant actually has five dedicated baristas who do nothing but pull the best Intelligentsia shots for your post-dinner pleasure. One of Bmore's best. DL Sunday: Off to Wildwood. No fried butter on this trip, but carnitas for dinner, a riff on the recipe from Los Taquitos in Phoenix. AS I heard my mom shout at me while I fried up a pan of bacon at my parents' house Sunday morning. "That sounds like it's done," she yelled from the living room. "Don't burn it!" Yes, my mom has the ability to aurally determine whether or not bacon is about to burn, even if she's not in the kitchen. I love me mum. DL

Photos | Adam Erace

Rainy Sunday at the shore meant lunch at Chido Burrito (807 Tilton Road), a colorful Baja-by-way-of-Disney burrito and taco shack in a Northfield strip mall. The joint gets cred because it's owned by the same people who own Margate's excellent Steve & Cookie's, and because of these salsa-slathered, heavy-on-the-cilantro fish tacos. AE

Photo | Drew Lazor

Sunday: Stopped into Pumpkin Market (1609 South St.) to grab a couple veggies (and a couple Market Day Canelé) to cook dinner, which consisted of a simple salad and sautéed shrimp marinated in lemon, cilantro and the perfect-for-seafood Spike Scallion sauce from WMD (1212 South St.). DL

jason

Posted 2010-08-24 13:39:34

I ate like total shit this weekend:

on Friday I rewarded my hard weeks work with silk city cheese fries and a couple of victory prima pils to wash it down. a little later on I got a little hungry watching piranha 3D, which feasibly could be my kick start to cannibalism (no homo the jerry O'Connell wiener scene).

Saturday I woke up with only a minor hangover then rode out to the burbs for the 1yr anniversary party for reign skate where I ate burger from the grill followed by peer pressure eating at subway which made me feel less like an asshole. the rest of the day was filled with sparkling lemonade from B2 mixed with a healthy amount of sweet tea vodka and the most epic EKTA feast/food baby that's ever filled my belly (the lamb vindaloo is my new go to.)

Sunday I ate my delicious ritual of lemongrass tofu hoagie and fried shrimp rolls from QT Vietnamese. I also drank copious amounts of Coca-Cola while drawing piles of rocks until midnight.

Shao

Posted 2010-08-24 01:04:27

It has been too long since I went out for dinner, so Saturday night I headed out to Supper. I started the meal with Mini Lobster Rolls and Duck Fat Fingerlings with Truffle Mayo. Love the Truffle Mayo and was tempted to order the fingerlings again just for that. Decided to skip the very popular Smoked Chicken Wings and got the special of the day, Mussels, instead. Went light with the entrées and ordered the Pan Roasted Sea Scallops and the Grilled Hanger Steak. Ordered a Lemon Tart and Peach Cake with Sweet Corn Ice Cream for dessert. So good! Will be going back to Supper just for those two desserts. Our waitress mistakenly ordered us a Banana Bread Pudding and decided to give it to us anyway. I dont see it as a mistake. I think it was meant to be.

rascal b. schuylkillian

Posted 2010-08-24 10:02:13

I had a good weekend that included various tasty beers and some good meals at home and out and about.  Weekend started off with the always incredible Prohibition Taproom green beans and a few Avery Maharajas.  Dinner that night at home included some grilled mahi mahi, fresh corn, some home grown tomatoes and avocado salad.  I made a banging dressing that consisted of greek yogurt, roasted poblanos, cilantro, lime and avocado.  Incredible mixed with the corn.  I've been using greek yogurt in everything recently...

Saturday my lady made some fig and prosciutto sandwiches and i mixed up some above average vodka and sodas.  I remembered I had frozen some pureed watermelon into ice cubes, and added that along with a leave of basil and a wedge of lime to the drinks.  All of which made for an enjoyable evening watching the sunset at the park.

A rainy sunday inspired us to go to the movies with a quick trip to Eulogy beforehand because I hadn't been there in a loooong minute.  I will say, the Rodenbach Grand Cru on tap there is a really special beer and quite perfect for a rainy late afternoon.  After the movies a hankering for raw fish resulted in a detour to Haru, which was sufficiently meh, but hit the spot none the less.  The crab and papaya rolls were the best of the few we sampled.

Marc Steel

Posted 2010-08-24 11:11:01

My weekend eating was shaped by the week leading up to it. The previous Sunday I had guests in town to see Paul McCartney so I got some sandwiches for before and after the show. Then the next day I took them to Paesano's. Tuesday I hit to road to see Phish and we picked up sandwiches from Ricci's for both lunch and after the show. Then Wednesday we picked up sandwiches from a good deli on Long Island. That's right, 4 straight days of non-stop sandwiches. So Friday I think I had broth or something for dinner. 

Saturday I met a family friend at Parc and had the burger, which was excellent. Burgers in summer with ripe tomatoes are that much better in general, and Parc had really fresh produce to go with the gargantuan patty smothered in raclette. Saturday night was dinner with friends at Sabrina's on 9th. We split the calimari, mussels and veggie something or other. Dessert was John's Water Ice. Chocolate for me. My friend got Birthday Cake ice cream which was awesome.

Sunday morning I made my world famous turkey bacon breakfast burrito. OK, Philly famous. Neighborhood famous? Sunday night was a vermicelli bowl from Pho Hoa. Followed by a tasty helping of True Blood. (I did not eat any people though, maybe next week.)

rachelburgos

Posted 2010-08-24 10:29:28

on Friday my dad helped me move some hand-me-down furniture from north jersey to my south philly apartment, so I thanked him with a Geno's steak. I know, I know, but the man loves them. We had a hot cherry pepper eating contest inspired by the vat of them next to the ketchup. I lost embarrassingly, and got called a wuss. My dad keeps it real.

Saturday I did my usual- grabbed an Ultimo iced coffee whilst dicking around the city running errands. Later that night a friend kindly made us an early dinner, the catch being I provide  beers & wine in exchange for her cooking. Totally awesome, righ? We had chicken parm, grilled asparagus, and some raviolis. yummm.

poncho

Posted 2010-08-24 11:59:18

Supper's dessert are so good, I save room every time!

Molly Eichel

Posted 2010-08-24 10:42:56

Left the shore on Saturday with some breakfast at Maggie's in Avalon, which is becoming somewhat of a tradition with the shore group. On Sunday, I took the outta-town shore group stragglers to Koch's and they thought it was hilarious. In the great Sarcone's v. Koch's debate, they took the side of Koch's but admitted that it was comparing apples and oranges (although the "I prefer my sandwiches Jew-ier" was a favorite quote of the day.)

Michelle

Posted 2010-08-24 12:22:13

Woodberry Kitchen was awesome- I could eat that smoked onion dip (1st pic) everyday.

Posted by Drew Lazor @ 11:42 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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