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Openings
Word from on high is that Rex 1516 (1516 South St.), the restaurant from Jet Wine Bar owners Jill Weber and Evan Malone, will open next Thursday, March 1. The 35-seater, designed to mimic the feel of a "faded mansion" (distressed wood, antique mirror pieces, wrought iron chandeliers), will feature a Southern-inflected menu from chef Regis Jansen, an Alabama native. Signatures of his will include crawfish pot pie, seitan meatloaf, stuffed pork loin and the house burger (pictured), a filet tip/brisket/pork belly blend served with gorgonzola and onion marmalade on a scratch-baked brioche roll. Pastry chef Shamus Moriarty will put out unconventional sweet plates like "Pretzels & Beer," a dark chocolate torte crusted with preztels and served with IPA caramel and stout/chocolate sauce. Heather Rodkey, who last ran Adsum, will handle GM duties here and has built the beverage program. Rex will serve lunch and dinner daily from 11 a.m. to 4 p.m. and 5 to 11 p.m. respectively.
Photo: Courtesy of Rex 1516
Holly Ricciardi, a newcomer to the local baking scene, will open Magpie Artisan Pie Bakery & Boutique at 1622 South Street this summer. Ricciardi, who holds a culinary degree from at The Art Institute of Philadelphia, previously opened 20nine, a brand development agency, with her husband in 2002, and has decided to take on this different, more yeasty endeavor.
The smoke is still clearing on what exactly happened last weekend at Little Bar, Eighth and Fitzwater’s beardo live venue and drinkery, but somewhere between Saturday night and Sunday morning, PVP, the crew behind Little Bar’s live bookings, quit, and Michael D'Addesi closed the bar for good. While PVP is currently moving its shows to Teri's (where it will book permanently) and JR's, D'Adessi contacted me to say that he's getting out of the bar biz to attend law school in North Carolina, that all pending shows are cancelled and that "the new tenants are going in the neighborhood bar/restaurant direction, so no more music venue." He will be the landlord of the new restaurant/bar through a local agent. He wouldn’t say who it was or where it was the new tenants were from. Stay tuned.
Peter McAndrews (Modo Mio, Monsu, Paesano's) is saying "early March" for the rollout of Popolino, a BYO Roman trattoria in what was Lafayette Bistro (501 Fairmount Ave.). Much like McAndrews' other spots focus on underrepresented facets of Italian cuisine, this spot ("commoner" in Romanesco) will express the chef's fondness for the "Quinto Quarto," or offal meats consumed by the lower classes of Roman society while the gilded pimps in Vatican City got all the prime cuts. Those dishes will be accompanied by slightly more recognizable touchstones of Roman fare (carbonara, saltimbocca), plus an option for "Tavole Calde," a table of room-temp antipasti-style choices that allow eaters to put together a personalized plate of salads, marinated veg, cured meats and so forth. They'll also offer the popular "turista" prix-fixe option that originated at Modo Mio; here it'll include antiasti/tavola calde, a pasta, a main and a dessert for $40. Stephen Flis, former server and fromager at The Fountain, will run the front of the house (and cheese program).
McAndrews' other upcoming spot, a pizzeria called La Porta, is reportedly chugging along well in Media.
UPDATE [20feb12]: Barring any unforeseen details, Media's La Porta will open on March 7.
Photo: Drew Lazor
A tipster sent along this shot of a posting at Ramen Boy (204 N. Ninth St.), which just opened last Friday — looks like the brand-new shop has been forced to cut service due to a gas line issue. Owner Nelson Tam says PGW work in the neighborhood inadvertently tripped up the flow to his kitchen, but he hopes he'll get the issue resolved by this weekend. Those looking to drop in should call ahead to confirm they've reopened: 267-687-1388.
View galleryEuropean Republic, which opened its Old City location (213 Chestnut St.) in '09, debuted a second Philly restaurant at 602 South Street two weeks ago. While Ali Noor owns both businesses, his partner/cousin Naqib (pictured) is overseeing this new spot. They're offering the same wrap- and frite-heavy transcontinental menu that originates at Noor's Long Island location (look out for canned pear nectar, too), though they might slightly pare down their housemade dipping sauce selection on South. (The jalapeño was the favorite of the three sauces we tried; there are many vegan-friendly options among the lineup, too, including BBQ, balsamic and mango chutney.) There are a couple dozen seats in the space. The hours here are the same as Old City: daily from 11:30 a.m. to 10 pm.
Stephen Wagner and chef Sam Jacobson still haven’t decided on a name for their new restaurant coming to 14 S. Lansdowne Avenue in Lansdowne, but the space is coming along nicely, with March as the word for the soft opening.
Wagner has outfitted the former hardware store, more than quadruple the size of his nearby Sycamore, with honey-toned wood planks, box chandeliers awaiting fabric wraps, doing much of the construction and refinishing himself. Repurposed factory windows serve as room dividers, cordoning off intimate seating vignettes that make the lofty space feel cozy, while a massive wooden slab discovered in the basement has become a communal dining table for the restaurant’s back room.
Flanked by a pair of high-tops at which Jacobson will serve casual, off-menu tastings, the open kitchen acts as the room's focal point. Once the last of the hardware is delivered, he can get cooking in the space, putting ingredients to the fire for the Mediterranean menu he's been developing since the summer. Stay tuned to Meal Ticket for the opening menu.
Every day that goes by is another day closer to spring, and Revel, the gorgeous, curvaceous glass fortress housing a new hotel and casino at the tippy-top of Atlantic City's boardwalk, isn't wasting any time letting people know what to expect from its dining portfolio. Within the past couple months, they've announced three concepts from our very own Jose Garces (Amada, Village Whiskey, Distrito Cantina); a steakhouse by Michelin-starred New York chef Mark Forgione; Mussel Bar, an outpost of Robert Wiedmaiere's "Belgian roadhouse" in DC; and the French Riviera-inspired Azure by Allegretti from Alain Allegretti, who operates Les Promenade des Anglais in NYC. Eat your heart out, Nuck.
The casino has tapped Manhattan again for its seventh restaurant (of 14!), a branch of the bustling Midtown brasserie, Lugo Caffe. Chef Stefano Chiaruga will be making his own mozzarella and firing Neapolitan pizzas in a brick oven, cornerstones of menu at this grand, gilded, ocean-view space, the kind of place we could see Angela Darmody waiting tables back the in day, if she didn't get ... you know.
Revel will soft-open April 2, eight weeks before the casinotel's formal debut on Memorial Day weekend. Online reservations for the 1900 hotel rooms will open up March 5. Set your alarms.
Came across Iron Tower (56 N. Ninth St., 215-485-7399) yesterday afternoon on the walk back from the newly opened Ramen Boy. About two months old, it's a tiny sandwich shop and creperie owned by Mitchell Ho, a classically trained native of Vietnam who spent the better part of 30 years cooking in Paris, most notably at La Gauloise in the 15th Arrondissement. The trilingual Ho, who's been in Philly for about three years, initially ran Iron Tower as a proper French/Viet pastry shop, hawking cream puffs and pate de chocolat, but business was too slow; he's since rejiggered his offerings to focus on sweet crepes (strawberry, banana, Nutella, etc.) and the best-priced banh mi around. He's charging $3 flat for a straight-up Ba Le-rolled sandwich — BBQ pork, chicken, beef, ham or crispy tofu dressed with mayo or olive oil, lettuce, pickled shredded carrot and crazy-spicy bird chili (upon request). Ho says he might be able to accommodate requests for Gallic sweets, too, if you call ahead. Iron Tower is open daily from 8 a.m. to 6 p.m.
Photo: Drew Lazor
It's hard for a restaurant to open quietly in Philly these days, especially when that spot specializes in something as universally lusted-after as Japanese noodle soup. Such is the case with the "soft-open" Ramen Boy (204 N. Ninth St.), filling brothy bowls for capacity houses since Friday night in C-Town.
"Ramen is so common and so popular in Japan," says owner Nelson Tam, who also has Yakitori Boy two blocks away. His popular karaoke joint does offer the stuff, but he "wanted to do a place and stand out only for ramen." He's got that here, with native-son chef Yuichi "Ben" Watanabe and his bandanna-rocking crew serving four varieties of soup — a traditional pork broth with chargrilled meat and naruto (pictured); a soy-and-miso with chicken; an spicy oxtail-based broth with sliced ribeye; and a vegan bowl featuring soy milk-based broth and a rotating lineup of 11 different vegetables. They're also doing gyoza (pork, chicken, shrimp and a cheesesteak-like beef/cheddar) fried on the flat-top, rice platters and a couple of sides. Full menu after the jump (click to enlarge).
Don't be discouraged if every seat's occupied when you swing by — people seem to come and go pretty quickly here, and your sidewalk-to-soup time can be considerably slashed if you grab a stool at the kitchen bar. Ramen Boy is open Tuesday to Thursday and Sunday from 11 a.m. to 10 p.m. and Friday and Saturday from 11 a.m. to 11 p.m.
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