It’s been a year of extraordinary new burgers in Philadelphia, from the McDonald’s Money, the over-the-top double stack of luxury flourishes at Honeysuckle inspired by an Eddie Murphy stand-up routine, to the dessert cheeseburger with raw onions and blue cheese served alongside a chocolate sundae at Roxanne, to Ian Graye’s next-level vegan bean and smoked mushroom burger at Pietramala. Now seafood lovers can rejoice because the Lil’ Kahuna has made the scene at Tesiny, Lauren Biederman’s stylish new oyster bar in the Dickinson Narrows neighborhood of South Philly.
Perhaps you’ve had a tuna burger before. This is not one of those typically fishy hockey pucks. That’s because executive chef Michael Valent blends the richness of high-quality bluefin tuna belly with hand-minced Iberico pork shoulder, which lends both a fatty savor to the mix, as well as a meaty crumble that lets the patty take on the caramelized sear of a backyard burger over the restaurant’s charcoal grill. Set in a pillowy soft sweet potato bun from Mighty Bread with shredded lettuce, melted American cheese, and a special mayo blended with apricots and serrano chilies, the burger is so meaty, you’d be hard-pressed to guess that it wasn’t beef.
It is absolutely that savory, but also a touch lighter on the palate, with an almost fruity character from the tuna that swims up to make itself known, in the best way possible, on the finish of each bite. It’s a smart use of trim from two standard items on Tesiny’s menu — a bluefin crudo and a fantastic pork chop — which explains why it’s a nightly special limited to 8 to 12 burgers a night. I predict it’s going to become so popular, though, that Lil’ Kahuna fans may rally for it to become a fixture on its own. Tesiny, 719 Dickinson St., 267-467-4343, tesiny.com
— Craig LaBan
The chicken cutlet at Wine Dive, 1534 Sansom St.
Chicken cutlet at Wine Dive
If you call your bar a “dive bar,” is it really a dive bar? Especially if the beers, wines, and cocktails are playfully irreverent and unpretentiously sophisticated? Probably not. But the new Wine Dive, in a former nail salon off 16th and Sansom in Rittenhouse, is a fun, boisterous hangout nonetheless, with a tongue-in-cheek attitude and a killer menu that’s many, many levels above the dirty-water hot dog/reheated pizza level at a typical dive.
Chef Scotty Jesberger goes for hearty comfort with his shrimp Lejon, roast beef sandwich, loaded baked potato, but my go-to is an almost impossibly crispy chicken cutlet for the low, low price of $10, served with what they call antipást. It’s a punchy, old-country mix of whole cherry peppers in hot oil, sliced banana peppers, capers, fresh sliced garlic and granulated garlic, slivers of roasted red peppers, whole green olives, specks of cauliflower and artichoke heart, all bound together with olive oil and cherry pepper brine and artichoke water. Everything is designed for late-night eating; the kitchen stays open until 1 a.m.
Chef Shadee Simmons’ Olive Oil cake is drizzled with delectably sweet raspberry and blueberry compote with a light dusting of powdered sugar.
Olive oil cake from chef Shadee Simmons
While fashioning a ceramic vessel at Duafe Natural Hair Salon’s “A Lump of Clay,” event on a recent Friday evening, I snacked on mini crab cakes, oxtail sliders, and a bit of beet salad courtesy of Chef Shadee Simmons, the man behind Khyber Pass Pub’s New Orleans-style menu. (You can try his food on the regular at the Old City bar.)
As I prayed the walls of what I hoped would be a sage burner didn’t collapse, dessert was served. All of a sudden, my poor clay-making skills stopped mattering. The culinary highlight of the evening was upon me: The olive oil cake reminded me of fluffy, not-too-sweet cornbread. The sweet blueberry-raspberry compote drizzle was the perfect consistency. And the cake was covered with a flurry’s worth of powdered sugar — a taste of fall and winter in one bite. Chef Shadee Simmons, Foodheadz Philly, foodheadz20@gmail.com, instagram.com/chefshadee. Dessert available on request.
Dining rooms in Philly are abuzz with talk of Michelin’s impending arrival in Philadelphia —whose stars (or lack thereof) are set to be announced on Tuesday.
On a recent night, while celebrating my wedding anniversary at the elegant Friday Saturday Sunday, diners at tables on either side of mine discussed the potential of the restaurant winning a star. That same week, at the hushed, luxe soapstone counter at Provenance, where spotlights shine precisely upon the parade of twenty-some courses (which costs $300 inclusive of tax and service charge, but not beverages) placed in front of diners, Michelin was brought up by every single guest to chef Nich Bazik as he made his rounds. “I’ve been to a lot of Michelin-starred places and they’ve been mediocre. But I think you’re going to get one,” I overheard one diner telling Bazik.
Anticipation is high. But what would getting Michelin recognition actually mean to Philadelphia restaurants? In at least one case, it might translate to survival. For the rest of the city, the guide’s arrival is both foreboding and exciting.
The experience that Bazik concocts at Provenance is Michelin bait: As I was being seated, my purse is given its own stool. Each time I get up to go to the restroom, my napkin has been replaced with a fresh, clean, starched, and folded one on a wooden tray. I count as many staff members as diners seated around the counter. My grenache noir is served in an impossibly delicate German Spiegelau glass. A single glass can cost $40, far more than the $15 wine it contains. These are the touches Michelin inspectors — or at least, diners who dine frequently at Michelin-starred restaurants — pay attention to.
“A lot of folks dining here liken us to Michelin-starred restaurants in New York and around the world,” said Bazik in a phone conversation after my meal.
“There’s a lot of weight for me in that outcome. We’re confident in the products that we bring in and our execution, but my anxiety lies with people’s expectations,” he said.
For Bazik, the expectation that his restaurant will attain a star is high, and more than any of the other Philly restaurants speculated about in recent Michelin banter, Provenance needs a star to keep operating. Unlike its fellow contenders — Royal Sushi & Izakaya, Friday Saturday Sunday, Kalaya, and Vetri Cucina, to name some likely star recipients — the year-old restaurant hasn’t received international attention nor garnered any major awards.
Royal, Kalaya, and Friday Saturday Sunday made appearances on the inaugural North America 50 Best list, an institution often considered a bellwether of future Michelin recognition, much the way Hollywood insiders consider the Screen Actors Guild Awards a tip as to who might ultimately take home an Oscar. Provenance’s recent appearance on Bon Appétit’s 20 best restaurants of 2025 list was exciting for Bazik, but didn’t contribute to any discernible increase in reservations.
Provenance chef-owner Nicholas Bazik greets guest in the Headhouse Square restaurant on Oct. 17, 2024.
On Nov. 18, Michelin will release its 2025 Northeast Cities edition, covering dining in Chicago, New York City, Washington, D.C., and for the first time, Boston and Philadelphia. Over the last two years, the Michelin Guide has expanded rapidly in the United States, growing to include a new region of the South (Alabama, Louisiana, Mississippi, North Carolina, South Carolina, and Tennessee) and the states of Texas and Colorado. Atlanta’s guide was introduced in 2023, but has since been rolled into the South’s edition. The Florida guide, introduced in 2022, has expanded to include a greater Miami area, Orlando, and Tampa. Internationally, the guide arrived in Qatar, New Zealand, and the Philippines in the last year.
Anonymous inspectors were dispatched to Philly’s restaurants many months ago. About a month ago, those selected for either stars, a Bib Gourmand designation (for restaurants that have a “simpler style of cooking” and “leave you with a sense of satisfaction, at having eaten so well as such a reasonable price”), or to be listed in the guide without either recognitionreceived a short survey from Michelin via email to confirm details like how they take reservations and their address.
Invites to the ceremony went out last week to chefs and restaurateurs, some who will appear in this new guide and some who won’t. Intentionally or not, Michelin seems to toy with the hopes and expectations of chefs, inviting a number of attendees who will walk away empty-handed or, in some cases, having lost a star.
The communication between Michelin and restaurants is famously terse and, for some included the guide’s newer editions, highly unexpected. When the Philippines’ first-ever Michelin stars were announced on Oct. 30, one restaurateur did not appear to receive his plaque because he had believed the emails to be spam.
The Michelin Guide’s arrival has also been rejected, as is case in Australia, where Michelin reportedly asked for $17.33 million over five years from Tourism Australia. The bid was rejected and Australia’s restaurants were passed over while the guide landed in New Zealand, to varying fanfare.
The interior of Friday Saturday Sunday.
Michelin math
As deserving as the Philly food scene is on the international stage, the reality is that Michelin attention is coming because the Philadelphia Convention & Visitors Bureau invested inexpanding the guide’s coverage here.If Provenance were located in Pittsburgh, Bazik would have to wait until the city’s tourism board was willing to pay for its restaurants to be considered by inspectors.
Restaurants may stand to benefit financially from Michelin recognition. In the documentary Knife Edge: Chasing Michelin Stars, produced by Gordon Ramsay and heavily promoted by Michelin itself, host Jesse Burgess says, “They say with one Michelin star you get 20% more business. With two Michelin stars, you’re going to see about 40% more, three Michelin stars, double — 100% more business.” These numbers were corroborated by Eater in 2010.
But some restaurants have also reported having a Michelin star can cost them money. An initial bump can be followed by a slump, according to a study in the Strategic Management Journal: “Consequences of Michelin stars were not all necessarily favorable. Restaurateurs also emphasized how relationships with employees, landlords, and suppliers became more strained as these exchange partners sought to bargain for more value.”
The downsides
Michelin-starred restaurants may struggle to maintain diners’ expectations, which have been compounded by shows like The Bear and examples set forth by empire-building restaurateurs like Will Guidara, also the author of Unreasonable Hospitality.
“Traditional gestures of hospitality will not cut it. Sending an extra appetizer to a table seems quaint, and just forget about the ubiquitous candle in the dessert,” wrote restaurateur John Winterman, the owner of one-starred Francie in Brooklyn, in a recent article in Food & Wine. Michelin-caliber restaurants, in addition to everything else they’re trying to keep up with, are now dealing with diners used to extraordinary gestures.
Guests fill the dining room at Kalaya in Fishtown as restaurant staff weave through service on Aug. 22, 2024.
“Someone complained once because we didn’t have purse stools. And why not? We have a Michelin star, so we should have purse stools,” Winterman told me in a phone conversation.
Michelin expectations can also have a downside for diners: Who wants to travel thousands of miles to eat the same food?
More and more has been written about the creeping sameness that haunts Michelin-caliber restaurants around the globe. As they strive for stars, restaurants start to resemble one another in both hospitality and food. In his 2024 review of New York City’s one-starred Noksu, the New York Times’ former critic Pete Wells pondered, “There are restaurants like this in almost every major city now, imitation pearls on a string that circles the world. Once the door closes, you could be anywhere, or nowhere. How did chefs who prize both originality and a sense of place decide that the most appropriate backdrop for their food would be copycat rooms done in a blank-faced global style?”
Even as Philly gears up for more international visitors and attention for the World Cup and America’s 250th anniversary, it’s likely that a (much-desired) influx of food tourists will all try to go to the same places thanks to Michelin. Many already are.
“We’ve booked Friday Saturday Sunday and Kalaya, where else should we go?” a Canadian friend texted me last week. He was looking for the usual suspects, the must-eats, notches on his belt. A rising tide may not lift all ships, but rather concentrate the money and attention on a select few.
Morale boost
“Awards are always superspecial. Obviously we love getting recognized,” said Marc Vetri in a phone interview. “But in the end, we are not here to win awards. We’re here to do what we love. Awards are never the end goal.”
Open for over a quarter of a century, Vetri doesn’t need a Michelin star the way Provenance does. Vetri Cucina already attracts well-heeled international visitors, happy to open their wallets for the extraordinary pastas and meats that the kitchen turns out. “If you’re around that long, folks are going to hear about you. Everyone knows about us. Our dining room every night has a variety of area codes from local to the West Coast, to European numbers, phone numbers from all over the world,” said Vetri.
Getting a Michelin star won’t change how he operates either. “This is my life, maybe a lot of chefs are thinking about this differently — sticking things on their menu specifically for Michelin. But once you stray from who you are, you’ve lost who you are. We’re always evolving. We’re a new restaurant every year. We evolve with my life experiences,” he said. “And we won’t raise our prices, like in a war.”
Marc Vetri makes pasta at Vetri Cucina.
Vetri is excited for Philly to have more recognition on the world culinary stage. “It’ll bring more Europeans and worldly folks to Philly,” he said.
Nich Bazik has wanted his own restaurant since the age of 20 and has never worked in a Michelin-starred restaurant. If Provenance attains a star, his own will be the first that he has cooked in. This is a rarity. Chefs at his level typically train at Michelin-starred restaurants in many cities, gaining experience from global kitchens and hobnobbing with other chefs with Michelin stars in their eyes. Bazik’s cooking is entirely homegrown, nurtured by experiences working at James with Jim Burke and at Russett with Andrew Wood.
“I am from Philadelphia. This is my home,” Bazik said. “My entire paid tenure of being a cook has been in Philadelphia and by design. I didn’t see the benefit of going elsewhere.”
Despite Bazik’s anxiety, “Michelin isn’t going to change how we operate. I work from 9:30 a.m. to midnight every day. I’d be doing that whether Michelin was coming or not.”
More business?
The reservation system OpenTable regularly posts its top 10 most-booked restaurants in cities. In their latest Philadelphia update, on Nov. 5, that list included Borromini, Parc, the Love, Talula’s Garden, the Dandelion, and El Vez, and none of the other restaurants mentioned in this article. (Resy, which Kalaya and Royal Sushi use, does not put out a comparable, data-driven list).
This is a reminder that the restaurants contending for a Michelin star exist in a rarefied space. As much as the guide’s representatives try to downplay their focus on fine dining, the vast majority of Michelin hopefuls do charge a lot of money. On a purely economic basis, they aren’t for everyone.
Conversely, OpenTable’s top 10 is a reflection of where people are really going out to eat in Philadelphia and, of course, the restaurants large enough to accommodate them — six of 10 of those places are owned by Stephen Starr (an altogether different star than what we’re talking about). At the end of the day, actual diners mean more to the bottom line and longevity of a restaurant than stars. But they probably can’t hurt.
Philly’s restaurant scene will finally receive the
famous star ratings. How many stars should we expect and what restaurants are likely to win?
At long last, Michelin stars are finally coming to Philadelphia. It won’t be long until we find out who will receive the very first stars in the city, as they’ll be revealed at a ceremony on Nov. 18 at the Kimmel Center.
So what is a Michelin star, how does a restaurant earn one, and how many will Philly get? We’ll answer those questions and more, below.
What are Michelin stars?
A Michelin star is a coveted award among restaurants and chefs and is the most prestigious of the awards the Michelin Guide bestows. Only 259 restaurants in the United States earned a star rating in 2024. In addition to the star ratings, the Michelin Guide also awards the Bib Gourmand to recognize restaurants that are serving high-quality meals at a reasonable price and a Green Star to symbolize excellence in sustainability.
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Restaurants are not nominated nor do they apply to be evaluated. Stars are awarded annually and can be lost or gained year-on-year. Michelin keeps most details of the process secret, but we know a few vague details.
Anonymous inspectors visit restaurants multiple times to evaluate the restaurant during different dining periods, different days of the week, and different seasons. Restaurants around the world are evaluated by the same inspectors, to ensure that restaurants are judged by the same standards, and those inspectors make decisions to award stars as a collective.
Inspectors evaluate based on the following criteria:
Quality of ingredients
Harmony of flavors
Mastery of techniques
Personality of chef expressed through cuisine
Consistency across menu and time
What does each rating mean?
Michelin stars rate the quality of a restaurant’s food. The more stars awarded to a restaurant, the stronger the recommendation. Naturally this means that two- and three-star awards are in the minority. Here’s what each ranking means:
82% OF RESTAURANTS
Top quality ingredients. Dishes consistently meet a high standard.
12% OF RESTAURANTS
Dishes are expertly crafted. Food is refined and inspired.
5% OF RESTAURANTS
Cooking is elevated to art. Some dishes will become classics.
How many stars will Philly get?
There are a lot of factors at play but to get an estimate, let’s look at how other cities fared in 2024’s guides.
City/Region
New York City
55
14
5
Northern California
35
9
5
Southern California
30
4
1
Washington, D.C.
23
2
1
Florida
25
1
0
Chicago
15
2
2
Texas
15
0
0
Atlanta
9
0
0
Colorado
6
0
0
With almost two decades of guides under its belt and a population of almost 8.5 million, it’s no surprise that New York City topped the list of cities with the most starred restaurants in 2024. New York City was the first American city to get a Michelin Guide, in 2006.
In this top ten both Atlanta and Washington, D.C. serve as a better comparison to Philly. Atlanta, with about 513,000 residents, earned five one-star ratings in 2023, the first year that Michelin awarded stars there. Washington’s population was about 700,000 in 2017, the same year the Michelin Guide was introduced there and awarded 15 restaurants with star ratings. Population isn’t always a good indicator though. Houston, with 2.3 million residents, earned six stars in its first year.
Kiki Aranita, a food writer (and former chef and restaurateur) for The Inquirer, predicts four or five Philadelphia restaurants will earn a Michelin star this year. She also thinks we might see a Bib Gourmand or two.
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Will Philly get any two- or three-star ratings?
Paula Forbes, a senior writer and restaurant critic at Texas Monthly who has reported on the Michelin Guide in Texas, says that “generally speaking, I think that there is sort of an attitude towards, you have to kind of grow into it. You have to get your first star, then your second star, and then your third star.”
Restaurants often don’t earn a two- or three-star rating the first time they achieve a rating and it often takes several years for a restaurant to move up a rank, if at all. Texas has yet to earn a two- or three-star rating. In its third year, Colorado gained its first two-star rating.
What cuisines tend to receive stars?
Contemporary
Japanese
American
French
Korean
Californian
Mexican
Italian
Barbecue
Seafood
Number of restaurants
*Chart shows the top ten most common cuisines out of 35 unique cuisines awarded a star rating in 2024 in the U.S.
In 2024, 26% of Michelin-starred restaurants were categorized as serving contemporary cuisine. Contemporary is a bit of a catch-all term Michelin uses to categorize cooking that doesn’t fall into a traditional cuisine category and instead has a new, creative chef approach to food. The sixth-most common cuisine in 2024 is the similarly vague-sounding Californian cuisine. This modern cuisine, which pulls inspiration from other international cuisines, is characterized by a focus on local, seasonal ingredients and simple preparation that allows the fresh ingredients to shine.
While Philadelphia probably won’t earn any stars for Californian cooking this year, some of the city’s most popular restaurants fall into the top cuisines. Contemporary is followed by Japanese, American, French, and Korean to round out the top five most common cuisines that earn stars. Royal Sushi & Izakaya, which serves a 16-course omakase meal, was already named one of North America’s 50 best restaurants in September. Provenance, a French restaurant with Korean influence, was called “the most ambitious fine dining restaurant to open in Philly in a minute” by Inquirer food critics in November 2024.
What is the impact of a star on a restaurant?
There are some downsides to earning a star. The pressure that comes with earning (and keeping) a star rating is very real. Restaurants and chefs must also decide whether they want to stick with what works, and what earned them a star, or retain the ability to experiment and evolve. While Paula Forbes hasn’t gotten the sense that Michelin star restaurants in Texas have become less accessible for regular patrons, that may not be the case in Philadelphia, where restaurant footprints are smaller.
Restaurants that have earned a star may also see a number of benefits. They have more reservations and customers. They may also attract and retain ambitious restaurant and hospitality workers who want the experience of working in a Michelin restaurant. Finally, there’s a general sense that a rising tide raises all boats, at least in the Texas food scene, according to Forbes.
However, Aranita wonders if the same will be true for Philadelphia.
“After reporting on the inaugural North America 50 Best awards and seeing restaurants like Friday Saturday Sunday, Kalaya, and Royal Sushi & Izakaya listed on it, I am not confident that Philly’s other restaurants will benefit that much from Michelin’s presence in our city.” said Aranita. “Those three restaurants are among the select few that garner the most press, particularly national press. The fact that they made it onto a 50 Best list is no surprise. If they get Michelin nods, that will also be no surprise.”
What restaurants do you think will get stars?
Now that you know more about Michelin stars, let us know which of these restaurants you think deserves one — swipe right for Yes or left for No. Yes, just like Tinder. Finding it hard to decide? We'll also show you how other Inquirer readers have voted so far.
Mawn
Cuisine
Cambodian
Neighborhood
South Philadelphia
Crowd says
Friday Saturday Sunday
Cuisine
Modern American
Neighborhood
Center City
Crowd says
Her Place
Cuisine
Modern American
Neighborhood
Center City
Crowd says
Provenance
Cuisine
French, Korean
Neighborhood
Center City
Crowd says
Honeysuckle
Cuisine
American, Brunch
Neighborhood
Spring Garden
Crowd says
Zahav
Cuisine
Israeli
Neighborhood
Center City
Crowd says
Kalaya
Cuisine
Thai
Neighborhood
Fishtown/Kensington
Crowd says
Pietramala
Cuisine
Vegan
Neighborhood
Northern Liberties
Crowd says
Royal Sushi & Izakaya
Cuisine
Japanese
Neighborhood
South Philadelphia
Crowd says
My Loup
Cuisine
French, Seafood, Modern American
Neighborhood
Rittenhouse
Crowd says
Parc
Cuisine
French
Neighborhood
Rittenhouse
Crowd says
Vernick
Cuisine
Seafood, Modern American
Neighborhood
Rittenhouse
Crowd says
Vetri Cucina
Cuisine
Italian
Neighborhood
Center City
Crowd says
Andiario
Cuisine
Italian, American
Neighborhood
West Chester
Crowd says
All rated!
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Staff Contributors
Design, Development, Reporting, and Data: Aileen Clarke
Editing: Sam Morris
Photography: Jose F. Moreno, Monica Herndon, Yong Kim, Tom Gralish, Charles Fox, Tyger Williams, and Tim Tai
Illustration: Steve Madden and Sam Morris
Copy Editing: Brian Leighton
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Finding the perfect holiday gift can be tricky, but you can always rely on pastries from local bakeries or chocolates from Philly confectioners. And if your loved ones prefer something savory, there are plenty of delicious local options to ship — from fried pickle kits to pork roast sandwich sets.
Here are 15 very Philly foods to gift this holiday season.
The selections here represent The Inquirer’s picks this holiday season. When you make a purchase through a link in this list, The Inquirer may be paid a commission.
Add habanero dill to your burger for an extra kick.
1. Fishtown Pickle Project
For the pickle lover in your life, Fishtown Pickle Project offers two fried pickle kits featuring their signature fresh pickles, spices, and tempura batter. The original kit includes Philly Dilly pickles, tempura mix, and spices to make a pepper aioli dip. The spicy version features Habanero Dill pickles and ingredients for a cool ranch dip. Each kit costs $35.
Creamy chicken Brazilian tapioca flatbread at Kouklet’s new location.
2. Kouklet & Tanda Brazilian Bakehouse
Gifting Mardhory Santos-Cepeda’s tapioca cheese breads might be the most Philly gift you can give this holiday. The round bites of cheese, butter, and eggs — all locally sourced from Pennsylvania farmers — ship frozen. Each package serves 12 and includes a dozen pão de queijo, or Brazilian cheese breads. For giftees with a sweet tooth, there are also Brazilian cake rolls ($34.95 to $54.95).
James Beard-winning Ellen Yin’s High Street is a Philly bakery destination. On Goldbelly, find artisanal breads (sourdough and grain loaves) for $39.95, baked goods (brownies, cookies, and cinnamon buns) for $64.95, and rye chocolate chunk cookies for $39.95.
Sweet and nutty, the almond butter crunch might be the gift for your chocolate-loving friend.
4. Shane Confectionery
Most everyone loves a box of assorted chocolates, especially when they’re from Shane Confectionery. The Craftsman Assortment box features caramels, cordials, bonbons, ganaches, and more. Each piece is dipped in chocolate made in-house. Sizes range from 13 to 35 pieces, priced at $48 to $95. For buttercream fans, Shane’s Buttercream Assortments feature a family recipe dating back to 1911, with flavors like coconut, maple walnut, and vanilla bean. Prices range from $38 to $80.
Cookies at Famous 4th Street Cookie Co. in Reading Terminal Market.
5. Famous 4th Street Cookie Co.
What’s a better gift for cookie enthusiasts than a treat from Reading Terminal Market’s go-to spot? Famous 4th Street Cookie Co. offers plenty of cookie boxes to choose from, including black and white and chocolate lovers assortments. You can bundle mini cookies, order bake-at-home chocolate chip cookie dough, pick your favorites, or go big with a giant cookie cake. Prices range from $44.95 to $60.95.
A classic cheesesteak with onions and American cheese at Joe’s Steaks and Soda Shop in Northeast Philadelphia.
6. Joe’s Steaks
For your vegan friends and family, there’s even a cheesesteak you can ship. Joe’s Steaks offers a four-pack of its vegan cheesesteaks on Goldbelly, made to order, frozen, and shipped for $119.95. The package serves four to six people and includes four 9- to 10-inch sandwiches, plus your choice of a T-shirt or hoodie.
Try the Vietnamese Espresso Blend at Càphê Roasters.
7. Càphê Roasters
Introduce coffee lovers to the art of brewing Vietnamese coffee with Càphê Roasters’ brew kit for $28. It includes a house espresso blend, a can of sweetened condensed milk, and a phin (a traditional coffee filter). And for those who don’t know how to use the phin, there’s a handy printed 10-step brew guide, too. Throw in a KINTO x Càphê water bottle to keep your giftee hydrated.
Reading Terminal Market’s beloved ice cream shop is also on Goldbelly. Ship a brownie sundae kit (three pints, eight brownies) or a DIY cookie ice cream sandwich kit (three pints, one tub of Famous 4th Street ready-to-bake chocolate chip cookies) for $64.95. You can also order a six-pint pack featuring bestsellers or your favorite flavors.
These alfajores are a family recipe Jezabel Careaga, chef and owner of Jezabel’s Cafe and Bakery, perfected.
9. Jezabel’s
In West Philly, Jezabel’s is the place for some of the best Argentine treats — but you don’t have to be in the neighborhood to get your hands on chef/owner Jezabel Careaga’s alfajores. These coconut-coated butter cookies filled with dulce de leche are available in classic or chocolate-dipped varieties. There’s also a half and half box with three of each. Prices range $28 to $30.
Everyone loves a good bagel — and Kismet knows a thing or two about making them. Order the bagel brunch kit, complete with the 12 par-baked bagels, two containers of cream cheese, two bottles of seasonings, and a pound of lox. The kit ships fresh with ice packs. Note: Bagels last in the freezer for up to six months.
John’s Roast Pork chicken cheeseteak at the Inquirer studio on March 5. Food styling by Emilie Fosnocht.
11. John’s Roast Pork
There’s no better Philly gift than a cheesesteak or a hoagie, and John’s Roast Pork is here to help. On Goldbelly, you can ship the South Philly hot spot’s namesake sandwich drenched in all its garlicky glory for the holidays. The made-to-order kit offers all the parts to build four nine-inch pork roast sandwiches, including two pounds of roast pork, a quart of gravy, a quarter pound of sharp provolone, a pint of spinach, and four large seeded sesame rolls. Instructions for assembly are included. Same goes for the cheesesteak kit, which includes 12 ounces of meat. Order kits range from $119.95 to $229.95 each.
Soft pretzels at Center City Soft Pretzel Co. on April 1, 2024.
12. Center City Pretzel Co.
Who wouldn’t want a giant pack of Philly pretzels? On Goldbelly, Center City Pretzel Co. offers a box of 10 soft pretzels with a container of salt and 10 mustard packets for $54.95 — shipped fresh and ready to enjoy. There’s also a five-pack option available.
The tomato pie at Iannelli’s is one of classic archetypes of the genre and is still baked in the deep brick oven built by the Iannelli family 115 years ago.
13. Iannelli’s Bakery
Along with cheesesteaks and hoagies, Philly is known for its tomato pies. South Philly’s Iannelli’s Bakery is here to help you share the pie love. Ship a tomato pie and cannoli kit combo for $169.95. Folks will get a brick oven tomato pie, 13 cannoli shells, vanilla ricotta cheese with dark chocolate morsels for the fillings, and sugar for dusting.
Homemade granola via a recipe from Metropolitan Bakery owner and head baker James Barrett
14. Metropolitan Bakery
Metropolitan Bakery’s bread gift box includes a variety of bread loaves, cookie jars, and pound cakes for $38 to $115. There’s the breakfast box with Metropolitan Bakery Blend coffee, local honey and preserves, and gluten-free granola. For pound cake enthusiasts, ship two loaves of chocolate and lemon pound cakes. And for your cookie monsters, gift cookie jars in three flavors.
Packaged ricotta and chocolate chip ricotta cookies at Isgro on Nov. 17, 2022.
15. Isgro Pastries
A cookie tin from a Philly institution is a no-brainer, and thankfully Isgro Pastries offers shipping nationwide. For $69.95 on Goldbelly, gift two or four pounds of cookies this holiday — that’s about 40 to 60 cookies. Flavors include butter walnut, almond macaroon, chocolate, raspberry, and more. Cookies come frozen and ready to eat.
When Angelo’s Pizzeria opened in South Philly six years ago, it didn’t just elevate the city’s cheesesteak standards — it reshaped them in its own image. Gone were the stale rolls, shredded meat, and molten flows of watery Whiz.
Under the purview of owner Danny DiGiampietro, Angelo’s introduced crusty, house-baked rolls. DiGiampietro grilled seasoned rib eye right up to the chewy line without crossing it, merging Cooper Sharp and beef at the optimum melting point. A new school of cheesesteak emerged.
Since 2019, reviews from the likes of Barstool’s Dave Portnoy and Somebody Feed Phil’s Phil Rosenthal have spread word of the shop’s high-quality operation nationwide, abetted by hype from actor Bradley Cooper and a bevy of media outlets (this one included). Its renown has prompted wave after wave of customers to show up to the corner of Ninth and Fitzwater five days a week. The line there has become a raucous scene, with cheesesteak hunters happy to wait more than an hour just to place an order and wait another 20- or 40-plus minutes for the food.
Whiz steak from Angelo’s Pizzeria at 736 S. Ninth St.,
But DiGiampietro, a known perfectionist, can’t be everywhere at once.
A visit to the Terminal-based Uncle Gus’ spinoff (a partnership with Joe Nicolosi of DiNic’s Roast Pork and Dave Braunstein of Pearl’s Oyster Bar) provided an uneven experience this past spring, when I sampled a disappointing set of sandwiches. I expected a long-rolled reminder of life’s redeeming qualities, and instead got … something else. While the rolls were expertly baked, they were both filled with a wad of dry beef strings glued together with gobs of stubborn fat.
It got me wondering if Angelo’s had grown too fast, too soon, and too far to maintain the standard of cheesesteak excellence that they set for the rest of the city.
Has demand decreased Angelo’s quality?
On an April trip to Angelo’s Ninth Street location,I had a similarly subpar encounter. The rib eye in the cheesesteak was haphazardly chopped and extremely dry. There was more salt in the Whiz than on the meat. The signature crusty bread — usually up to handling the mound of toppings — was coming apart under the weight of the poorly cooked beef.
I ordered multiple sandwiches, with various cheeses and sauce combinations, and the best bite I had on that visit was the pizza steak, with the blend of meat, sauce, and cheese melding into what can only be described as a cheesesteak-meatball sub hybrid. The sauce smoothed over the dryness of the meat and balanced it out with a thick twist of mozzarella.
Beef from an Angelo’s cheesesteak.
I went back to try again in May. Maybe it was just an off day? But I was still disappointed. The major issue this time was the house-baked roll. Famed for its crustiness, which everyone is copying, this bread was uncharacteristically underbaked. It got soggy — fast. It buckled under the weight of overstuffed meat, which was once againon the drier side. (The Cooper Sharp, however, was perfectly melted into the meat this time.)
When I told DiGiampietro about these experiences recently, he said, “It breaks my heart.”
DiGiampietro’s original shop, which he opened in Haddonfield in 2013, won regional recognition, but its cult following didn’t hold a spatula to the national rep Angelo’s claims today. Before moving to the Ninth Street location in 2019, he said, he “never, in my wildest dreams, expected any of this.”
“Have some things gotten through the cracks here and there? They sure have,” he said. “And they drive me crazy at night.”
What makes a good cheesesteak?
According to the Philly-based “fatty foods biographer” Carolyn Wyman, who authored The Great Philly Cheesesteak Book in 2009, an exceptional steak relies on four core principles: a bakery-fresh roll, gooey cheese that doesn’t overwhelm the taste or soak the sandwich into submission, onions that aren’t caramelized into oblivion, and beef that actually tastes like beef and not just a pile of gristle.
It has to be more than a working-class sandwich. It has to be a symphony. It should coalesce into one glorious flavor, with each component equally balanced. One component should not be used to balance out weakness in another.
I figure the Angelo’s problem results from the pressures of serving a daily deluge of customers.
When I worked at a cheesesteak shop in college, the major pain points came with getting the meat off the grill. DiGiampietro knows well the perils of the flat-top.
“My biggest pet peeve is too much meat on the grill,” he conceded, “because now you’re not frying. You’re steaming it. And it’s a completely different steak.”
He tells his staff all the time: “People are going to wait. Make it worth their f’ing wait,” he said.
And let’s be fair to the cooks: That line can be intimidating.
“A lot of times my guys get too nervous,” he said, “and they see those tickets coming in, and they want to try and load up the grill, but there’s only so much we can do and how fast we can do it the right way.”
Too much, too fast
I have a ton of respect for DiGiampietro, for everything he’s built and for his dedication to his craft. He’s onlyhuman.
“It’s daunting,” he said. “I see a therapist, believe it or not. Just the pressure of the expectations can sometimes be very overwhelming.”
Danny DiGiampietro, owner of Angelo’s Pizzeria, at Angelo’s Baking Co. in Conshohocken.
“I thought we’d be serving sandwiches and pizza to the neighborhood,” he said. “I did not see this.”
The Uber expansion in particular was a little harder than he anticipated, he said. “It’s been a challenge,” he said. “I am getting it under control.”
But if someone has a bad experience, he said he’ll own up to it and offer ways to make it right.
“We’re trying our best,” he said. “We’re not Michelin stars here. It’s pizza, cheesesteaks, and making bread. But we do it the best we can and as honestly as we can.”
I stopped by Angelo’s yesterday to see how things were going.
I picked up a few sandwiches, and there was a lot of good: The steaks weren’t overstuffed, and the rolls were ideally crusty on the outside and buttery soft on the inside. But the beef between the two sandwiches varied in how well it was cooked, and the ratio of cheese to meat was inconsistent.
The longer I ate one with Whiz the worse it became; the meat was a touch too tough. On the other hand, the cheesesteak with Cooper Sharp increasingly won me over with every bite — it lived up to the hype, and it’s exactly what people are waiting for. It was the epitome of the new-school cheesesteak Angelo’s made famous.
So it wasn’t a redemptive visit, per se, but it does show that Angelo’s has plenty of fight left in its grill. They’re still dedicated to getting it right. It’s just a matter of execution.
This last visit helped solidify my belief that DiGiampietro will get things back on track. He set his own standard, and Angelo’s made steaks in Philly better. A few missteps won’t change that.
Bells and birds help tell the city’s story, but it’s a sandwich that helps explain Philadelphians. How we evolved from farmers in the cradle of liberty to DoorDashers in a melting pot of orange whiz is informed and defined by the cheesesteak. Raising the Steaks is a weeklyish chronicle of this long-rolled reminder of life’s redeeming qualities.
When Keith Critchley and JT O’Brien were looking to buy a restaurant last year, they toured the dining room and kitchen of Georgio’s in downtown Downingtown, which Georgio Malle was selling after more than 30 years.
“Keith and I went to lunch and I said, ‘There’s no way we’re buying this for what he wants. It’s not that big,’” O’Brien said. They went back to negotiate, he said, Malle told them flatly, “My price is my price.”
Crispy chicken sandwich on a doughnut at the Borough in Downingtown.
It quickly became evident that Critchley and O’Brien had not seen the upstairs of the rambling building on Lancaster Avenue. “When I saw the upstairs, I thought, ‘Now I can start thinking of different ideas and concepts that we can do,’” O’Brien said.
They seem to be throwing everything at the Borough, which began opening in phases in recent weeks. There is a 35-seat sports bar/restaurant with 40 TVs, 20 taps, and a full cocktail menu on the ground floor, connected to a large patio through garage doors. Upstairs, there’s a 20-seat bar, a six-seat sushi bar, and a venue hosting live music. Programming such as open-mic nights, karaoke, trivia nights, and comedy shows will ramp up in November. Big brunches — think mimosa towers and full entertainment — will start after Thanksgiving.
Critchley and O’Brien retained pizzaiolo Ptah Akai to set up the pizza kitchen.
Five years ago during the pandemic, the Swarthmore-born Akai noticed that the successful restaurants were offering pizza — “and not because they were making great pizza.”
Consultant Ptah Akai at the Borough in Downingtown.
Akai began teaching himself, using YouTube and setting up an oven in his backyard. By day, Akai, 33, works as an installer for Toast, the restaurant point-of-sale company. He quickly became popular among his neighbors. “It brings people together,” he said. “You can go anywhere in the world and make pizza and probably make a friend.”
A lifelong vegan, Akai wanted to make pizza he could eat himself, and the challenge of making tasty nondairy pizza became motivation. When he learned that Critchley and O’Brien were opening, he offered to get them started. (Georgio’s had a fairly extensive pizza kitchen, including a large mixer.)
Forager pizza at the Borough in Downingtown.
Akai’s pies are beautifully puffy-crusted, sort of neo-Neapolitan, with zero flop and a light char. The sliced garlic gave a subtle roast to a cheeseless tomato pie that he made for me off the menu. His Forager ($23), with basil pesto and three kinds of mushrooms, was balanced and did not sink under the mozzarella. There’s also a plain cheese ($18), pepperoni ($21), and a margherita ($19).
As they did with the other restaurant amenities, Critchley and O’Brien created a something-for-everyone menu, served anywhere in the space. There are pork belly burnt ends ($18); Bavarian pretzel ($13); meat-and-cheese board ($32); crispy chicken sandwich ($16) with a sesame soy glaze and kimchi on a glazed doughnut bun; and a lamb gyro ($19) with sumac red onion and tzatziki on a house-made pita. Rolls make up the sushi menu, and the few entrees include miso striped bass ($34), seared scallops ($36), cauliflower steak ($25), and steak frites ($36).
O’Brien started in hospitality 25 years ago bartending at Reed’s in Blue Bell and counts six years at Seacrets in Ocean City, Md., and 11 years with P.J. Whelihan’s in Downingtown and Montgomeryville in his work history. Critchley, who has no hospitality background, recently sold his business, Lang’s Lawn Care in Malvern, but runs it under the new owners.
Downingtown has always had a solid restaurant scene, with La Sponda, Myrtos, and Jads nearby and R Five Wines and East Branch Brewing Co. across the street from the Borough, and Dressler Estate serving ciders nearby. The other newcomer is mother., with a creative menu of tacos plus beer, wine, and cocktails.
The Borough, 149 E. Lancaster Ave., Downingtown. Hours: 11 a.m. to midnight Sunday to Thursday, 11 a.m. to 1 a.m. Friday and Saturday. Tip: Do not park in the adjacent private lot. Use the municipal lot across the street.
On our first date 10 years ago, my husband and I went to Pica’s Restaurant in Upper Darby and then to a John Oliver stand-up show at the nearby Tower Theater.
The latter was his choice, but the restaurant was my pick. I was well aware of how large Pica’s legend loomed in Delaware County, and Upper Darby native Tina Fey had recently extolled her love for its unique sauce-on-the-top square pizza on The Tonight Show Starring Jimmy Fallon, so I wanted to try it.
I arrived at the restaurant a bit frazzled, given that I’d spent the hours before reporting on ferrets eating a baby’s face off. “Intense” is the word my husband uses to describe me that night. I’m pretty sure my nail marks are still embedded in the table where we sat.
The final night of dinner at Pica’s Restaurant in Upper Darby.
I don’t remember what we talked about that night or what we ate, but I remember feeling comforted by that man and by that place. Pica’s wasn’t fancy or pretentious — the outmoded decor looked like it hadn’t been updated since the ’90s — but it was packed. Not with people who came to be seen, but with people who came to be with each other.
You know how there are comfort foods? I could tell this was a comfort restaurant.
My husband and I haven’t been back to Pica’s a lot in the years since, maybe because it felt like a place we’d always be able to go back to. So when I heard Pica’s was closing its Upper Darby location on Sunday after 69 years, I knew we had to get in on the last night. We invited friends — a couple who are Delco lifers, like my husband — along for the ride.
How Delco rolls
On a TV in the lobby, a still frame of Tina Fey eating Pica’s pizza on the Tonight Show played on rotation, along with photos of Pica’s food and awards it’s received over the years, like Philadelphia Magazine’s 2017 Best of Philly award for “Best Red Gravy Italian.” The carpeting and wood paneling were unchanged since my first visit a decade ago.
Upper Darby native Tina Fey and “Tonight Show” host Jimmy Fallon share a Pica’s pizza on air in 2014.
There was a good crowd, but the restaurant wasn’t packed. Within 15 minutes of arriving, our friend ran into two of his friends who’d also stopped in for a last supper, because that’s how Delco rolls. Near us was what appeared to be three generations of women who shared two pizzas between them, and at another table, a dad and daughter who said little to each other, but were very happy to see their huge pasta dishes.
We ordered pizza and mozzarella sticks as appetizers and pasta for dinner, which felt gluttonous because it was, but we’ll be happily eating the leftovers this week. From the wonderfully sweet sauce to the perfectly melted cheese and pepperonis the size of manhole covers, everything was on point.
Two year-old AJ Jr. sits between his parents AJ Grenier, Sr. (right) and Carolyn Grenier (left) as he grabs a slice of pizza on the final night of dinner at Pica’s Restaurant in Upper Darby Sunday.
The bar even had Montepulciano wine and I got the last full glass. Our amazing server, Shannon Murphy, who’s worked at Pica’s for 27 years, also brought me a sidecar glass containing the last few sips of the bottle so that it didn’t go to waste. The way I’d felt like I’d won the lottery in that moment is hard to explain.
Murphy, who had her wedding reception at Pica’s, said the closing of the Upper Darby restaurant was “bittersweet” and “nostalgic.”
“The family is just amazing to work for,” she said.
Three generations
Founded by Frank Pica Sr., Pica’s first opened in 1941 as a brick-oven pizza shop in West Philly before the proprietor and his son, Frank Pica Jr., moved it to West Chester Pike in Upper Darby in 1956, where it became a full-service restaurant.
The company is now owned by the third generation of Picas, Angela Pica-Oandasan and Frank Pica III. Their sisters, Lori Pica-Rosario and Karen Pica, also played important roles in the family business over the years.
Brian Henley (left), part-time Pica’s bartender for 10 years, talks with Anthony Voci, Jr. eating dinner at the bar on the final night at Pica’s Restaurant in Upper Darby.
The siblings grew up in the restaurant, and the staff was always happy to see them because that meant extra hands to help, Pica-Oandasan said.
“We would all sit in a circle sometimes making pizza boxes together on a Friday afternoon,” she said. “We all joke around about our memories.”
In 2017, Pica’s opened a second location in West Chester, which remains in operation. The family plans to open a takeout spot in Delco, most likely in Broomall, but they’re still in negotiations (they hope to make an official announcement in the coming weeks). Until then, takeout at the Upper Darby Pica’s remains open.
‘Tough decisions’
When Pica’s posted on Facebook in March that it would close its Upper Darby location this year, its page was flooded with comments calling the restaurant a “landmark,” a “core memory,” and a “historical spot.”
Carolyn Grenier sits with her twin two year-old sons James (left) and AJ Jr. (right) eating their ice cream dessert after pizza on the final night of dinner at Pica’s Restaurant in Upper Darby Sunday.
Generations of Delco residents have had their birth, death, and wedding celebrations at the Upper Darby restaurant. One of the options on Pica’s phone directory was: “If you are calling regarding a luncheon after a funeral, please press six.”
Making the decision to close the restaurant wasn’t an easy one, the owners said. But the building is older and needs a lot of work. The Upper Darby location is just massive — it seats 250 in the dining room, 200 more in the banquet room downstairs. On top of that, staffing has been hard after the pandemic, and the owners often have to fill in.
“It’s hard leaving here because we just spent so much of our time and our lives here … and we know how much this building and this business meant to our father, our grandfather. But sometimes in business you have to make tough decisions and you have to transition and adapt to the times,” Pica III said. “We do really understand how much this business has meant to this community for so long — all the schools, all the graduations, we worked them all.”
Dominic D’Angelo (right) banters with nine-year server Stephanie Cornman (standing) as he has dinner with family members on the final night of dinner at Pica’s Restaurant in Upper Darby Sunday.
Pica-Oandasan said the family received cards from customers dining at the restaurant for the last time, some of whom they’ve been serving for three generations.
“It’s very heartwarming to see the impact, that it means so much to them,” she said. “It makes it harder. It’s bittersweet, all the memories that will be lost in that building.”
It’s not only the customers they’ll miss, it’s the employees. One staffer worked there for more than 50 years and two others, for more than 40.
“It was always a big family environment” Pica III said. “Everyone really put their heart into here.”
One last hug
At the end of our meal, Murphy didn’t judge me for using a $20 off coupon I got in a mailer, like the classy Delco resident I am. And when I asked, she said I was more than welcome to take a copy of the paper menu for my scrapbook.
Murphy told us a lot of people had asked to keep the menu, and one customer even requested all of the restaurant staff autograph it for them.
As we got ready to leave, I met two women in the lobby wearing Pica’s T-shirts and getting their photos taken with staffers. Bernadette Wasch, 72, of Havertown, and her friend, Kathleen Baker, 73, of Upper Darby, are uber Pica’s fans and said it always felt like home.
Kathleen Baker, 73, of Upper Darby, at left, and Bernadette Wasch, 72, of Havertown, at right, are uber Pica’s fans. They came to the Upper Darby restaurant in their Pica’s shirts for dinner on Sunday, the final night for in-house dining.
Wasch first came to Pica’s in grade school. In the last week before its closure, she visited three times to wring all the nostalgia she could out of the place. I watched as she hugged staffers one last time with what seemed like every ounce of her being.
“The food is just incredible and so is the waitstaff. People say it’s like family and it really is,” she said. “We’re very sorry to see it go.”
Baker agreed. “This is goodbye but it’s not good,” she said.
Dozens of Philadelphia-area restaurants have signed on to participate in CHOMP for CHOP, a weeklong fundraiser to benefit Children’s Hospital of Philadelphia’s Food Pharmacy program, which provides food access and nutrition resources for families in need.
The initiative, created by CHOP’s food pharmacy manager, Abbe Stern, aims to raise $50,000 for CHOP’s programs addressing food insecurity between Nov. 10 and 16. Participating restaurants will raise funds in various ways, such as selling specific dishes, offering special menus, donating a percentage of sales, and allowing customers to contribute on their tabs.
Abbe Stern, food-pharmacy manager with Children’s Hospital of Philadelphia, takes a selfie with volunteers from Vanguard after they distributed 90 bags of food on Oct. 23.
The restaurants include some of the city’s most recognizable names, such as Zahav, Scampi, Amá, Little Water, Yanaga Kappo Izakaya, a.kitchen, Federal Donuts, Riverwards Produce, Santucci’s Original Square Pizza, El Chingón, Forsythia, Barbuzzo, Bar Hygge, El Merkury, Huda, Irwin’s, Kismet Bagels, the Boozy Mutt, Lark, Khyber Pass Pub, Wilder, Bridget Foy’s, Cry Baby Pasta, Sabrina’s, Middle Child Clubhouse, 48th Street Grille, Vientiane Bistro, Fishtown Pasta, and Cavanaugh’s Rittenhouse. More restaurants are signing up daily, Stern said.
Stern said she got the idea after hearing about a restaurant week fundraiser in the suburbs. “I had this idea: ‘Can’t we just do something like that in Philly?’” said Stern, who previously worked for the Rittenhouse Hotel and also for the app Too Good to Go, which addresses food waste. “I knew there was so much motivation within the Philly restaurant scene to help the community and feed people.”
Alyssa Drummy and David Forgione with Vanguard distribute food outside Karabots Pediatric Primary Care Center in West Philadelphia as part of CHOP’s food-access initiative.
Stern reached out to public relations executive Peter Breslow, who with his colleague Mike Prince agreed to help recruit restaurants. “We had a really quick call and brainstormed how to engage the restaurant scene to raise funds,” Stern said. “From my experience, I wanted restaurants to create something that would work for their businesses and encourage patrons to buy, while helping us build food access for the community.”
Stern said the effort is timely, as families face mounting hardship amid impending cuts to SNAP benefits, with more patients and providers reaching out for help. “Families are scared, struggling, and can’t find support anywhere else,” she said.
Through CHOMP for CHOP, she hopes to connect the city’s hospitality community with families in crisis. “These businesses are excited to say they’re part of the solution — part of a big initiative to feed our neighbors,” Stern said.
Ed Baumstein is betting that Philadelphia’s next great restaurant won’t come from a professional chef — rather, from the kitchens of everyday Philadelphians.
Baumstein, a longtime business executive, is behind the ambitious Recipe Philly, a 175-seat restaurant, opening next spring at Broad and Arch Streets. In a novel hook, the menu will exclusively feature recipes created by the winners of a competition, and the creative process will be filmed as a docuseries of the same name.
A rendering of the bar and entrance at Recipe Philly, planned for Broad and Arch Streets.
Baumstein said those personal stories will differentiate Recipe Philly from other food-competition shows. “We’re capturing the story behind the dish and the people,” he said in a phone chat last week. “There have been several applicants already that give me goosebumps — the love that goes into the dishes and the people they cook for. It’s almost romantic.”
How Recipe Philly will work
The competition will begin Nov. 8 with a casting call and registration at the Convention Center’s Broad Street atrium; pre-registration is open at recipephilly.castingcrane.com. With cameras rolling, contestants will fill out recipe cards and share the stories behind their dishes, not the dishes themselves.
Josh Randall, the warmup host for American Idol, will emcee that day’s filming. Production will continue as producers whittle the entries down to about 100 contestants, and then to about 35 finalists.
Contestants will compete across eight categories: appetizers, soups and salads, poultry, pasta, seafood, meat entrees, desserts, and an “other” category for creative outliers. Film crews will tape at contestants’ houses and on the site of the new restaurant as the competition continues. The recipes will be judged — by “chefs, food influencers, and community voices,” according to the show’s press release — based on taste, creativity, and story.
A rendering of the dining room at Recipe Philly, planned for Broad and Arch Streets.
Each winner will receive $1,000, with additional category prizes of $2,000, and their names and photos will appear on the restaurant’s menu next to their dishes. They’ll also eat for free at the restaurant as long as their recipe remains featured.
“Here’s the beauty of this,” Baumstein said. “We have no idea what we’re going to serve yet. It’s part of the intrigue of the show.”
The docuseries will consist of eight to 10 episodes, beginning with the November casting call and the early stages of restaurant construction. Later episodes will focus on the competition, the judging, and the restaurant’s transformation from an empty space to a fully realized dining room designed by Nelson, an international design and architecture firm. (Joe Scarpone, himself a former chef-restaurateur, and Alex Snyder, both of MPN Realty, represented Baumstein in the lease at the One City building. Stefanie Gabel and Jacob Cooper of MSC represented the landlord, an affiliate of Alterra Property Group.)
Baumstein said he expects to secure a network or streaming partner in early 2026. He also wants to expand the idea to other cities. “Every restaurant will have a completely different menu — indigenous to its home city,” he said.
From potluck to prime time
Baumstein, 70, a graduate of Olney High School and Temple University, is an unabashed Philadelphia booster. “This city’s vibrant, especially when it comes to food,” he said in an interview last week. “It’s the best-kept secret in the country — 25% cheaper than New York, 25% cheaper than D.C., and just full of family and community.”
Baumstein’s inspiration for Recipe Philly traces back to his days running SolomonEdwards, the Philadelphia-based consulting firm he founded in 1999, expanded internationally, and sold three years ago.
Signage for Recipe Philly on the windows of the One City building on Oct. 24.
During the 2008 recession, Baumstein’s chief financial officer proposed canceling the company’s annual holiday parties. Baumstein refused. Instead, he invited employees to his suburban Philadelphia home for a potluck dinner. “I was just blown away by the enthusiasm that our colleagues brought to the Christmas party,” Baumstein said. “They were super-excited about making their dishes. They watched the buffet table to see who was eating their dishes. We gave out little prizes, and just getting that three minutes of fame was unbelievable.”
SolomonEdwards compiled the recipes into a cookbook, which Baumstein kept as a reminder of how food brings people together. “What I love more than food is the inspiration that people give you,” he said. “In a world full of negativity, I wanted to create something that highlights the positive.”
The team behind the kitchen
Baumstein’s Homebred Hospitality owns the Recipe Philly brand. His restaurant partner is chef Andy Revella, who has handled menu development and operations for restaurants including Bennigan’s, Steak & Ale, and Rainforest Cafe and is a former director of food and beverage for Harrah’s Casino. Jarrett O’Hara, formerly culinary director of Federal Donuts, is vice president of culinary operations.
Baumstein said the total budget was $4 million — comparable to similar restaurants.
A rendering of the private dining room at Recipe Philly, planned for Broad and Arch Streets.
Asked if he had ever thought of opening a restaurant before, Baumstein replied: “No, and thank God, and I’m not going to be the one responsible for the daily operations. That’s Andy’s job. I’ve grown some big companies, and I think probably what my skill set is hiring really smart people that are talented and are able to get the team all rowing together in the same direction.”
Filming for Recipe Philly begins Nov. 8 at the Pennsylvania Convention Center. Registration and details are available at recipephilly.castingcrane.com.
A picture is worth a thousand words, or at least 974 Reddit upvotes.
A photo of a sad-looking burger wrongfully attributed to Two Robbers — the homegrown hard seltzer-turned-hard soda brand with bars in Fishtown and South Philly — has been circulating on the r/Philly subreddit since last Wednesday, when user Seraphanarie posted a since-deleted photo of a flier they claimed their boyfriend found while walking in Fishtown.
“Two Robbers Pub Burger,” the flier reads in bold all-caps font. “This is literally the burger that came out [on] October 10, 2025.”
The heinous-looking burger in question: A barely-there beef patty so crumbly it doesn’t stick together sandwiched between a dry, unseeded bun. The scene is so dismal that the cheese is falling off the side of the burger, almost as if it’s trying to run away.
“The people need to know!!” the Reddit post was titled, with a caption that said, “whoever posted this is doing the lord’s work.”
A screenshot of a Reddit post from u/Seraphanarie of a flier with a photo of a disintegrating burger patty that alleges the burger was served at The Lodge by Two Robbers on Oct. 10, 2025.
The burger in question supposedly hailed from Two Robbers Lodge, the beverage company’s cozy South Philly offshoot. Twin brothers Vivek and Vikram Nayar founded Two Robbers in 2019 as a bespoke hard seltzer brand before pivoting to canned vodka sodas in 2024. The company opened a futuristic tasting room in Fishtownat 1221 Frankford Ave. in 2023, and added the Lodge — a homey pub inside the former Hawthornes space in South Philly — earlier this year.
Both locations are known for serving simple yet well-executed burgers, with the Lodge’s Pub Burger clocking at a sturdy 8 ounces of custom Pat LaFrieda dry-aged beef and ground chuck.
So when the flier emerged, Philly’s Redditors, like us, wanted to know: What gives?
Pub burger and fries from the Lodge by Two Robbers in June 2025. It features an 8 ounce patty made with a mix of dry aged beef and ground chuck.
The post received close to 1,000 upvotes and over 170 comments, with Redditors poking fun at anyone who has high expectations of a burger from a seltzer bar.
“This is what you get for ordering a burger at a craft seltzeria,” one user commented. Another said it looked like a burger they made at home: “It was horrible.”
In actuality, the flier may be nothing but a ketchup-covered smear campaign. A reverse Google image search traces the photo back to a 2018 post on the meme aggregator 9GAG titled “Nasty Burger.” An Inquirer reporter could not confirm that a physical flier existed after several walks around Fishtown, and the original poster declined to comment, citing the “overwhelming” amount of attention they had received.
The different, but equally notable, smash burgers served at Two Robbers’ Fishtown tasting room. They are Craig LaBan-approved.
Two Robbers co-owner Vivek Nayar said he was in his car after a trip to the bank Wednesday afternoon when he was bombarded with texts from coworkers about the Reddit post. He started seething straightaway.
“We immediately knew when we saw the photo [that] it wasn’t our burger. It wasn’t our restaurant,” Nayar told The Inquirer last week. “Just thinking about that picture makes me sick.”
Less than a couple of hours later, Nayar had revived his own Reddit account, posting a passionate defense in r/philly.
“I just wanted to come on here to tell you all, it’s not our f—ing burgerand that photo wasn’t even taken at our restaurant … those aren’t our fries, that’s not our table, that’s not our plates,” he wrote. “Truly a DIABOLICAL move for someone to go out on [Reddit] and post this.”
Nayar’s screed has been upvoted more than 2,500 times. The 35-year-old Olde Kensington resident — who claims he is “too old” for Reddit — said he was surprised by the positivity his post has received, with some users even going as far to wonder if Burgergate was just a masterful attempt at guerrilla marketing.
“I wish I was that smart,” Nayar said.
Defenders said that the Lodge’s burger “looks thicc” and was worthy of a visit.
Burgergate is not the first time Two Robbers has polarized Philadelphia. As the Nayars prepared to open their controversial moss-green tasting room in Fishtown, community members took to Facebook to complain about the paint job. For months after, a rowhouse across the street had signs that read “I Hate Two Robbers” hung in the window. They’ve since been taken down.
“I Hate Two Robbers” posters hung in the window of the rowhouse across from the canned cocktail brand’s Fishtown tasting room at 1221 Frankford Ave. for months after it opened it 2023.
Nayar said he doesn’t view the incidents as connected. Fishtowners were just coping with perpetual gentrification. Whoever posted the flier is just a hater, Nayar said. He doesn’t care to investigate further.
“It’s hard for me to blame people for piling on,” Nayar said. “If I saw a post like that and had nothing to do with Two Robbers, I would find it hilarious.”
Comes to 
