Category: Restaurants

Fergus Carey, arguably Philadelphia’s best-known barman, is expanding his empire.

Carey and business partner Jim McNamara, who own the popular Fergie’s Pub in Washington Square West, the Jim in South Philadelphia, and the Goat Rittenhouse, are taking over the shuttered Mac’s Tavern at 226 Market St. in Old City.

Mac’s — whose ownership roster included the South Philadelphia-raised actor Rob Mac (the former Rob McElhenney) and his wife, Kaitlin Olson, of TV’s It’s Always Sunny in Philadelphia fame — closed last summer after 15 years.

Carey said the name was not final, but the concept will be a Celtic pub with Irish-Scottish food — “our usual stuff.” Opening is penciled in for the spring. He described the work ahead of them as “more of a cleanup and opening up than a full renovation.” They want to open at noon weekdays but earlier on the weekends for European sporting events.

Carey has spent three decades shaping the city’s bar culture. Known to generations of Philadelphians simply as Fergie, his trademarks are his Irish accent, an encyclopedic memory for names, and a knack for turning strangers into regulars.

Born in Dublin and raised on the city’s north side, Carey left for the United States in 1987 at age 24, armed with a background in hospitality and fast-food management, including a stint running a fast-food shop called Burgerland. His first U.S. stop was Houston, but he left after a few weeks because, he said, he hated it. He likes to tell the story that he arrived in Philadelphia on a Saturday night and started a job at the Cherry Hill Mall food court at 9 the next morning.

He landed behind the bar at McGlinchey’s on 15th Street, quickly earning a reputation as a natural host.

In 1994, Carey and business partner Wajih Abed opened Fergie’s Pub at the old Hoffman House on Sansom Street in Washington Square West, at a time when Center City nightlife was thin and new bar openings were rare. The pub’s easygoing, come-as-you-are atmosphere helped spark a revival of the neighborhood’s drinking scene.

Abed died of cancer in 2017.

Carey went on to play a role in launching some of the city’s most influential beer destinations, including Monk’s Café, the Belgian Café, and Grace Tavern — each helping introduce Philadelphia to Belgian ales and European café culture long before craft beer became mainstream. He also ran Nodding Head Brewery and the Fairview.

Major changes are coming to the Rittenhouse Hotel on Rittenhouse Square, as the Italian restaurant Scarpetta will leave the bilevel space next weekend after nearly a decade to set the stage for a posh new steakhouse called the Ruxton, from Baltimore-based Atlas Restaurant Group.

Alex Smith, Atlas’ president and chief executive, told The Inquirer that the Ruxton, a sibling of the location in Baltimore’s Harbor East, would open in spring 2027. This will be the second Philadelphia restaurant for Atlas, which opened the high-end Loch Bar at Broad and Spruce Streets in fall 2023.

But before renovations for the Ruxton begin, the Rittenhouse space will host a residency from up-and-coming chef RJ Smith, 21, who launched Ocho Supper Club last year in his Drexel University apartment to showcase Afro-Caribbean cuisine through a fine-dining lens.

RJ Smith, no relation to Atlas’ president, said he has scheduled the first seating for his eight-course tasting menus for Feb. 1 and plans to offer them through July 26; the schedule has not been formally set but includes Valentine’s Day.

Scarpetta, owned by LDV Hospitality, has set its final service for Jan. 31. Scarpetta opened in 2016, filling the space previously occupied by Smith & Wollensky, also a steakhouse. Lacroix, the Rittenhouse Hotel’s signature restaurant, is unaffected by the changes.

Construction is expected to start in late summer for the Ruxton, whose deal has been in the works for nearly a year. Alex Smith said the Ruxton will occupy more space at the Rittenhouse — allowing for a total of 220 seats, vs. Scarpetta’s 120.

The Ruxton, offering Rittenhouse Square views from its second floor, will have three private dining rooms and a 50-seat outdoor space on the deck. The restaurant’s entrance will be moved next to the hotel lobby, and there will also be an interior entrance through the hotel lobby.

Designer Patrick Sutton is channeling inspiration from the Jazz Age, with highlights including velvet upholstery, walnut wood millwork, and custom Murano-style glass chandeliers. Corporate chef Aaron Taylor will oversee the steak and seafood menu.

The Philadelphia location will be Atlas’ third Ruxton location; the second is due to open this fall in National Harbor in Maryland, outside of Washington, D.C.

“We love Philly,” Smith told The Inquirer, adding that Loch Bar’s numbers are strong. “It’s a great town. In some ways, it reminds me of Baltimore — just much bigger. And we’re planning on doing more in Philadelphia.” He said developer Carl Dranoff, his partner at Loch Bar, would be involved in the Ruxton.

Cole Hernandez, a Rittenhouse Hotel spokesperson, said that the Scarpetta space, in the short term, would also be used by Lacroix chef Eric Leveillee to host groups, do cooking and mixology classes, and other programming.

In addition, the hotel’s Library Bar continues to rework its cocktails in collaboration with James Beard Award winner Danny Childs. A fresh drinks menu will launch in February.

“Where we’re ultimately heading is a broader shift across the property,” Hernandez said. “The Philadelphia dining scene is changing — it’s more vibrant, more interesting, and less formal and stuffy. We’re evolving our concepts to be more relevant to today’s diner.

At Lacroix, service standards have been modified to allow for more approachable, 90-minute dinners and “more dynamic and social” brunches that include à la carte options.

Tyler Gerber loved growing up in Medford in the 1990s and early ’00s. But for all its suburban charm, “Medford didn’t really have a lot of places people could attach themselves to and be proud of,” he said.

On Jan. 23, Gerber, 32, marks the grand opening of Happy Place Homemade, a bright, modern shop designed around the daily rhythms of the Burlington County town. Set up in a former Bank of America branch on Route 70 — including the drive-through — it serves coffee and scratch-made doughnuts in the morning, and adds soft serve and shakes in the afternoon and evening. There’s seating in booths along the front windows.

“We’re trying to create a fun, unique experience for the town,” said Gerber, who moved to Philadelphia after his Shawnee High graduation to study entrepreneurship and financial planning at St. Joseph’s University.

Combining seemingly disparate food product lines — Federal Donuts & Chicken comes to mind — is not new. “But it hasn’t been done around here,” Gerber said. “We call it ‘new nostalgia.’ We want to build a place people remember — a spot they come back to 10 or 20 years from now and say, ‘Oh, my God, Happy Place.’”

At first, Gerber said, “we were going to be a straight soft-serve shop. But the challenge around here is that most ice cream places aren’t open year-round. We wanted to build something that could be sustainable all year, so we started thinking about what paired naturally with soft serve. Hot and cold just makes sense. That’s where doughnuts come in.”

And where there are doughnuts, there is drip coffee — in this case, from La Colombe. Gerber makes his own syrups to flavor coffee drinks and soft serve.

Gerber bought a country-fair-style Belshaw cake-doughnut machine with a glass front to let customers watch the process from the first drop of batter to the roll-out of the finished doughnut. Batter is mixed in-house and temperature-controlled before being fried, cooled, glazed while warm, and displayed in the nearby case.

The soft serve is spun into a dense, low-air product that tastes creamier than even most ice cream, even though at 9% butterfat it is not “ice cream” by industry standards.

“We aim for about 40% overrun,” he said, referring to the percentage of air whipped into the mix during freezing. (Super-premium ice creams’ overruns are about 50% and lower, while premium brands range between 60% and 90%.)

The doughnut-and-ice cream combination led to one of the shop’s signature creations: Happy Stacks — a doughnut sandwiched by soft serve, served in a cup, with toppings and a syrup drizzle.

There are also soft-serve parfaits (“Perfects,” he calls them), doughnut soft-serve sandwiches (“Donut Dandies”), and nondairy, fruit-based iced drinks (“HomeADE”).

Although Gerber doesn’t come from a traditional restaurant background, he says his strength is creation. “I love to cook. I’ve been experimenting my whole life,” he said.

“He goes 100% into everything,” said his father, Larry, who sold his concrete business several years ago and is helping him with the business. “Sports, school, business — he’s a perfectionist. This whole concept came out of his imagination.”

Tyler Gerber said he was making a long-term bet on his hometown.

“We’re not just popping up,” he said. “We’re building a brand. We’re building an experience. And hopefully, we’re building something that Medford can call its own.”

Happy Place Homemade, 690 Stokes Rd., Medford, N.J., 609-969-9650, happyplacehomemade.com. Hours are 7 a.m. to 9 p.m. Wednesday through Monday, closed Tuesday.