Welcome to Philadelphia (part one)

I didn’t know a lot about Philadelphia, when I moved here in 1994.

I knew it was a big East Coast city with an excellent newspaper that had won a boatload of Pulitzers, and that newspaper had offered me a job. That was all I needed to know. I packed my bags, broke my lease, loaded Wendell the rat terrier into his carrying case, and headed east.

I got lucky with the job offer, and luckier still with the neighborhood I picked: Queen Village, a South Philadelphia enclave less than two and a half miles from the Inquirer’s offices in Center City.

I found a two bedroom apartment with hardwood floors, central air and laundry in the basement, for $600 a month plus utilities (those were the days!). As soon as I moved in, I started exploring. I walked to work every day I could, through Queen Village and Washington Square West and the Gayborhood, into Chinatown, through the Reading Terminal Market and north on Broad Street until I’d reached the office.

It didn’t take me long to fall in love with Philadelphia. I love the human scale of the city, how pretty much everything you could want – a grocery store, a great restaurant, a theater or a bookstore or a coffee shop – is less than a twenty-minute walk away. There’s great food, incredible culture, beautiful parks and excellent cycling. It feels like Brooklyn, if Brooklyn didn’t have Manhattan right next door, if the brownstones were rowhouses, if the people had about fifty percent more attitude and if everything was about fifty percent more affordable.

Philadelphia’s got its challenges – it’s the poorest of the nation’s big cities, with all the trouble and conflict that poverty brings. Sometimes it feels like the potholes will never get filled, the corrupt politicians will never get called to account, and the bike lanes will never be protected by anything but paint.

But mostly, I love it here. I still live in Queen Village, where I’ve moved three times, around a single block, since 1994. I walk Levon the same dog park where I walked Wendell, and Moochie. I ride my bike on the same routes I discovered in the 1990s, and take my kids to the same restaurants I went as a single lady.

And now the national press is beginning to discover Philadelphia, and to spread the word: this year alone, Travel & Leisure and the Wall Street Journal have declared Philadelphia a bucket-list destination.

There’s a lot of spots I’d recommend to visitors who’d never been to my city. Today, we’re talking food.

Way back in the 17^th century, William Penn laid out a grid of streets, with numbered streets running east and west, and named streets running north and south. Broad Street – where Fourteenth Street should be, but isn’t -- is the extra-wide main drag, running for ten miles from Central High School and Temple University in the north to the Naval Yard in the south. Fun facts: Broad Street’s called the Avenue of the Arts from City Hall South to Washington Avenue, where many of the city’s biggest theaters are. And on the first Sunday in May, the street shuts down and some 40,000 runners race along a ten-mile, slightly downhill race along the road. It’s the largest ten-mile race in the United States. (I’ve done it twice!)

There are two big rivers surrounding Philadelphia – the Delaware River and the Schuylkill River (that’s Skoo-kill). The main roads are I-95, running north and south, and 676/I-76, aka the infamous Schuylkill Expressway, running east and west. But I’m going to keep you out of your car, traveling on foot or by bike as much as possible.

I’m also going to assume that, if you’re coming, you’ve got your major activities sorted, whether that’s a World Cup soccer game, the MLB All-Star games or one of the bicentenniel celebrations or a trip to the Barnes Museum or the Franklin Institute, the Please Touch Museum or the Magic Gardens. So today we’re going to focus on food, in a few days I’ll share more about my favorite spots and my very favorite bike ride.

Enjoy!

If you like a side of activism with your buttermilk biscuit or frittata, try the Morning Glory Diner, at 10^th and Fitzwater, a Philadelphia institution. Come for the breakfast burrito, the blueberry pancakes and the challah French toast, stay for the anti-ICE and anti-Trump posters (and bring cash…they don’t take credit cards).

The best doughnuts in the city are Beiler’s Doughnuts in the Reading Terminal. The best Beiler’s Doughnut is the maple bacon. (More on the Reading Terminal shortly)

Winkel, on 1119 Locust Street, offers brunch with a Dutch twist. You can get standard omelets and egg dishes, plus smoked fish, hete kip (hot chicken), and, in season, soft-shell crab eggs benedict. The deep-fried bread-pudding French toast is beyond decadent…and it’s not the season for it, but the snert – a hearty split-pea soup, enriched with bits of ham, sausage and caraway seeds – is the perfect winter dish.

And the new kid on the block is Middle Child, which won Good Morning America’s Best Breakfast in America contest with its pastrami, egg and cheese sandwich. I have been for lunch, but not breakfast yet (which is a problem…when there’s so many great spots in your neighborhood, it can be hard to stray farther afield). But someday!

The Reading Terminal Market is an institution, a sprawling food hall with something for everyone. Whether you’re craving a classic cheesesteak, fresh oysters, a Georgian cheese boat at Saami Somi or a bowl of spicy Cajun gumbo from Beck’s Cajun Cafe, you’ll find it at the Terminal, along with butchers, fruit and vegetable vendors, and some of the best chocolates in the world at Mueller Chocolate (get the chocolate-covered apricots – my favorite!)

I’d send anyone and everyone to Parc, on Rittenhouse Square, for a lunch salad of grilled shrimp and avocado in a buttery dressing, or a cocktail and a side of chicken liver, or a dinner of a French bistro classic like steak frites or roast chicken with the world’s creamiest mashed potatoes, but whether you go for breakfast or brunch or dinner or lunch, you need that bread basket. The Atlantic named its bread basket the best free bread in all the land, and I concur. The cranberry-walnut is the bread I’d ask for on my death bed (death bed bread? Is that a thing?)

In Chinatown I’d hit Tom’s Dim Sum or Dim Sum Garden – no rolling carts, but all your classic buns and dumplings.

When I worked at the Inquirer, two places I’d go for lunch were the Silk City Diner –which just hosted the GOOD IN BED anniversary party! – and Vietnam. Both are city institutions. Try the beef papaya salad, grilled pork meatballs and any of the vermicelli bowls at Vietnam, the fried chicken and waffles and the banana bread pudding at Silk City.

My husband runs an Instagram account devoted to his two passions -- long walks and sandwiches — so I asked him what he’d recommend. Take it away, Bill!

Angelo’s: The hype is real. If you go, be courteous to the neighbors, whose patience has been tested by the lines down the block.

Dolores’ Deli: As good as Angelo’s with less of a crowd. I like the Gavone and the 12th-and-Wharton.

John’s Roast Pork: An institution. A warning: they have seating but no bathroom. I met a friend for lunch once and he had to pay a visit to the Chuck E. Cheese down the street.

Mighty Bread Co.: My favorite food spot in Philly. According to my calculations, if this shop was 50 percent closer to my home, I would weigh twice as much. Mighty Bread has only a few sandwiches each day as part of their broader offerings and the menu changes regularly, but in my experience they’re never missed. A Cubano I had a few years ago lingers in the memory.

Juana Tamale: Philly is teeming with great Mexican food. The bean-and-cheese burrito at Juana Tamale is better than I thought a bean-and cheese burrito could be.

Al-Sham: This local chain is not on the foodie radar, and I haven’t sampled their broader menu. But I will get their chicken shawarma sandwich any chance I can.

Fiore Fine Foods: When they moved their shop, which used to be in my neighborhood, to a new location, that wounded me deeply. But I have to acknowledge: they serve the best breakfast sandwich I’ve ever had.

The date night/bring-your-parents spots are Kalaya, for elevated Thai fare in a stunning, transportive setting; Suraya, for Middle Eastern deliciousness, and Osteria for excellent Italian food – pastas, grilled meats, and A-plus gelato.

Pizzaria Stella has delicious wood-fired thin-crust pizzas, housemade pastas, delicious meatballs, arancini and salads.

My most recent birthday dinner was at Honeysuckle, which celebrates the cuisine of the African diaspora. Everything on the menu is thoughtful, intentional, layered, subtle and, most of all, delicious, and like nothing you’ve ever tasted. (Tamron Hall called it the single best food experience of her life.)

Coming soon: parks! Shops! And a bike ride through some of the farther-afield neighborhoods! Stay tuned!