Green Eggs Cafe

Didn't you hear, South Philly's Green Eggs Cafe is the new weekend brunch hot spot. This translates into an hour wait if you want to grub during normal brunch hours.

But the genius of Green Eggs Cafe, and what takes the sting out of the wait, is that there is a large room on the cafe side of the restaurant with two long couches to sit on and two large TV's (usually tuned to Food Network), one above the fireplace and one behind the cafe bar, to while your time as you sip on a coffee or some other beverage. If the weather's nice, have a seat at the outside bar with stools along the entrance ramp. So much better than standing in line, huffing streetside for an hour.

Thanks to the two open, airy rooms with plenty of light from open windows and doors when the weather is amenable, Green Eggs does not feel like your typical cramped Philly dining room with row house dimensions. Green Eggs could be in California. Or Texas. Or anywhere other than Philly. The atmosphere is refreshing, actually.
Green Eggs puts to practice the green philosophy by using LEED-certified building products, using biodegradable plastic ware, composting, banning Styrofoam, sourcing local ingredients (who doesn't say that?), and donating the $1 charge for filtered tap water to the National Oceanic and Atmospheric Administration.
Peanut butter-stuffed or vanilla creme brulee are the two decadent French toast options, and I went with the creme brulee. With creme brulee in the name, I was expecting a thick custard-stuffed French toast, but this is not the case. A stack of creme brulee batter dipped bread tasting like normal French toast topped with vibrant and fresh berry compote and whipped cream are centered on a plate of maple syrup and creme anglaise. Perhaps the creme brulee let-down was for the best, because I was actually able to finish the stack without feeling weighed down.
The breakfast burrito is a behemoth filled with eggs, olives, corn, chorizo (omitted by request), Tex-Mex cheese, and signature potatoes (roasted breakfast potatoes by any other name) topped with pico de gallo, sour cream, and avocado in a pool of fire roasted red pepper black bean sauce. Phew, that was a lot of ingredients! Greasy potatoes, eggs, and tortilla are what you'll mostly be eating, along with a thin bean sauce that lacks heat or a zesty punch. Meh. That's how I feel about all tofu scrambles, but at least Green Eggs does tofu scramble well. No watery tofu over-seasoned with turmeric or curry powder, just a well balanced scramble studded with thinly sliced green peppers and onions, topped with crunchy nuggets of Bac-o-Bits, which are vegan if you didn't know, but all vegans know this.

The accompanying bowl of fruit was nicely varied and super fresh. Your choice of toast arrives in a cute wire basket.Thinly sliced beets hide underneath a tower of spotlessly fresh mixed greens dressed with a dried oregano-heavy herbal vinaigrette in need of more acid and charm. Mix in olives, tomato slices, and the artichoke hearts on the side of the plate and you've got a Seinfeld-ian big salad.
Watching see-through wire baskets of fries (regular or sweet potato) float through the room en route to other tables was just the sales pitch I needed to order my own. Lack of crispness is always a problem with sweet potato fries, but these limp, medium-cut fries are still salty, sweet and tasty.

Service at Green Eggs is a crapshoot. Obviously, going during weekend brunch hours is the worst time. During one prime weekend brunch time visit we suffered an hour wait for a table and then a ten minute wait for acknowledgment after being seated, a long wait for food, and a mostly absent server that we replaced with which ever server happened to pass our table, and then a long wait for the check. On another visit during a weekend mid-afternoon we opted for the bar seating on the cafe side of the restaurant and received much better service, only because the cafe servers are captive behind the counter and easy to flag down.

I will bemoan this about Green Eggs, but, really, I could say this about most every breakfast and brunch spot in Philly: how about getting some tempeh! Green Eggs' menu lists bacon, turkey bacon, pork roll, sausage, smoked ham, scrapple, and chorizo as sides. They just about covered it all...except for the non-egg, protein-seeking vegetarian. With just that one simple menu addition, I'll be able to substitute tempeh for meat and enjoy many more dishes.

Welcome, Green Eggs, to the club of popular Philly weekend bruncheries with absurdly long waits and good, but not mind-blowing food. South Philadelphians no longer need to walk north to wait for brunch. They can lounge on a couch watching Food Network while suckers else where stand on the street.

Green Eggs Cafe
1306 Dickenson St., Philadelphia, PA 19147
215-226-EGGS
Open daily: 7am-7pm
Full menu: 8am-4pm
Supplemental menu: 7-8am and 4-7pm
BYOB

Gluten-Free Double Chocolate Cashew Cookies

Deciding on the perfect cookie to take to a party can be daunting. Not really, but...pull out an old trick or try something new? I wanted something new.

Martha Stewart has an online Cookie of the Day feature, so I started my hunt there. Nothing sang to me as I clicked my way through many months of archives, then I landed on a recipe for a chocolate cookie with nuts (Martha used pecans) that looked perfect.
The cookies turned out to be gluten-free. Even better! A gluten-free friend would be at the party, and, believe me, it's ain't no party if you can't eat the cookies.

Then I realized, hey, it's almost Passover, and half our our household observes this Jewish holiday. These cookies will also work for that whiny, hungry week without leavened wheat. Double win!
With only powdered sugar, cocoa powder, chocolate, nuts, salt, and egg whites in the ingredients, these cookies cook up light and chewy like a meringue, but taste like a rich brownie.

I'd make these cookies again even if there weren't a celiac at the party or Passover was in observance. These cookies are truly "a good thing." Thanks, Martha!
Gluten-Free Double Chocolate Cashew Cookies
adapted from Martha Stewart
makes about 24 cookies

3 cups powdered sugar
3/4 cup cocoa powder
1/2 teaspoon coarse salt
5 ounces bittersweet chocolate, chopped
1 1/2 cups chopped cashews (can use any nut)
4 large egg whites, room temperature

• Whisk together sugar, cocoa powder and salt.
• Stir in chocolate and cashews.
• Add egg whites and stir until just incorporated. Do not over stir.
• Line two baking sheets with parchment paper, and drop cookie dough on the sheet by the spoonful, about 3 inches apart.
• Bake in a preheated 325 degree oven until tops of cookies are dry and crackled, about 25 minutes, rotating baking sheets halfway through.
  

Dim Sum Garden

Underneath a tunnel which acts as a homeless shelter, and next to a Chinatown bus station sits a the neon-fringed, sparsely decorated Dim Sum Garden. This Shanghainese eatery, which is not really a traditional dim sum house, has gotten praise for their hand drawn noodles and the (apparently in Philly) elusive Shanghai soup bun (Xiao Long Bao). Unfortunately, Shanghai soup buns — a sort of steamed dumpling filled with pork and hot soup — are not vegetarian. Carry on.
What I love about the grungy-looking (although, it was clean) Chinese eatery is the smiling service. What I love even more is the decisiveness and confidence our smiling server had in recommending the better of two dishes — even if she might have been lying just to get on with her job. Thank you for having conviction.
The vegetable steamed buns are not the steamed soup buns most people come looking for, but are the thicker bread-like buns, and are filled with a mixture of chopped Shanghai cabbage, black mushrooms, and tofu. Mildly flavored, be sure to douse the vegetable bun with one of the few condiments on the table, like vinegar, soy sauce, or chili sauce.
The vegetable steamed dumplings (again not the one's filled with soup) are filled with the same mixture as the steamed vegetable buns, so it may be best to pick one over the other so as not to grow tired of the filling.

Having just eaten a really bad dumpling that surely came from a freezer bag at another restaurant, rest assured that Dim Sum Garden's dumplings and buns are housemade. You can watch the employees make the doughy pockets behind the counter.The handdrawn dry noodles with tofu come slathered with a strongly anise-scented brown sauce studded with bits of craggy, chewy tofu and peanuts. I love the chewy noodles, but the extremely salty, though tasty sauce was borderline inedible. I managed to down most of the noodles by convincing myself that enjoying salty food is an indulgence, but an hour later found myself successively downing six glasses of water to quench my thirst.Feeling that the salty noodles with tofu were an aberration, I checked back in with Dim Sum Garden. This time I ordered the tomatoes and eggs over rice, simply because I've never seen a dish of that description on any Chinese menu.

What came out was breakfast on top of rice — a large plate of rice topped with scrambled eggs and ever-so-slightly-sweet cooked tomatoes with side garnish of cooked bok choy. This dish is the absolute opposite end of the salt and seasoning spectrum; there is almost none. Yet, it still tastes good. Condiments from the table livened things up a bit, though. An odd sounding dish, but trust me when I say it is the perfect meal for any time of the day.

If you eat meat, I'd say drop by Dim Sum Garden for the handmade steamed soup buns (every table orders them, so they must be good), but if you're veg, there are plenty of dishes to choose from on the menu.

Dim Sum Garden
59 N. 11th St., Philadelphia, PA 19176
215-627-0218

ZZang Candy Bars

A few years ago my Dad mailed be a copy of Steve Almond's book, Candyfreak, a quick, fun read that takes a closer look at regional and specialty candy bars of the United States. My interest was piqued, and in probably one of the most indulgent months of my life, I ate my way through eighteen US regional candy bars and lived to tell the tale.

It's been a while since I've wanted to eat multiple candy bars, but here I am taste-testing ZZang candy bars from Zingerman's, the Ann Arbor, Michigan, gourmet and specialty foods purveyor, which most of us living elsewhere know from their catalogs and online site.

The tag line on ZZang candy bars reads, "taking candy bars back 100 years," and is a nod to the old-timey regional candy bars that used to be so prolific. And, to make you feel at least a little bit better about eating candy bars, the ingredient list on the ZZang bars are populated only with items you'd find in your kitchen.Ca$hew Cow is milk chocolate cashew butter gianduja, cashew brittle, and roasted cashews dipped in dark chocolate. There's an interesting play of crunchy textures from the cashews, cashew brittle, and crisped rice amongst the softer texture of the gianduja. There is also a noticeable saltiness that makes the bar irresistible.
What The Fudge? is milk chocolate fudge, Muscovado caramel, and malted milk cream dipped in dark chocolate, and was my least favorite of the three bars. The milk chocolate fudge was a touch grainy and not as dark and luscious as I like my fudge. And, while I tolerate malt in candy and shakes, it is not my favorite flavor, so the malted milk cream did not help win me over.
The Original is butter-roasted peanuts, caramel, and peanut butter honey nougat dipped in dark chocolate, and is like Snickers' slightly peanut-buttery (thanks to the peanut butter honey nougat), sophisticated (that's the dark chocolate) cousin. Snickers is a near perfect candy bar, but this bar is more intriguing...and my favorite of the bunch.

At $6 each before shipping costs, these bars are stupidly expensive to order from Zingerman's, and can only be justified as splurge. Be on the lookout for ZZang bars at finer grocery stores (I spied some at Di Bruno Bros. on Chestnut St.) and you can save yourself the shipping costs.

Devil's Alley

I never considered stepping foot into Devil's Alley until Burger Club Philly held a meeting there. Don't know why, but it just looked like a college douche bar. I still can't tell you who frequents Devil's Alley, as I haven't been back since Burger Club and we were sequestered in the back part of the upstairs, but I will say that the two-story restaurant and bar in Center City didn't seem nearly as douchey as my imagination made it out to be. The downstairs dining area looked kinda classy, actually.

Before Burger Club, I sidled up to the upstairs bar alongside a handful of downtown suits for a happy hour sangria that was sweet with a low class maraschino cherry as the fruit and not nearly as alcoholic as I'd like.

I switched things up and went with one of their many interesting sounding specialty cocktails. Above is the Zypher with Hendricks gin, muddled cucumber and jalapeno. The drink had just enough spice to be interesting, but I played bartender by dumping two sugar packets in the drink to take the bitter edge off. Better!
A side of grilled sweet potatoes are just that. Piping hot would have been nice, instead lukewarm going on cold.
Everyone knows that I'm not the kindest to restaurant-style mac and cheese, especially with weird toppings like the sweet tomato jam (tastes like really sweet ketchup) that Devil's Alley uses to top their mac and cheese, but I somehow didn't mind the small portion of bland and creamy noodles. Order the large portion, and I might complain a little louder about wanting sharper, more pungent cheese and no weird toppings.
Devil's Alley makes their own veggie patty with a blend of grilled vegetables held together with Goldfish Cracker crumbs. Spicy with lots of flavor, the not overly-mushy nor too-thick patty with crispy edges is definitely on par with, if not better than most in-house made veggie burger patties. What won me was the sweet and savory red onion marmalade — more like a confit — on top of the burger. Big flavor! The lettuce leaf and pale tomato (it was February, so they get a pass on the tomato) were skipped. The bun was mysteriously crunchy at the edges, like it was left to toast a little too long, although other diners did not have such bun issues.

In eating my way through more than a few veggie burgers in Philly, I'm finding that locking down a good veggie burger, much less one that trumps all, is difficult. Unlike meat burgers, there are a wide range of ingredients used in veggie patties, varying textures, and flavors that cover the entire spice rack. Ultimately, veggie burgers are highly subjective. I subjectively liked Devil Alley's burger. Who'd a thunk it?

Devil's Alley
1907 Chestnut St., Philadelphia, PA 19103
215-751-0707
Mon-Fri: 11am-close
Sat & Sun: 4pm-close
Sat & Sun Brunch: 10am-3pm

Yummy Yummy: Ball Waffle

Don't know where, but I stumbled upon the fact that Yummy Yummy (name win!) makes ball waffles — also known as eggette or gai dan jai — a Hong Kong street food consisting of egg, flour, sugar, and evaporated milk. That yellow honeycomb balloon hanging in Yummy Yummy's window is your beacon. Three electric waffle irons at Yummy Yummy with deep round wells crank out the large waffles with pull-apart bite-size balls. When I was there, none of the signs were written in English, so just know going in that there are three flavors of waffle to choose from: plain, chocolate, and green tea with white chocolate.

How do they taste? Like a waffle, actually. A little crispy on the outside, a little doughy on the inside, and subtly sweet.
The green tea waffle tastes faintly of green tea on the first bite, and then it's all waffle after that. The white chocolate chip dropped in the middle of each well (or at least most) adds a bit of sweetness to each bite. I prefer the green tea waffle because of the added sweetness, but the waffle still is not nearly as sweet as most American desserts.
Ball waffle innards!

These two waffles cost a total of $4.

Yummy Yummy
52 N. 10th St., Philadelphia, PA 19107
215-625-9188

Percy Street Barbecue

I'm not from Texas, and I've never eaten Texas barbecue, but that don't matter, 'cause I'm not here for the barbecue at Percy Street. I'm here for the sides!

I have eaten sides at a few real Texas barbecue joints, but it was so long ago that it might as well have never happened. So, this will not be a "this ain't how they do it in Texas" review of chef Michael Solomonov and Erin O'Shea's recreation and interpretation of Texas barbecue.

A bar slinging whiskey cocktails will greet you at the door, and then Percy Street opens up to a rustic, large open space with long wood tables for larger parties, and brown easy-to-wipe pleather-topped two tops. Two large menu blackboards are hung on rolling doors, and ample light shines through the wall of front windows in the daytime.

A roll of paper towels are brought to the table so you can help yourself to all the napkins you want. Fill up your glass from a large jar of water brought to the table, as well.
Percy Street gives a nod to vegetarians and vegans with a vegan chili on the menu, but unfortunately not all of their veggie sides, which come in cup or bowl size, are vegetarian.

Vegetarian: vegan chili, macaroni and cheese, coleslaw, chopped salad, and green bean salad.
Not vegetarian: root beer chili, pinto beans, German potato salad, collard greens, and black eyed pea salad.

We got everything that was fit to eat, except for the green bean salad, which is only available at dinner. Also, note that collards are also only available at dinner. Not sure why they don't offer the entire menu all day, since the menu is pretty short, but they don't.
Mac and cheese is the lone side that does not come in both cup and bowl size, so if you want some mac and cheese you're just gonna have to pony up for the larger bowl size. The hot croc of crumb-topped, cheesy, greasy mac and cheese is good, and will make most happy, but nothing makes this restaurant-style mac and cheese stand out from all the others around town. Props for using macaroni noodles, though.
The mayo-based cabbage and carrot coleslaw gets better as you eat it down; the bottom of the cup marinates longer in the dressing and is more flavorful than the top. A little umpf from maybe a tad more acid or sugar might brighten up the whole thing from top to bottom, but not a disagreeable coleslaw at all.
A soupy stew of black beans, seitan, carrots, and tomatoes is spiced with chili powder, and besides being slightly salty, is a fine chili, but no better than most chilis I've sampled at friend's house parties. I never even considered ordering the chopped salad, but my partner did, and this dish turned out to be my favorite despite being topped with two of the worst deviled eggs I've had in recent memory — filling was strangely silky, like pure mayonnaise without the grainy texture and body the cooked egg yolk provides that's normally added back in, and way too salty. But underneath those deviled eggs is a melange of black beans, lettuce, shredded carrots, red onions, avocado, and scallions smothered in a creamy buttermilk dressing spiked faintly with dill. If you like macaroni salad (hi!), you'll love Percy Street's chopped salad.
And, you know the real reason I was at Percy Street was to try the banana pudding, don't ya? So good, yet so disappointing. The vanilla pudding is gourmet, luscious and brimming with vanilla bean flecks, but at the bottom of the cup there is only one soft wafer (maybe two?), and only one or two banana slices. It's like making Tiramisu with only one Lady Finger. Such a tease. Props, though, for adding the two Nilla wafers to the top before serving, so they're still crunchy. Even with the pudding component being so great, I don't think I'd order the banana pudding again.

When it was all said and done I enjoyed the food and atmosphere of Percy Street, but felt I was eating at just another sleek Philly restaurant. There's something missing from the experience and food that doesn't resonate barbecue house. Missing homespun, from-the-heart character, maybe? The food's fine, but it ain't got no soul.

Percy Street Barbecue
900 South St., Philadelphia, PA 19147
215-625-8510
Lunch: Sat and Sun, 11:30am-2:30pm
Dinner: Sun-Thurs, 5-10pm; Fri-Sat, 5-11pm, bar til 2am

Garces Trading Company

Garces-branded coffee, olive oils, and vinegars; artisanal cheeses; house-made and imported charcuterie; on-site baked breads and pastries; and boil-in-bag take-home entrees are not the only for-purchase goods lining the outside of Garces Trading Company's sit-down dining area. A small, 200 label boutique Pennsylvania Liquor Control Board wine store walled off by glass sits off to one side of the open dining room and gourmet food shop. Purchase a bottle of wine (or liquor in the cabinet behind the register) to go, or bring it over to your table to sip with lunch or dinner.

The sit-down restaurant commands most of the indoor space, though. Garces Trading Company's menu is heavy on the cheese and charcuterie plates, which are perfect for pairing with your bottle of wine. You'll also find anipasti, soups, salads, sandwiches, pastas, pizzas, and a daily entree special on the menu.

With Garces being such a badass and hailing from Chicago, we had our eye on the prize all along — a Chicago-style deep dish pizza. The deep dish pizza takes about 30 minutes to prepare, so we had a couple starters while we waited.
Hearing good things about the artichoke antipasti, I gave it a go, and, oh boy, am I glad I did! These sliced baby artichokes topped with chewy dates and drizzled with preserved lemon olive oil and honey-ginger balsamic vinegar might be the best artichoke dish I've had to date. Even being a pool-of-olive-oil hater, these delicate artichokes were not weighed down by the light and sweet lemony olive oil and vinegar that dressed the dish. I even scraped the oil slick off the plate to lick the fork.
A salad of baby greens bathed in blood orange vinaigrette is topped with winter's red jewels, pomegranate seeds and blood oranges, along with a round of pistachio-dusted goat cheese and rectangular Parmesan crisps. As fine a salad as any, but it paled next to artichoke appetizer. A few forked salad greens may have been dipped in the artichoke's dressing before landing in the mouth.
At $24 before the addition of your choice of veggies or meat at $5-$8 per item, the deep dish pizza is not cheap. We didn't mind the $24 price tag because the pizza can easily feed three or four (OK, it did hurt a little), but did mind the pricey add-ons. I understand meat being pricey, but we felt a little ripped off paying $5 for the addition of cippoline onions. Yes, cippoline are fancy little onions, but, really? $5? Spinach ain't fancy and it's a $5 add-on, too.

Keep in mind that this 6-slice pizza pie (because that's really what it is) corrals so much Mozzarella (surely a factor in it's price) that one or two slices are all any sane person can handle. I stopped at one piece, unable and unwilling to ingest more cheese than I normally eat in one or two weeks.The ultra crispy crust holds up to all the gooey Mozzarella and fresh-tasting San Marzano tomatoes, but you still must tame this pizza with cutlery.

As always, pizza opinions are divided. The boy thought the sauce could use more spice, but, agreeing, I appreciated the fresh clean taste of the tomatoes. The boy loved the so-crispy-it's-hard-to-cut crust, but I preferred the crust as a left over after it had softened a little. The boy could eat pounds of cheese all day long, but I can not.
What I can eat all day long are pastries. At $8 for a dozen, I picked up a mixed box of little pastries. Grapefruit macarons with grapefruit curd? I am so there! Heated a bit at home to warm the custardy insides of the canelés, I traded off with the delicate hard-shelled macarons to see which one I preferred, and, before I knew it, I went through them all with the two coming out a draw. The lemon ricotta cookies with a lemon glaze were top notch as well, but came in last place in the race to my belly.

Aaaand...Garces is solid again! I'll have to get back soon for a cheese plate and a bottle wine. And more pastries.

Garces Trading Company
1111 Locust St., Philadelphia, PA 19107
215-574-1099
Breakfast: Mon-Fri, 7am-11am; Sat-Sun, 8am-11am
Lunch and Dinner: Mon-Sun, 11am-10pm

Callie's Biscuits

Biscuits have always been a mythical bread to me whose perfection was elusive. This is only because I grew up thinking that my sister was born with magical biscuit-making powers. As a teenager, my sister proved to unfailingly make high-rising soft biscuits every time, so my parents deigned her the biscuit maker, and hung up their flour-dusted aprons.

I've come to find out that biscuits really are not that difficult. In fact, I dared to make my sister a biscuit-topped pot pie over the holidays, and she called the biscuits as good as hers.

The biscuits I made my sister are from the famed biscuit maker Callie White of Callie's Charleston Biscuits in Charleston, South Carolina. People simply go ga-ga over her biscuits. And, in a Serious Eats biscuit throwdown they won, hands down.

The following recipe for Callie's biscuits has recently been my go-to biscuit recipe (besides the one's I grew up on), and it wows 'em every time.

Secret ingredient: cream cheese. Yes, y'all!Lately, I've been cutting the biscuit dough into squares — rectangles really — to avoid mashing all the scraps together left over from using a round cutter. Every one knows that the more you handle biscuits the tougher they get, so I just avoid biscuits made from scraps all together.

I really can't stress the "do not over-handle" biscuits enough. After the dough drops out of the mixing bowl onto a floured surface, I throw flour on the top of the dough and gently (like, be scared to touch it) press the dough out. Sometimes I'll fold the dough over a few times (creates layers), but other times I forgo the folding in favor of keeping my hands off.

My other trick to great biscuits is to make the dough wetter than called for. You can bake out moisture, but you can't bake it in. This, of course, makes for a really sticky dough, but just throw copious amounts of flour on the surface before (gently) pressing the dough out.

Oh, and don't forget to use Southern flour. It does make a difference, but don't beat yourself up over it if you live in a region that doesn't carry Southern flour. The taste and texture differences are subtle and recognizable only to die-hard biscuit lovers.

Callie's Biscuits
makes 8-10 biscuits
adapted from The Washington Post

2 cups self-rising flour
2 tablespoons salted butter, room temperature, plus 1 tablespoon melted butter for glazing
1/4 cup cream cheese, room temperature
3/4 cup plus 1 tablespoon buttermilk

• Place flour, butter, and cream cheese in a large mixing bowl. Cut the butter and cream cheese into the flour with a fork or with your fingers (I find fingers easier), until the butter and cream cheese are the size of small peas.
• Add buttermilk to the flour, and mix until just combined. Do not over mix. The dough will be wet.
  
• Turn dough out onto a floured surface. Flour the top of the dough, then gently press out the dough to 1/2-inch thickness (I usually don't press it out quite this thin).
• Cut dough with 2-inch biscuit cutter or similarly sized drinking glass, cutting as close together as possible.
  
• Place biscuits on an ungreased baking sheet so they are just touching, and brush tops with melted butter (I skip the butter glaze to lessen the calorie count) and bake in a preheated 450 degree oven for 8-12 minutes, or until slightly golden brown.
• Biscuits are best served hot.