I was interested because I didn’t know people put ketchup on cheesesteaks.
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Our dinner last night was probably our second favorite sit-down meal in town (not counting the SEA market outings) at Stina Pizzeria, which came highly recommended by @Bigley9 for their pizza & their way with octopus.
It’s a cute lil place a coupla SEPTA stops south of us, with outdoor seating along the street. We had a 2-top right at the window, and loved the low-key atmosphere and decorative touches. It has the feel of a real neighborhood place.
It’s also BYOB, and we brought along a wonderfully crisp Falanghina, a casa lingua favorite & a great pairing for what was to come.
We shared the fried smelts with tzatziki, which were perfectly crispy but a bit lacking in salt, and I like fresh lemon with most of my fried foods.
The server was happy to provide both, but the owner stopped by to let us know that the smelts were already seasoned with salt & lemon. Well, dude. Quite clearly not enough for this salt fiend & lemon head! 
The octopus was all that and more: tender, crispy, flavorful, and came with a red pepper paste and black olive tapenade. Fabulous. Go-back-for worthy 
My dude decided to also get the dolmades stuffed with beef over rice, which were slightly crisped up — neither of us have had charred dolma and asked the guy where he’s from: Saloniki. Perhaps a thing there? In any event, also very flavorful & even the rice was delish.
Finally, we shared (but couldn’t finish) the mushroom pide with Taleggio,
and my crazy PIC ordered a ginormous slice of chocolate layer cake with tahini buttercream covered in an espresso and chocolate ganache to take home.
You know…. in case we got hungry later bahahahaha. We may have had a fork or two 
Some shots from the cute bathroom.
And now I need to find an equally cool octopus TP holder!
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It’s available on Amazon!
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Thank you! Unfortunately, it wouldn’t quite work in our bathroom, but it’s fun to imagine it there, anyway 
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Evil Genius Brewery last night to catch a thrilling 2nd Phillies/Mets game before a (final? 
) celebratory meal at Kalaya.
I’m not much of a beer connoisseur & am generally happy with a crisp pilsner/lager that’s not hopped to death, but I like trying the occasional sour.
The papaya smoothie sour was tart & on the dry side, less fruity than I’d have expected. It tasted like beer 
My PIC had the extra special bitter. Big fat nope for me, but he enjoyed it.
Finally, he got the chocolate pumpkin porter I liked more than I thought I would, and I the Sichuan peppercorn saison — crisp, clean, with just a whisper of floral spice.
Great place to hang out and watch a game, though. Too bad it requires taking two trains 
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Kalaya for a final (? ) celebratory meal. We’d dined there a few years ago with friends at its old iteration on South Street, and before the NYT, Phil Rosenthal and the James Beard award for Best Chef Mid-Atlantic made it damn near impossible to snag a rez, and which prompted the owner to move to a warehouse-sized location up in Fishtown. It was already pricier than your usual, run-of-the-mill Thai restaurant, and specialized in a more elevated take on popular and lesser known dishes, with a keen eye on beautiful presentation & delicate flavors.
The new location was positively buzzing on a Sunday eve with the young, the beautiful & the well-off, so naturally, we fit right in . Our first seat at the bar was blasting the a/c right down my neck, so we switched to the short end of the bar.
I had the super-refreshing Lum Yong to start with, ‘a mysterious blend of gins, coconut, lemongrass, galangal, lime & turmeric,’
my PIC got the Achara, ‘a bitter & tropical sipper with mango tequila, toasted coconut, and lime leaf vermouth, which was also quite good.
Our server was hell-bent on recommending the $75/person tasting menu, which included a few things we wanted to try, but we decided to order à la carte instead.
Shaw Muang: 6 bite-sized chicken dumplings that were very pretty (the place is famous for its gorgeous dumpling creations), but rather forgettable. The slice of Thai pepper perched atop each at least provided a bit of a zing.
Pra Ram Long Som: pork tenderloin with peanut satay sauce and water spinach. Velvety, tender pork in a very rich sauce. We probably could’ve stopped there.
Pla Muk Thod Kreung: fried curry squid with long hots, lime leaf, and nam jim waan. The fry was crispy & very light, but I didn’t detect any heat from the long hots (nor any actual long hots).
For our ‘large plate’ we’d chosen the Pu Pad Pong Karee: colossal crab meat with chili oil, egg, Chinese celery and crab roe, served with Jasmine rice. Very good, though not much heat (again), and incredibly rich.
The side of pickled mustard greens with egg & garlic was probably not necessary, evidenced by our taking home most of it, along with the crab curry.
Overall, it was a nice meal, but we much prefer the more casual (much cheaper and much spicier) Thai we’re accustomed to from our favorite place in Berlin.
I don’t see any reason to go back.
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Too bad it was not a spicy as you’d hoped for in some of the dishes. They might have had some ground chiles or chile oil if you’d asked. I’m sure you’re not the only spicy food lover that’s come through there. I know you’re not going to stay very long in Philly, but sometimes places need to get to know you before they send the heat!
Unfortunately, I doubt that’s how the place operates, and I don’t have the financial means to find out
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Sometimes i feel more satisfied with places that cook the food the way mom did rather than places where chefs are trying to “elevate” their home cuisines
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I don’t mind a more elevated take on cuisines we usually think of as ‘hole-in-the-wall’ food, and I am willing to pay more. Kalaya was already elevated in its old location, but I remember it being better than its current iteration.
Overall, I do prefer more low-key food.
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not exactly what I mean - since for example Thai cuisine is or cqn be a rich tradition of its own and not all hole in the wall food at all - but chefs with westerb culinary training and experience might add fat and other components (or tone down traditional components) which change the experience and take the brightness out of the flavors. Its a tough thing to balance!
The owner & chef, Nok, is Thai.
We checked out Beddia Pizzeria last night, mostly for comparison purposes, but also bc the pie looked quite delectable when we passed the place a week ago.
It’s a spacious, modern, inviting place
fit for groups (a huge one wearing silly bday hats had taken over two large tables beneath that pretty star wall), with an open kitchen adjacent a semi-circle bar.
The wine list is interesting, with some neat choices like the Oregon Maloof, a skin contact Pinot Gris that was on draft — nicely effervescent, full-bodied, juicy.
The pies are on the pricier side, starting in the mid $20s, with additional toppings ranging from $3 for pickled long hots to $5 for sausage, anchovies, or pepperoni.
We were told to limit additional toppings to two at the most, so as to not overwhelm the crust. I rarely want more than 2-3 toppings on my pizza anyway, so that was fine with us. We ordered the basic pie with cremini, sausage, and pickled long hots — the latter of which were served on the side, bc… you know, that delicate crust n 'at
While the sauce, cheese & toppings were very high quality, the crust was lacking. Too floppy in the middle (i.e. NY-style?) and not particularly flavorful. We finished it anyway 
, but Angelo’s def takes the cake-I-mean-pie for us. It’s also much larger for less cashola.
The more you know >cue rainbow<
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Looks amazing. I grew up in a family that loved old-school bakeries – Jewish, Italian, Portuguese – and they are still my favorite kind of bakery. Gotta hit it on my next Philly visit.
We’ve only had the cookies (I keep forcing myself NOT to get the lobster tail hahaha), and they are great. Not overly sweet, just … well, perfect 
Do not go on a weekend, tho. We went Saturday and it was packed.
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I just looked at the online menu. I know I will be walking out with a bigger box of treats than I should. Just like what happens at Beiler’s. LOL
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#YOLO!!! 
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We have quite a number of ambitious restaurants being opened in NY (as in Europe and elsewhere) by folks from far flung countries who have gone to culinary school or worked their way up in “western” kitchens, and its been a wonderful development, but it looks like Suntaranon is not in that category. Though maybe modifications to So Thai might make the food feel more mainstream to a non-thai clientele?
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Absolutely! I also likely would walk from Center City to Isgro’s so I will earn at least a few bites of a shfoyadell.
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