I always look for sicilian because I love the cuisine, but like other regional italian places they tend to play it safe and be more eclectic. There is fennel salad with citrus there too. I guess it qualifies. But bufala? gorgonzola? gnocchi sardi? Anyway does look promising from its IG so I am hopeful for you!
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The endless summer weather yesterday had us craving Turkish food at Isot, a cozy & popular BYOB off of South Street.
Our party of four shared the cold mezze platter with abugannush, acılı ezme, haydari, saksuka, hummus, and Russian salad — some unusual items I’ve not seen at Turkish places in Berlin (the saksuka, which is fried veg, and the Russian salad in particular).
That said, it was all very nice & the acılı ezme had a pleasant kick to it. We also shared the manti, billed as an appetizer but enough for one person to make a meal out of it. Tender, juicy lamb dumplings in yogurt and chili sauce.
The main event was the mix plate for 2, as experience has taught us to generally under-order at Turkish/Greek/ME places. We still couldn’t finish the meat-a-palooza we were presented with
(beef kebab, chicken adana, İçli Köfte, grilled chicken thighs, kasap köfte and lamb kebab), nor the large side of bulgur.
We did finish the vegetable sauté, which was not very Turkish, but flavorful and cooked perfectly, leaving the various veg nice and crisp.
We are spoiled by the Turkish food in Berlin, and this didn’t come close in terms of seasonings & variety of mezze, but it was a very nice meal with great company 
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Went back to Ba Le Bakery for another banh mi, this one far better than our initial experience. Got the grilled pork banh mi with extra paté and do chua,
and lemongrass pork summer rolls.
We also purchased this spectacularly spicy & scrumptious kumquat dipping sauce, which I think may just go with everything 
I almost grabbed some pork & egg quiche, but decided we had enough food for lunch 
A customer I asked about these told me they were sweet treats. The banana steamed in banana leaves with sticky rice sound great, the neon green mung bean dumplings not so much.
I didn’t have a chance to ask what to do with any of these items, so will post a general inquiry 
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“Mam Ruoc is Vietnamese fermented shrimp paste, a staple condiment in Southeast Asian cuisines. It can also be effectively used to disperse a crowd.” 
Sounds delish! And thank you 
I have to admit liking those mung bean things in pandan jelly. they are VERY bland but not as sweet as you would expect and somehow itworks. Probably a minority taste!
Wonderful meal at Illata, a tiny, cozy BYOB. Considering I almost cancelled our rez due to general Weltschmerz, I’m so glad we went! A welcome distraction a day after Election Day.
The place has a few counter seats around a bar, and maybe 6-8 tables — mostly 2-tops and 4-tops.
We’d brought a favorite Falanghina & a Greek rosé, both great pairings for our meal.
We shared a fantastic salad with endive, radicchio, frisée, comté, anchovies and buttermilk dressing,
spectacularly flavorful eggplant tortellini with tender and delicate skins in a tomato broth with basil oil,
“potato, leeks, and ricotta salata” — looks like nothing, but def worth returning for,
and finally, the strip steak with sweet Jimmy Nardello peppers and cippolini. We both would’ve preferred the meat closer to MR, but that’s a minor complaint.
We ended up taking home dessert: a very nice, small chocolate cake with peanuts and caramel.
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Dim Sum Garden is no secret location by any means. The place has been around for as long as I can remember coming to Philly, and we’d been to both their former location near RTM as well as the ‘new’ one in Chinatown a handful of times.
That said, it had been far too long, so a revisit was in order. What better occasion than having a friend in town with his teenage daughter, who used to join us for our Sichuan chili head outings back home when she was just a lil baby?
Plus I’d been fantasizing about XLB for a while now. The place was hopping on a Saturday night (they take no reservations), but the line moved fast. We were seated across the kitchen, which provided us with a great view of the perfectly choreographed workflow feeding the multitudes of eager eaters.
The main draw here are the XLB, no doubt, and you can choose from 6 varieties: pork, crab & pork, spicy pork, chicken, pan-fried pork (never had pan-fried soup dumplings, will have to try them next time), but there are also many other dumplings, as well as many popular Shanghainese dishes like noodz with scallion sauce, and a few Sichuan faves.
We shared the spicy pork XLB and the crab & pork XLB, as well as the pork & shrimp shumai, and stir-fried Shanghai bok choy. The girl was in a sweet mood & got herself some baozi with red bean paste, those sesame buns, and a boba tea.
The XLB were all that and more: juicy filling, flavorful broth, tender skins, whereas the pork & shrimp shumai were much larger than we were accustomed to, and light on shrimp flavor.
When we go back we will stick to the XLB
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Getting close to the end of our stay. We probably dined at more than 34 places in the meantime, including a few repeats.
Today was a visit to one of Philly’s institutions, John’s roast pork. It was alright. I’m already getting lectured on the Philly subreddit how I chose the wrong cheese, should’ve eaten it right there (so cozy out! not!) bc it doesn’t travel well, yadda yadda yadda. Excuses, excuses.
It was fine. The place is way out of the way of anything & required a car trip.
The bread was nice. The meat was ok. The spinach was alright. Mild provolone. We both thought it was on the bland side & added a few banana peppers. We have a little nub left. My PIC can have all of it 
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Philly being Philly 
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Just to add to JenKalb’s Comments, I didn’t see a single Item on the Menu that I would associate with P.A Dutch Cuisine other than Ham.
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I like John’s - it’s a half mile from me. Always put hot peppers on it (roast pork, greens, sharp provolone, and long hots is the traditional way, long hots are at the register). Also get it wet, or ask for juice on the side if you’re taking it home. 
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I didn’t see any long hots & would’ve loved some!
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Also, it was def wet enough, in that the bread was pretty softened up.
Maybe it’s just not my thang
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One of our favorite meals in town so far was at the super-popular, super-tiny / cozy Little Fish BYOB.
As the name might indicate, it specializes in seafood. We thought the 5-course prix fixe might be a bit too much food, and instead decided to share everything from the à la carte menu instead, save for the final two mains.
First, the bread service with baguette from one of our favorite bakeries and a little pot of butter with anchovy, Calabrian chili, and parm, which I suppose we were to smash up ourselves (and which I did immediately)… but a compound butter ready to shmear on the bread would’ve been equally welcome.
Next up were lovely oysters with fermented yuzu mignonette & honeycrisp apple.
The crudo of kombu-cured fluke with ponzu vinaigrette and radish was fantastic — full of umami, and one of my favorite dishes.
The scallop toast is their most famous menu item, and it lived up to the hype: perfectly buttery slices of raw scallop dressed in a chili oil with hints of Sichuan peppercorn & chives on a sesame toast. Brilliant.
I liked the grilled octopus with spicy pork ragu, horseradish aioli, honeycrisp apple, and cured egg yolk better than my dining companion, but he prefers octopus grilled with a squeeze of lemon and nothing else 
I was getting mighty full at this point & panicked about having two more dishes coming out. Thankfully, we were able to nix the grilled mackerel, and so our final dish was the one I was the most excited about (well, besides the scallop toast): uni & crab tagliatelle with house nori pasta, crab soy, smoked trout roe, and chili breadcrumbs.
Fabulous, and the perfect ending to our meal, as we had no room left for dessert.
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I prefer DiNic’s roast pork sando to John’s. OTOH, John’s cheesesteak is really good and flies under the radar a bit.
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Hmm. Judging from the reactions I’ve gotten in Fb food groups, the cheesesteak is popular, and often preferred over the roast pork sandwich.
I’l never know
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