Best of the West - Sandy's picks

Having arrived at Broad street, we figured we would help distill down the west half of this journey into one post - guided by suggestions from our readers.

Friendliest service
Nominations: Roberto's Cafe, Philly Cupcake, New Tower Pizza, Fortune

The lady at Fortune was very, very sweet. The staff at Roberto's were were just an instant pick me up. 

The ladies at Philly cupcake helped me out when my ovarian cyst decided to become the size of an orange. 

(However, considering Philly Cupcake doesn't exist anymore, so I think it would be unfair to give this to them).

The friendliest of them all however are the guys at New Tower Pizza. They're always happy and chatty and even when I know they are lying to my face about that milkshake machine they claim to be getting - I can't be mad at them.

Winner: New Tower Pizza

Best Chinese
Nominations: Fuzhou House, Fortune, New South China

Hands down Fortune. They are one of few places in center city that have a vegetarian version of General Tso's. I did taste Sam's Moo Goo Gai Pan and was a fan. I by far do not think this is the best Chinese food in Philadelphia or anything. However, I remember them pleasantly and ergo they are better than the other two options west of Broad on South.

Winner: Fortune

Best Fine Dining
Nominations: Ants Pants Cafe,  So Crepe, Rex 1516, Pumpkin, Entree

This was a tough category. The food at all the nominated places was phenomenal. However, I think the best "fine dining" experience I had (considering ambiance and food) was at Pumpkin. Their ever changing menu guarantees a unique, creative experience. The ambiance is familial and cozy yet sophisticated. 

Expensive enough to make the imaginary fine-dining cut-off and worth every penny, Pumpkin is my winner for this category.

Winner: Pumpkin

Best Bar
Nominations: Jet Wine Bar, The Cambridge

The Cambridge has good cocktails and is another notch in Philly's, already saturated, English Gastro-pub hat.

However, Jet Wine Bar has wine flights - which are rare. I really liked the post-work day crowd and they have a bunch of creative happy hours during the week. I think you can get the experience that The Cambridge would give you and many pubs in the city - but not the one you would get at Jet Wine Bar.

Special Mention: Bob and Barbera's - Pickle-backs are a thing of heaven.

Winner: Jet Wine Bar

Best Dessert 
Nominations: Rex 1516, Magpie Pies, Miles Table, So Crepe

Another tough category for me - again, all of these places have phenomenal dessert and should be given a try if you can. 

However, the one I still remember my face melting in happiness from was the  dessert we had after brunch at Rex 1516. We had their Milk and Cookies which was fried chocolate and pecan cookie dough truffles with a rum-chata spiked milkshake. It was a creative spin on a simple concept and it blew my mind.

Winner: Rex 1516

Worst Overall 
Nominations: DELIcious bites, Indian restaurant, L2, My Thai

It would be unfair of me to give this to Indian Restaurant because, being Indian, I'm biased and more critical. L2 and My Thai were okay but neither did illicit the level of disappointment that DELIcious Bites did. Over-priced boring food. A complete waste of my time and money.

Winner (er... Loser?): DELIcious Bites

Best overall
Nominations: Miles Table, Rex 1516, Pumpkin, So Crepe

Everything we had at Miles table was amazing. Great food, great dessert, great atmosphere and on top of  it very affordable. A very pleasant surprise and great South Street addition - Miles Table, you are doing everything right.

Winner: Miles Table

#37 Saqqara Cafe - Sandy's synopsis

So resumes our journey on South Street east of Broad. Here is unchartered territory - an area I have ventured into very little and therefore do not know what to expect. Yes, yes, I suppose I could expect the unexpected, but that is very stupid advice. 

Our first stop is Saqqara cafe which I will admit I have never had a desire to go into. I don't do hookah and frankly, their menu didn't look the most appealing. However, this is why I love doing this blog because it makes me go and try places I wouldn't have otherwise. In this case, I was pleasantly surprised.

Saqqara cafe is a pretty small establishment with about 6-7 tables. 

A very kindly man greeted us when we entered and showed us to our table. Their menu is a mix of middle-eastern cuisine and american junk food, which was a little strange. I decided to stick with the middle eastern fare and ordered a turkish coffee to start and their chicken kebab platter as my entree.

First for the turkish coffee - it was quite the experience. When I ordered it, I was asked how sweet I wanted it. I like my coffee pretty damn sweet. When it arrived, it was poured into a cup and saucer from a steel  container with a spout, which I imagine was the container it was just brewed in. 

This coffee was amazing. Its flavour was unexpected. Yes, yes, I know what I said before. It was black coffee brewed with cardamom and it was delicious. That coffee already made my trip there worth it. 

As for the chicken kebabs, they came with rice, some vegetables.and a yoghurt based dipping sauce.

The kebabs were lightly spiced, but that doesn't mean it lacked flavour. It was good. What stole the show , however, was the rice. Buttery and salty perfection - if I could just order that rice I would. The kebabs didn't re-heat very well in my opinion and I do like my kebabs with more spices. I wouldn't go here for kebabs, for that I'd go to Kabobeesh. Sam's falafels looked very good however and that coffee really was delicious.

I have one more thing to mention. When we were eating a couple of patrons come in. The person who greeted us when we came in greeted them as well, but with hugs like they were friends. He then grabbed a chair and sat  and chatted with them while they smoked hookah. It was honestly pretty heart warming and spoke to how nice I thought he was at the beginning.

On that note, don't let outward appearances deter you from Saqqara cafe. If for nothing else, go there for the turkish coffee.

Saqqara Cafe

1356 South Street

Philadelphia PA 19147

215-735-0565

#37 Saqqara Cafe - Sam's synopsis

I had never heard of Saqqara Cafe before - Sandya kept pronouncing it like Sakura, which I think is actually pretty close, although the emphasis might be on a different syllable. Of course I think of my girl Cardcaptor Sakura when I hear that, but this is not a maid cafe. It is a hookah bar that also serves food. I think most patrons come here for the hookah, but since neither myself nor Sandya are all that into hookah, we just got food. It is also a BYOB, which we missed the memo on, so I'm pretty sure our server (who I think might also be the owner) was very confused as to why we were there, but he was still very friendly. 

The only thing I will say about the interior is that we were the only folks in there for awhile until a group of women came in who knew the owner/waiter so it was particularly quiet. I say this because the television screen above us was blaring middle eastern music at a volume too high for such a small customer base. Maybe they were expecting it to fill up and get noisy, in which case the volume would have been acceptable, but when there are only two other people in the restaurant, it could have been lowered quite a bit. Of course, I failed to mention this because I really hate being a jackass about things and it wasn't THAT annoying, just something noticeable throughout our meal.

Since we didn't BYO anything, I decided to splurge and order a chocolate milkshake. It did not disappoint, although it's hard to mess up a milkshake. Very nice and creamy, with some chocolate syrup on top. For dinner, I ordered the falafel platter, which came with pita, tabouli salad, hummus and rice. Let me say right off the bat that the rice was absolutely delicious. Cooked to perfection and it had a nice, buttery flavor. It was some of the best rice I've had in a long time. The falafel was very good, some of the better I've had in the city. The tabouli salad had too much parsley in it - I actually enjoy eating parsley even though it's more of a garnish, but this was a bit overpowering.


Overall I enjoyed my meal, especially the buttery rice, and I would probably order take-out from here if I were in a falafel mood, but otherwise I imagine that most people go here for the hookah and the food is there as an added bonus.

Saqqara Cafe
1356 South Street
Philadelphia, PA
(215) 735-0565

#36 Govinda's Vegetarian - Sandy's synopsis

Govinda's has been around for as long as I can remember and this is the first time I've been here. Boy was that a big mistake - for their sandwiches are amazingly tasty. 

Firstly, Govinda's is entirely vegetarian and so anything with meat on the menu is faux meat. They have an order at the counter find a seat and come when your name is called....system. There was probably a more succinct way of putting that. Anyhow, they take cards which is convenient and they have outdoor seating.

They have alot of vegetarian options on the menu and it was hard making a choice. I am however a sucker for burritos so I ordered the golden tofu burrito. Sam read my mind when it came to the pepper steak sandwich, so we decided to share those two. 

We were feeling particularly peckish that day and also ordered fries and samosa as accompaniments.

Pepper steak

Tofu burrito

I cannot tell you how satisfying this meal was. That pepper steak was cheesy and saucy and hit all of the spots. The tofu burrito was lightly spliced but perfectly tasty. The portions were big too so I had delicious leftovers for the next day. The fries were good too and it is hard to go wrong with samosas. There clearly is also a good variety of food from many different taste profiles, so definitely wouldn't mind going back to try something else.  

Honestly, I feel pretty stupid for not having been here before. I have no explanation or excuse. I know nothing Jon Snow. 

Hopefully I will rectify that in the future because Govinda's has delicious affordable vegetarian food that you should all try.

Govinda's Vegetarian

1400 South Street

Philadelphia PA19146

215-985-9303

#36 Govinda's Gourmet Vegetarian - Sam's synopsis

Broad Street!

It's admittedly been a few weeks since we visited Govinda's, but I still dream about the meal I got there. So you can already tell this review is off to a good start. Even more awesome, this was our last stop west of Broad! Block-wise, we are about halfway done, but restaurant-wise might be another story, since once we enter "historic" South Street, there are restaurants galore. But we shall persevere! And to all you nay-sayers out there, we will finish our epic quest.

doesn't it look cozy?

I had heard a lot about Govinda's - mostly that it's a great vegetarian spot in the city. We arrived and it wasn't too busy, a few tables eating and only one or two people ahead of us in line. The inside is interesting - the counter where you order is in one room, which is very much like your local, greasy pizza joint with a few tables, a view of the food prep station and an overall vibe of being a bit run-down but at the same time very welcoming. Somewhere you'd go to hang out when you had nothing better to do, or if you couldn't decide where you wanted to eat so you'd go to the local spot that you know is always consistent. The other dining area, which consisted of several tables, was decorated like a stripped down version of a fancy room in your grandmother's mansion-like home. And that's also not a bad thing. Are these descriptions even making any sense? They make total sense in my mind. Maybe I have a weird concept of reality. But hopefully someone out there can read that description and picture exactly what I mean in their mind. And if that's you, dear reader, maybe we should be best friends.

so delicious. wow.

Anyways, FOOD! Everything sounded appetizing, but since I've been on a gravy kick lately I decided to go for the vegetarian pepper steak hoagie with mozzarella and veggie gravy. We decided we'd each order a sandwich and have half, so Sandya ordered the Golden Tofu hoagie, which was stuffed with rice and curry sauce. The veggie gravy was heavenly. The sesame hoagie roll was of the highest quality. The soy pepper steak was so flavorful and had a great texture, I didn't even notice it was fake meat. And I don't even like steak. I would highly recommend this sandwich to anyone, vegetarian or not. You can even order vegan "cheese" if you want to go that route. After such tastiness, the Golden Tofu wrap was less impressive. It was still a solid meal, but not nearly as flavorful. I guess part of that is because we didn't get the spicy sauce on it because I am a wimp, but I don't think much can compete with gravy. Guys, gravy is really delicious. We also got an order of fries, which were fried to perfection but could have used a little more seasoning. I somehow ended up with a free samosa, because Sandya ordered one and I guess they thought I ordered one too or they were being nice. It was your standard samosa. I enjoyed eating it.

fried to perfection indeed.

Apparently Govinda's is well known for its faux hoagies - I can understand why. We didn't get the chicken cheesesteak one, but I would be willing to venture there again, to both try that and divulge in another pepper steak hoagie.

Now that we've completed the western part of our journey, stay tuned for a recap of west South Street, plus an entire week of daily posts as we take on a restaurant-a-day challenge for one week!

Govinda's Gourmet Vegetarian

1400 South Street

Philadelphia, PA

(215) 985-9303

#35 Sweet Freedom Bakery - Stephanie's synopsis

Hello, I’m Stephanie. I’m Sandy’s boo and this entry’s guest blogger. I’m also celiac afflicted and ergo, Sandy and Sam’s go to gluten free aficionado. I can’t tell you  all how excited I was for when these two gals finally reached this section of South Street. I could barely contain my jubilation and my inner fat kid when the time arrived to visit Sweet Freedom and EAT ALL THE SWEETS.

First of all, I don’t bake. I did before I was diagnosed with celiac’s, but I found baking anything gluten free to be terribly difficult and requiring a bunch of esoteric ingredients. So I’m very grateful that places like Sweet Freedom exist to provide easy to consume sweets for those that have a hard time making their own or finding them. Further props to Sweet Freedom because not only are their baked goods gluten free, but they are also free from a multitude of allergens, including eggs, dairy, corn, wheat, soy, casein, peanut, and refined sugar. I’ll confess, I’m not entirely sure what they make their food out of!

Upon arriving to Sweet Freedom, we ordered at least one of each type of sweet that they had (okay, I ordered them in my zealousness. Sandy and Sam were more than happy to get only one thing each). We ordered a fauxtess cupcake, tiramisu, a s'mores donut, a salted caramel cupcake, and two cake balls (one raspberry-flavored and one Samoa girl scout cookie-flavored). 

Fauxtess cupcake and the cake balls

Tiramisu

The group consensus was that the donut came out on top by a large margin. This was my first time having one of their donuts and I was impressed. I’m more partial to Okie Dokie donuts, but these guys were a good 2nd. As for everything else, I’d say it was pretty on par with what I hear about Sweet Freedom from most people. Their frosting is great, but the rest tastes like sweetened cardboard. Which is mostly what I’ve come to expect for most gluten free foods.

Salted caramel cupcake and s'mores donut

So here is where my review comes in as someone who has tried almost every gluten free product available under the sun. When you are forced to live on a restricted diet, these guys are pretty good, especially if you’re looking for something specialized like a birthday cake. But if you’re looking for something to fulfill your sweet tooth’s craving, there are many better options out there for gluten free treats alone. If you are looking to meet multiple dietary needs, say gluten free and vegan, then these guys are your best bet, and they do a really good job with such limitations. So I’d say they are not the best gluten free option in the city, but they are still a place I return to on occasion, when the sweet tooth demands it.

Sweet Freedom Bakery

1424 South Street

Philadelphia PA 19146

215-545-1899