Ah, to be transported to Greece for an evening - South Street Souvlaki attempts to do this and since I haven't been to Greece, I cannot tell you if they succeeded. I can tell you, based on their website, that the owner Tom Vasiliades, is a charismatic man, who seems passionate about his restaurant. (Their old website had more direct quotes from him that made this more apparent. I was slightly disappointed to see that their newly re-vamped website removed most of his words.)
Coming out of the virtual world and onto their doorstep you are first greeted by music, I'm assuming it is greek music? Once inside, you are greeted by the bar.
It was a very striking sight to me and I loved the lights strung up top highlighting its presence. We somehow fought it's sirens' call and didn't order any alcohol, but I would be interested to give into it on a different day. Speaking of greek mythology, if you are seated on a table next to the wall, you will be surrounded by dramatic paintings from greek myth - something to peruse while you wait for your food.
Sam and I took sometime to look over the menu. Be warned, it is very extensive and the choice can be overwhelming. I am personally a "sucker" for octopus (see what I did there...) so I ordered the charcoal broiled octopus as an appetizer. We also got some houmus to start.
The octopus was delicious, with a few nice crispy burnt bits complemented by some very tender meat. The houmus with pita was fantastic as well and so we were off to a brilliant start, like Odysseus, assuming a pleasant and delicious journey home to Ithaca (or our main course) ahead.
Well, turns out I had angered the food gods again, for I did not enjoy what I had ordered for the main course. I know Sam had much better luck so be sure to read her review. I tasted some of what she ordered and it was very good.
Back to my poor choices, I decided to go with the Greek trio for my entree. The trio consists of moussaka. pastitsio and spinach pie. Now, two of those dishes are very similar and contain a lot of ground meat. From their menu, pastitsio is "ground meat with macaroni in a bechamel sauce" and moussaka is "ground meat with layers of potato and eggplant under our bechamel sauce".
I am also not a fan of ground meat, but for some reason thought this would be the dish I should order.
There you have it, Clotho, Lachesis and Atropos, waiting to screw me over. My biggest complaint about the trio was that it was bland. Even the spinach pie fell flat and I was fighting to secure some taste on my tongue that wasn't just white flour sauce. I prefer my ground meat to have some other flavour than just the meat. I don't want to fault the restaurant on this. I know I have a particular taste when it comes to meat and perhaps this is exactly how most people like their pastitsio. It just wasn't for me.
In conclusion, I might come back here to order something else. Perhaps give those kebabs a shot and definitely get some of the vegetarian dishes Sam got. For now, my main course left no taste in my mouth and I left disappointed.
South Street Souvlaki
509 South Street
Philadelphia PA 19147
215-925-3026
No comments:
Post a Comment