Steven F.'s Profile

For a neighborhood full of Italian restaurants, this one is not terrible but should not be your first stop.

Repeatedly walked by this restaurant, first time trying.  The decor looked like a mid-western high schooler's interpretation of Italian culture.  Colors more fitting a tex-mex restaurant and the ceiling beams are just stained 2x4s bolted to the drywall above.  Place is BYOB: not a problem and wine service was handled well enough.  In fact, the service was the exceptional part of the evening - two staff taking turns on each table, very polite & knowledgeable, and waters were refilled as frequently as done Chinese restaurants.

Whomever has been saying only $$ hasn't been in lately.  Even with a restaurant dot com coupon, we dropped over $100 for 2 despite sharing a pasta course.

Their menu and evening's specials provided a decent selection of antipasti, primi, and secondi.  However, while the food was tasty enough it was not impressive.  The gnocchi was overdone - dry, chewy, and crusted on the outside.  The homemade fettuccine & duck ragout was mealy and bland.  My secondo's sauce on the fish tasted old and stale, and the roasted potatoes didn't even hold a candle to a diner's potatoes, let alone something for dinner.  My partner's mashed potatoes were much better.  However, her veal wasn't tender as veal usually is.  Finally, deserts were ok; the homemade creme brulee cheesecake and limoncello-marscapone cake were tasty but more sweet than complex.

In a suburb, this place would do well against the Carrabas & Macaroni Grills.  However, in south Philly, there are too many good italian restaurants (even within a few blocks of this one) for Da Vinci's to stand out.

Best pizza in the city?  I invite Alan K to explore downtown & south philly a little more.  But best city on the block or in the area about CCP/Broad & Spring Garden?  Certainly.

I haven't tried any made-to-order yet, just a few occasions of slices  & garlic knots to go.  Their dough is perfect - crusty on the outside and done-yet-chewy on the inside.  It isn't herbed but is subtly flavored with olive oil.  Their sauce is tasty and slightly sweet, nowhere near the liquid candy served on Papa John's.  Other than their margherita slices, their stock moz was ordinary but not chalky and oily (I'm looking at the other 3 pizzerias on spring between 15th & 16th.

Their toppings seem fresh and the slices to go don't taste like they've camped out all day.  Certainly, they're benefiting from the curious checking out a new place for quick product turnover.  But if they keep up this quality, they'll keep the crowd in.  Hopefully their brick ovens will get well-seasoned in the coming years and take their good product to

Oh, I can't forget to mention the bangin' garlic knots.

Their prices are much higher than the other nearby pizzerias, but commensurate with the quality difference.

A shining star in the neighborhood, and a blessing that Philadelphia has such a collective present.

I've participated in the adult bike church evenings - buying a donated bike and getting volunteer assistance in fixing it up.  I'm mechanically inclined & reasonably good with tools, but I'm just unfamiliar with bike maintenance enough that I needed some direction on what needed fixing & how the fixed item should appear.

Their adult sessions are free - they only insist you be willing to pick up a clean-up chore at the end of the event.  They ask for donations, but are not in-your-face with the request.

NBW purposely does not sell new bikes or parts, in order to avoid competition with the local bike shops.  I think this is a well-reasoned and appropriate stance.  They do sell used parts of almost every variety, and are pretty generous with consumables like oil, nuts, bolts, & pumice soap.

Like any volunteer-run workshop, the demand can be heavy for volunteer time.  Fortunately, the workshop works very well for people like me who need occasional direction or guidance but can do most of the tool-jockeying himself.  Saving money on the repair and gaining some insight on bike repair are purposeful benefits that resonate very well with me.

I didn't find any of the elitism or hipster indifference that some of the other reviewers found, and I've chatted with the director& many of the facilitators/volunteers.  Either they read Yelp & shaped up, or those incidents have been isolated.  To a person, each facilitator was friendly, chatty, & helpful - but on their feet & making a point to help everyone stay moving forward.

For speedy professional service, high quality parts, fly aluminum or carbon fiber bicycles, and guaranteed repairs - NBW is unabashedly not the place.  Go to a bike shop for those things - I suggest A Trophy Bike Garage in NoLibs or Bustleton Bikes in the Northeast.  For inexpensive parts, a huge selection of inexpensive used bikes, the opportunity to improve your own skills for cheap, and of course to further their main mission of getting kids into bicycling, NBW does a fantastic job.

Restaurant week - either an unfair time or a pointedly fair time to review.  I say the latter - this is supposed to be the restaurant putting its best foot forward to draw me back for higher-margin meals.

Food delivered - excellent mix of flavors without being overwhelming.  Desserts were fantastic & just the right size.  If the rest were as good as the food I'd be hard pressed to decide between 4 & 5.

Margarita mix - tasty enough.  I like having a bartender to mix the right amount of tequila into the pitcher - I'd appreciate it better if the servers were trained on how to pour the customer's liquor properly.  Beverage service - functional but hurried (see below).

Service - The whole time i felt as if the staff were treating Restaurant Week guests like a burden rather than a boon.  All of the staff seemed annoyed at something and were all in a hurry, yet service kept getting hung up by long waits.  We also had to ask the manager to allow us to enter drinks & an appetizer before the rest of our guests arrived - to counter a rule that the entire order had to be entered at once.  With a fixed menu, the FOTH & BOTH should have an easier job; concocting a silly one-time rule like 'whole order at once' is unnecessary and speaks of a poorly-prepared staff.  Plus, with a fixed menu who wouldn't want to upsell drinks & apps?

Come back, but make it on Mon-Thurs and definitely not on restaurant week.

It's hard to find fault with this place - so popular they run out of seating?  Middle of downtown, so parking is limited?  Immediately upon walking in, one is reminded bakery is before cafe in their name - waiting to greet are 3 glass cases of pastries, breads, & desserts which look & smell delicious.

There's only seating for about a dozen couples, but the waitresses & counterstaff were very attentive at making our wait pleasant by pre-gaming us with pastries & drinks (not free, unfortunately).  The menu is a printed two-sided page and appears to change every few days.  The food is a normal mix of good brunch savories & sweets - the typically modern version of diner fare.  I ordered french toast with a sour cherry sauce, pecans, and whipped Mascarpone, my partner ordered an egg/muenster/salsa sandwich.  Both came out quite good.  Service was competent & friendly, and our bill was handled quickly.

My only complaint is the price - $42 for two after tip is a lot for brunch, although that price range is becoming depressingly more common.  Careful eaters can get out closer to $30.  This place is among the top search results of Brunch in Seattle, Wa for plenty of reasons, and I'm glad I validated 'em for myself.

The way a corner pizza & sandwich shop should be.

This place gets much less foot traffic than deserved, since there are two other pizza & sandwich shops around the corner facing Spring Garden.

Short line: great hoagies & grinders, awesome pizza, and plenty of dollar beverages.  Takes Visa for a single sandwich without complaint!  Eat there if you have a newspaper or nowhere else to go, otherwise take out.

Quite lovely.

Nearly empty on a Saturday evening, although it could've been hurricane Hanna's driving rain keeping the crowd out (they didn't dare stop us dripping on the carpet).  The service is efficient but a little creepy, with a bunch of bored waiters watching us from relatively close - we couldn't have stolen any plans or silverware under such tight surveillance.

One of my party wanted Paneer Tiki Masala - both Paneer & Tiki Masala are on the menu but not together as a single dish.  The waiter took a little while to understand she was requesting a custom item, and that the other entree was a backup request in case the chef wasn't willing (he wasn't).

The food was quite good - probably the best sit-down Indian I've had in Philadelphia.  My white-boy taste buds were quite sassified.  I'm a regular fan of Tiffin, their mint chutney is second to none.  However, KoT nudges them out on everything else.  The Nann, samosas, vegetarian entrees, and rice pudding were all phenomenal.  The Chicken Vindalu (spelling?) was incredibly spicy but quite flavorful.

I'll be going back, and sucking up spending more than $10 for lunch regularly.

This is a place for special occasions that are special for their own sake, not due to the location.  By that, I mean the decor is charming and non-intrusive - the place feels like it could be a 100 yr old tavern that's family friendly.  The food is flavorful and filling, seasoned simply but sufficiently.  The service is friendly, efficient, and unobtrusive.

We made reservations for early Saturday evening, though they proved unnecessary.  To hammer home the point of casualness, they use paper napkins, uncork away from the table (no corking fee!), and give you small tumblers for drinking your wine that look like they're supposed to be for orange juice at a diner.

Get the white bean soup, and get a bowl - you'll almost order a second bowl and make it your meal.  Skip the mushrooms appetizer - they're sliced and sauteed in white wine but served cold with dry orgeano on it.  They're flavorful, but somewhat unappetizing served as such.  The bread is tasty, chewy on the inside and crusty on the outside.  They're generous with extra bread.  Our meals were heaped in bowls other restaurants use for salad - leaving a portion that's very filling but not large enough to warrant leftovers.  As said before, their sauces are not complex but still flavorful, pastas cooked properly and seemingly fresh, and calamari at exactly the right texture.  We got out of there at just under $50 after tip.

The proprietor did visit our table briefly, he was accommodating and charming as previous folks have said, although he only stayed briefly.

Get there early or bring a book and wait a short while.  I got there early, we were seated immediately.  The place looks great, the appearance is a good fit in the bella vista area.  The waiters were efficient, friendly, and just noticeably busy enough.

The food is in line with other good philly brunch fare - large but deliciously detailed egg dishes, fun sweet dishes, and nifty juices.  We had ginger lemonade, challah french toast with mango & banana, and breakfast pizza.  They aren't the best brunch I've had, but they're what I expect out of a good philly brunch.

I agree with the previous poster's complaints regarding tin cups for coffee - one shouldn't have to burn their lips when trying to burn their throat.  I disagree about the ketchup though - yes it's homemade and yes it tastes nothing like heinz (more like a cross between barbecue sauce and marinara).  But what are you doing with ketchup anyway?  Good brunches don't need to be slathered in ketchup, but a little hot sauce never hurt.  There's also strawberry jam at the table - I don't know if it's homemade but it went really good on the french toast (and plain by the spoonful).

The ladie & I were out of there for just over $20 before tip.  Slightly more expensive than a diner but a good deal for brunch.  If you're in the area and you already tried Carman's recently, go get your Glory on.