Rossi's

I've never lost a battle to a burger until I ordered the Rossi burger. I was fully unprepared for this massive slab of delicious meat. Hamburger America led me to Rossi's for this famed Rossi burger.

Cheeseburgers are $6 and can be topped with a bunch of different options. I was out with Dan. Mine: Lettuce, Tomato, fried onions and American cheese cooked medium rare. Dan: Raw onion and American, also medium rare. The burger comes out on a large white roll, but the bread still can't contain the meat. As I bit into it, the juices began to flow. It was delicious meat and cooked as I ordered. Half way though my burger, it was a mess that's falling apart, and I had a big smile on my face.
We also ordered steak fries and fried zucchini. The fries were standard, and the fried zucchini was a huge order of a surprisingly tasty app. But we should have skipped these and focused on the burger; it was a lot of food.

Beer is pretty standard and nothing special. There are five or so taps; Stella, Yeungling, Miller Lite, Bud, Heineken were all represented, if I remember correctly. $5 for a pint of Stella isn't bad at all.

Most of the reviews on Yelp for Rossi's are silly. If you read most of them, most of the write-ups are about soda and topping prices. If you don't like that, don't get soda. And even with four or five toppings, the burger prices are still below average.

The bartender was nice and attentive, and even warned us that the kitchen was going to be closing down early so that we had enough time to get our order in. He was a fun guy. This place has a weird, but hometown atmosphere.

Bottom Line: The hours of 5-10pm 6 days a week are a downside. This place is still awesome, and completely worth the drive from Philly to try out this burger, which is surely a challenge to finish. I'm looking forward to my next attempt.

Xochitl

Xochitl was my second pick for restaurant week. I don't know why, but this place has been on my list for well over a year. I met up with my good friend Quinn for a Friday night dinner. The menu was exciting, three course plus house made guacamole.

For starters, the drink menu here is decent. There's a large list of house cocktails, a small wine list (36-42 per bottle) and a small, but decent beer list. Drafts are Negro Modello, Dos Eqius Amber and Lager, and Victory Prima Pils and they're all $5.

Throughout the night, our service was just okay, but not what I'd expect of a restaurant this caliber. The one high point of the night though, is when a drink was spilled on our table, someone (the hostess, I think) came over within a minute to help clean up the small mess.

After we ordered our drinks, someone came over and made our order of guacamole table-side. He used a fresh avocado and then asked what we wanted to be added in. We had him add everything, onions, cilantro, some spices, and a few others that I forget. It was good, but certainly not the best I've had.

We split the two appetizers The "Cazuela de chorizo y papas" (casserole of chorizo, potatoes, and kale" sounded really excited but in reality was pretty bland. There's a lot of potential with these ingredients. The same can be said for our other app, the civiche.

The first main was pork tenderloin with Brussel sprouts and turnups. It was a little overdone for my taste, but Quinn really liked it. This dish was decent. Our other main was head on shrimp, and I liked this, but it still lacked a distinct flavor.

Dessert was my favorite part of the meal. I ordered churros and hot chocolate. The churcos were sweet and had a perfect texture. Dipping them in the chocolate was fantastic. Quinn ordered a coconut and quince pie. She liked it a lot, I thought it was okay, but I don't often go for coconut desserts.

Bottom Line: The whole night was good, but not remarkable. I'd rather go to a hole-in-the-wall Mexican place than a fancy one, and I don't even think Xochitl is doing the best Mexican. Still, if you find yourself here, you won't be disappointed.

Buddakan

Buddakan is the quintessential Steven Starr restaurant. The food is goodish, and the atmosphere is great. The price is more than it should be, especially for drinks, but the majority of your money is going to decor and ambiance.

Nonetheless, I have been looking forward to dining here for a while. I was treating myself, and really wanted to enjoy the whole experience. I made my way to the bar and ordered a cocktail, awakening. It was made with Jose Cuervo, a thai chili, and pineapple juice, and was well made. Still, cocktails here are 10-13, plus tax and tip, which seems to be a bit much. There are some decent beer options available, I remember 60 IPA being $6. I was out with my friend Lena, and once I got to the table I split a pitcher of sangria, which was good an lasted the whole meal. Our server was attentive about filling up our glasses through out the night.

The service over all is good here. All of the dishes come out with good timing and are set in the middle for sharing. For starters we ordered the Kobe beef skewers and dumplings. Both of these were fine, nothing amazing, didn't have incredible flavor. My favorite part of the whole meal was my entree. I ordered the sea bass; it had great flavor, and was served with butternut squash. Lena ordered the Asian Pork BBQ, which was served medium rare and was good. The BBQ flavor was light but tasty. The weird thing about this dish was it was served with huge onion rings, and they seemed out of place.

For dessert we both went with a dish called Crying Chocolate. It was a small lava cake served with a dollop of Vietnamese coffee ice cream. We both really liked the dessert, Lena said the ice cream had a really authentic flavor; it was strong. I liked the cake a lot and it was a great way to finish out dinner.

Bottom Line: Service is decent, and atmosphere is great. The food isn't going to amaze you, but like all Starr restaurants, it's a nice experience.

White Manna

I love history. I also love good food. And burgers....and when all three can be worked into one, well, I'm pretty excited. The book Hamburger America again shed light on the amazing White Manna location in Hackensack, NJ.

I almost couldn't believe the place when I saw it from my car. It's a tiny building, maybe around 600 sq ft. When you walk in there door, there is a griddle in the center of the room fenced off by a counter. At max capacity, you can't fit more than maybe fifteen people. There are two employees, the grill man, and another person taking care of fries, drinks, and the register. To order, you must wait until the grill man makes eye contact with you, and then, you tell him your order. The menu is small, but that doesn't matter, because the look no further than the double cheeseburger.

When you order you double cheeseburger, the grill man will take two small wads of meat and flatten them on the griddle. He'll top it with american cheese and onions. And then you'll see his meticulous work while he manages the griddle filled with upwards of twenty burgers. The bun is set on top to steam and soak up the grease and onion flavor. And once it's cooked, he expertly slides the spatula under the patty, grabs half the bun, and uses the bun to pull the whole thing off the spatula. The result is a messy, gooey concoction of beef, onions and cheese. It doesn't look pretty, but it tastes amazing. Pickles, mustard, and ketchup are on the side, and like traditional cheeseburgers, this tastes best with pickles and mustard. The double cheeseburger is highly recommended as it offers the perfect bun-cheese-meat ratio.

The decor is also great. The joint was designed after the 1939 World's Fair Diner of the Future, and it doesn't look like much has changed since then. Everyone converges here, from travellers, to business men, to highschoolers. It's fun.

Bottom Line: Eating at White Manna is an experience. From the ordering, to cooking, to decor, this place stands out. And to top it off, you're going to have some of the best cheeseburgers you will ever eat.

Fork and Barrel

There are two reasons to go to Fork and Barrel: beer and atmosphere. With how well they present these two things, it's no surprise that Fork and Barrel are opening a location in Center City. It will thrive.

I must talk about beer first. The selection here in amazing. They have stuff that is just so rare, unique, and unavailable. Flights are $16 and come with five 5.5 oz pours, which for the quality of beer is an excellent deal.

I'm going to talk about all the beers I drank, and I expect most people to completely skip this paragraph. I'm not going to go into much detail, because we tried a lot of different beers. Gaspar Ale Picobrouwerij Alvinne was a Belgian IPA, finished too dry and sour. Didn't enjoy this one. Porterhouse Oyster Stout was on Nitro and was great. It was thick and incredibly flavorful, almost a dessert beer. Oyster flavor wasn't strong however. Wintercoat Cockney Imperial Stout was probably my favorite of the night, this Danish stout was strong and was so flavorful and smooth. 't browkot Netebuk was a smooth Belgian ale, we ordered this one twice. It's what Six Point Sweet Action wants to be. Schlenkerla Helles was a standard but delicious Helles lager. Gasser Huppendorfer Vollbier was on gravity tap and had a great thick, smokey flavor.

I was out with Rachel. For dinner, she had the lamb burger, and I had the duck confit. All of the entrees here are pretty small, but flavorful. The sandwiches were served on rectangular pieces of slate with small sides of coleslaw. We also ordered salt potatoes, which were small red potatoes covered with kosher salt. They were okay, I'm sure another side would have been more satisfying. The dishes here are small, but not too small. To finish the meal, we had the cranberry crisp for dessert. This was incredibly tart, and didn't taste much like a dessert at all. We both concluded that it needed more sugar and didn't finish it.

The service here wasn't great the night when we dined. Empty plates and dishes stayed on our table for a while. Our server seemed to have too many tables for her to handle. The decor is the downstairs is beautiful, it's entirely lit by candlelight, and they have a whole wall of beer bottles boasting some of the best and most rare beers in the world. There's hundreds. It's almost like eating in the most beautiful museum on beer you're likely to ever see. I didn't go upstairs, but they focus on American craft beer there, while downstairs is focused on the imports.
Bottom Line: Despite everything, we had a great night. Fork and Barrel has incredible beer selection, and the prices are pretty good too. Food is missable, but it's got to be one of the best spots in East Falls.

Bridgid's

Almost 3 years had lapsed between meals at Bridgid's. I remember really liking this spot, but honestly, my standards have gone up since my last visit here. I was under the impression that it was a Belgain joint, but they only had one Belgain on tap. The beer list here is solid, but not stellar. They're all $5 or $6.

As far as a bar goes, they do offer two unique things. First, although small, the U shaped bar is great. Many bars could take cues on how to effectively use a small space. Secondly, the gravity tap is great. When I visited with Dan they had Yard's ESA on. The gravity tap comes from the uninsulated attic. The winter air chills the beer and the gravity forces out through the tap. The result is a beer that has the mouth feel of a beer engine and the temperature of a keg. It made the ESA even better.

I ordered the burger, and this came stuffed with bacon, bleu cheese and onions. It sounded good, but in reality, its a disaster. The burger came out pretty well done, which it needed to be to hold all of the ingredients together. The flavors tripping over each other, and the distribution of the filling was all wrong; they all were concentrated at the center and the edges of the burger were woefully plain. That being said, they do serve the most perfectly crispy fries. They're truly excellent.

Bottom Line: This spot didn't live up to my memory. That said, I still think it's one of, if not the, best in Fairmount. I like the gravity tap, but if you're going to dine here I recommend it for dinner rather than lunch. I still am planning on going back in the near future.

Devil's Den

Last time I went to Devil's Den I remember horrible service, okay food and 3 lines tapped with no replacements in sight. My last visit, however, was much improved. This place first landed on my radar for the happy hour. M-F 5-7 gets you half priced drinks. And that's on top of the already reasonable prices. For beer selection, Devil's Den doesn't disappoint. Even though I don't go often, they always have something new for me to try, and I really appreciate that.

The decor here is great, I really like this place and it has a great long wooden bar. There are a few large screen TVs. I went here to watch a hockey game, and while there was music playing all night, the bartender turned up the TV's audio all the way so I could here the game a little bit. The service here does need some work. Everyone just seems to be moving on a slower pace, but it wasn't horrible.

I like the menu here. Dan ordered a raw meat platter and he enjoyed that. It had a lot of interesting different pairings, and the only complaint would be that it wasn't very filling for $15. I ordered the burger, my standard go-to. I ordered a cheeseburger, but it came out without my cheese. It was a few minutes before I could even get the bartender's attention to get it fixed, but I got a free beer for the ordeal. No harm, ho foul. There was harm in how it was cooked. I ordered medium rare, and it wasn't even close. No part of the inside of my burger was pink. The bread is great, the fries are good, and its served with a great aioli. If it came out with my cheese and cooked to order, I would be pretty satisfied. I was also out with Quinn, who is a lover of well done burgers, and she was still talking about it a few days later. I'm definitely willing to give it another go.

Bottom Line: They have a great happy hour here, good beer selection, and reasonable prices. It's not amazing, but Devil's Den is a welcomed retreat, especially in winter when you cozy up next to the fireplace, which brings the whole place up a notch on a blustery evening.