Year in Review

We have almost been in Philadelphia a full year. Our anniversary is September 3rd and I have a lot to say about this city. When we first the first thing that caught our attention was all of the great food choices in the city. We could walk to almost all of them and they were definitely better than average.
We started out going to get coffee and use the internet at an independent coffee house a few blocks away called, “The Last drop”. It is a little art college coffee house that is pretty nice to surf and people watch in; for reading or relaxing we can go to “Chapter House” a chill lounge type coffee house where no one is cramped and the atmosphere is almost meditative. But these are only two of the many choices, there are so many independent coffee houses near us, there are probably fifteen within a half a mile of us, that we could go really go crazy on coffee. I really like the intactness of the small business culture in Philadelphia. Philadelphians take pride in supporting local and small businesses.
Another place that we went to early on is “Naked Chocolate Café” It is more of a chocolate shop than a café but it has a great vibe and it is always filled with people. They actually make the chocolate themselves not just a melt and repackage job like some other places. We went there a lot in the fall of last year to get drinking chocolate and pieces by the pound but then not so much after we learned to make chocolate bark ourselves, and Jeannie loaded up on Marie Belle. I would still recommend it to anyone who wants some good artisan chocolate.
We are also lucky to be just a few blocks from whole foods and a regular supermarket and we get a lot of our produce from the reading terminal Market which has some really great food stands in addition to having some really cheap produce markets. I love the Carrot, cucumber ginger juice from the “Four Seasons juice bar” and we also get some great bruchetta at Mezze. For some really great Indian/Pakistani food try Nanee’s kitchen, their Mango lassis are delicious.
Last fall was also a time of discovering neighborhoods and walking everywhere. On average we were walking more than three and probably closer to four miles a day. We are fortunate that there are so many picturesque and historic neighborhoods within walking distance. One of my favorites is the small street from South street to Walnut on Camac street. The street narrows to just a few feet across in parts and the houses are all historic and you feel like you are in another time and another country. They are mostly old brick row homes and many that are ivy covered with thickly painted shutters and old worn marble steps. Another nice walk is on Spruce between 15th and 22nd. It is lined with beautiful old Brownstones and actually looks a lot like some of the beautiful blocks in Brooklyn sans the hipsters and the strollers.
Come to think of it there were probably twenty restaurants that were critical to having us feel at home in Philadelphia. I will just list them here out of order and write about some of them later: Pico De Gallo – Mexican, Govindas- American Vegetarian, Morimoto- Sushi, Tiffin- Indian, Mixto-Latin, Pad Thai-Thai, Su Xing House- Chinese Vegetarian, Continental- Classic American, Tamarind- Thai, Horizons- Gourmet Vegan, Maoz- Falafel, Bitar’s-Falafel, Rustica- Pizza, Marathon Grill- American, Slice- Pizza, Shiao Lan Kung- Chinese, Rita’s -water ice, Capogiro- Gelato, Café Nhu Y- Banh Mi, Sabrina’s- Brunch, Morning Glory-Diner, Geechee Girl Café-Southern, Sarcone’s- Bakery, Grocery- Sandwhiches, Isgro’s- Bakery.
This may seem like a lot of places but I have only listed the places we thought were great to excellent. We have been to a lot more restaurants that were good or at least ok but the ones I listed have really helped take the sting off being away from New York.
On the home front the past year has gone by brutally fast and although we have done a lot to our house there is still so much more that we want to do. This year we put up a fence ourselves with the help of my Mom and Dad early on and then Omar and my sister as well on the second phase. We also started a garden which was a great experience. The garden was a huge success in the spring but the summer heat waves cut short the growing season of many of our lettuces and tomatoes. This week looks like it will be the last harvest of our tomatoes. In the spring we were having salads from the yard almost every night and harvesting mint, cilantro, rosemary and sage for many of our meals. It was a really great feeling to grow your own food and we definitely going to plant a fall crop this week. We hope to learn from all our previous mistakes. Inside we have done some decorating and furniture buying but we are still woefully behind with what we had hoped to have done by this time of the year. We did manage to redo the downstairs bathroom and we are happy about that. There are a lot of decisions to make when you decorate and it’s all a little overwhelming but I think our biggest obstacle is parting with furniture and stuff that is still perfectly good but we are not going to use anymore. Hopefully we can get better at that this year.
Another thing that has helped temper the home sickness for New York is all of the arts events that happen here. From the very beginning we have gone to the first Friday’s event that is sort of a monthly art crawl that coordinates many of the gallery show premiers of both local and famous artist. This event is one of my favorite things to do in Philly and it happens every first Friday of the month without fail. We get lots of free food and drink (the best being at the Old City Jewish Arts Center) while going from gallery to gallery and we go as often as we can. The theater scene is really strong here too and although we have not really taken advantage of it yet, now that Omar is living in Philly I am sure that will change. Our neighborhood is crawling with artists and art students so it’s really good not be around stuffy suit types or suburban blahs all the time. The art scene here is getting better every day too as more artists flee the high rents of DC and New York, to say nothing of the booming indy music scene so I have high hopes for Philly in the coming years.
It has really been a year of adjustment for us: Getting used to not taking the subway everyday, getting used to a less busy metropolis, getting used to having an upstairs and a downstairs, getting used to having a yard, getting used to being so close to everything cool, getting used to most things being closed on Sundays, getting used to having most of our friends two hours away, getting used to being two hours away from New York. Getting used to a lot of things, but also getting used to not worrying about our future so much.
Overall though I would say our transplantation to Philly was a success. We are happy and living in a beautiful house that we can actually afford and finding new things to love about this sorely underrated city every day.