We left the house at 11am Saturday and we cracked beers as we got on the highway. My dad was driving so of course he wasn't participating in the alcohol consumption. We hit Chris D's place in Elkton and did a round of jager bombs.
We got back on the road and cracked another beer. I hadn't eaten anything yet so the alcohol hit me right away and I was borderline drunk when we rolled into Philly. The original plan was for everyone to meet at Tony Luke's so we could all get sandwiches but I read from multiple sources that Tommy DiNic's in the Reading Terminal Market had a better roast pork italian. Since the only RPI I had ever had was at Tony Luke's I decided to check it out to have something to base a comparison on. We met at the hotel--we stayed at the Holiday Inn Express on Walnut St.--and walked over to the market.
This place was insane. I've been to Cross Street Market in Baltimore and this was like that on crack. There were vendors of every kind and it was packed with a busy Saturday lunch crowd. We made our way through the masses and found the glowing beacon signaling we had arrived:
I knew exactly what we were going to order. Right before I left for the trip I read a blog entry that dissuaded readers from ordering the roast pork in favor of the pulled pork with greens. So I ordered the usual roast pork italian with rabe and provolone and had Chris D. order the italian pulled pork with spinach and provolone.
Luckily a table opened up so while everyone else ordered and paid I nabbed the table for us. I didn't wait for them, I ravenously dove in for my first bite... and was met with utter blandness and disappointment. Juices literally poured out of the bottom of the sandwich upon biting in. The pooled on the table. One would think this would be a good thing but it left the meat dry. And desperately needing salt. This pork honestly didn't taste like much of a step up from roasted pork you would find in a supermarket deli. The roll was chewy. I thought to myself "So-so bread in Philadelphia?? How is that even possible? Philly bread is usually awesome..." The rabe was nice and bitter but other than that it lacked seasoning. But the biggest slap in the face of them all was I couldn't taste the cheese. At all. I turned to Chris D. and told him they forgot my cheese but then he pointed it out layering the bottom of the sandwich.
To me, the creaminess of the cheese and the perfect crusty roll to contain all of the meat juices is what makes Tony Luke's RPI great, and they were both sub-par in DiNic's version. I didn't even finish it and unless it's severely detrimental to my well-being, I ALWAYS clean my plate. My bachelor weekend feasting began with a pretty big disappointment. Luckily I still had the italian pulled pork to try.
Now THIS was more like it. Right off the bat my tongue is singing with flavor. There's so much garlic on the spinach that it burned my tastebuds. The strange thing is after looking at the pictures, you can actually see chunks of garlic in the rabe but not with the spinach. Odd indeed. Anyway, I could most certainly taste the cheese which made me consider the possibility that maybe I got slighted on the RPI. The harmony of the pulled pork along with the garlicy spinach really made a powerful flavor punch. Unfortunately, the bread was still chewy and the juices still sluiced out of the sandwich, but all-in-all this was a MUCH better sandwich. I finished every crumb of this half. Jeffroy got the pulled pork with peppers, but he wolfed it down so fast and I was so over-stimulated with everything going on, I forgot to ask about it. But here's a pretty picture:
Satisfied we decided to walk around a bit while the rest of our crew finished their lunch. Andy, Zack, and Chris M. got cheesesteaks and my brother the vegetarian got a crabcake. I didn't ask about them, I had another destination to hit before we left. I read on another blog post about Fair Food Farmstand and their Blue Sue Dark Chocolate Fudge. This was fudge with bits of blue cheese in it. I was very interested in trying this enticing combination. We had to ask a guide person to direct us to their stand. Once we found it I happily approached the counter and asked if they had some. They said they were all out. Damn. All-in-all this wasn't going very well. Meanwhile my dad had gotten in line at the Famous 4th Street Cookie and moments later had a bag in his hand and a devilish smile on his face. He reached in and started munching as we walked. He handed me a hunk of cookie and told me to try it. It was a chocolate covered chocolate chip cookie. The coating reminded me of the chocolate dipped cones at the Arctic Circle on Rte. 22 in Churchville. It was very good, but I don't think I could eat an entire cookie. It was coma-inducing.
We returned to gather up the rest of our bunch and headed over to the hotel to check in at 3pm. Our rooms weren't quite ready yet so we congregated in the lobby and tried not to get kicked out. Chris couldn't wait till we got our rooms so he cracked a beer in the lobby while simultaneously undressing me with his eyes:
We finally got our rooms and congregated into one to commence the insanity. I didn’t realize we would be pre-gaming in the hotel room so the beers we brought along for the ride were gone within minutes. Luckily my dad always packs his gin & tonic so he started dishing them out to all comers. We set up another round of jagerbombs and phase two had begun. We hung out in the room drinking and enjoying the time with a pocket breathalyzer. Apparently if you take a huge swig of alcohol and immediately blow into it you can overload it thereby making it flash H, which we figured meant hospital. I think by the time we left about an hour later the highest true score was .17, double the legal driving limit here in Maryland. Not too bad. Since the real bar we wanted to go to didn’t open until 5pm, we headed to a place called Fergie which we passed on our way into town.
This was your typical Irish pub except that there was a live fiddle band playing at a table in the corner, which was pretty awesome. I was definitely in an adventurous mood, so I was checking what was on tap when my brother suggested carbombs and I emphatically concurred. The bartender replied “We don’t do carbombs.” Ummm, wait, an Irish pub that doesn’t do carbombs? What the hell was going on here? I just shrugged in bewilderment and ordered the first thing I saw that didn’t say IPA on the tap. It was called Colonel Blide's (after going to the website to refresh my memory on what it was called, I see it says Colonel Blide's Bitter... That explains a lot) and it was barely drinkable. I will never understand how people derive pleasure from drinking these hoppy bitter concoctions. They’re what I would imagine poison tastes like. Ugh.
From left to right that's dad, Zack, Andy, me, my brother Ryan, Chris M., George, Chris D., and Jeffroy.
After asking what everyone else was drinking and seeing Guinness and woodchuck I kicked myself for having forgotten how much I love snakebites, which is a drink that is one part cider to two parts Guinness where I come from. And its delicious. The alert went out that we needed to down our beers and head to our next destination and I just couldn't. I left my first beer of Philly mostly undrunk. Blah, not a good way to start the night.
We arrived at Apothecary right at 5pm so we were the first ones there and the hostess had to unlock the doors for us. The theme of this place was awesome. Probably the coolest bar decor I've come across. It was like a hospital mixed with a mad scientist lab. In other words, like an apothecary. We were kind of dumb-founded as to what to order since the selection was nothing close to what they listed on the website. I think they only had 5 cocktails to choose from and the Recession menu was only available during the week, also not mentioned on the website. Bah. The waitress explained that the first price was for a glass and the second price was for a bottle. We ordered a bottle of Booty Collins after she said it was their most popular. Chris M. also ordered a French Buck.
The presentation was awesome. The bottle came out in a bucket of ice and was served in prepared glasses with ice, brandied cherries, and an orange slice. Once we poured our drinks she handed us a flask of club soda which we were to splash on top. I transitioned nicely into the role of mad scientist concocting an otherwordly elixir, demonstrated here:
The drink tasted like a glorified mimosa, which isn't necessarily a bad thing. The best part for me was the late burn in the throat from the cayenne. The brandied cheeries were like little wonderful explosions of alcohol. Next time I'll order a bowl of those on the side.
Unfortunately, I didn't get a picture of the French Buck but I wish I had because it was very pretty. Upon sampling that beverage I immediately wished I had ordered that. I'm not a fan of black licorice flavor, actually I hate it, but I felt this concoction was a bit more forgiving and didn't assault the senses as much as straight up absinthe or jager.
As the bottle went around and we started getting comfortable we noticed some pretty awesome artwork. Behind me was a goat and sheep in suits drinking over-sized martinis:
And of course I had to get a picture posing with the poster advertising the very beverage we were currently imbibing:
The silhouette in the photo kinda looked like me too, bonus! I think I will end this post here for our next destination was dinner at Morimoto which will be quite long indeed. Chew on this for now, more to come soon.
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