All the End-of-Year Restaurant Openings You Need to Know About

Loretta’s bagel sandwich / Photograph courtesy of Loretta’s

Howdy, buckaroos! And welcome back to the weekly Foobooz food news round-up. I know it’s Thanksgiving week, and a lot of you out there have more important things to worry about than who has a new restaurant opening (Liz Grothe, Jesse Ito, Lauren Biederman, and others), who has a seven-chef collaboration dinner coming up (Cantina La Martina), or where to get a killer new cheesesteak (Reading Terminal Market). So let’s just keep this brief so we can all get back to brining the turkey, untangling the Christmas lights, resenting our in-laws, watching Home For The Holidays for the 100th time, or whatever else it is you do to make it over this first hurdle of the holiday season. We’ll kick things off this week with this …

Wait, What Do You Mean Jesse, Liz, Lauren (and Others) Have New Restaurants Opening?

Yeah, last week was a big week for opening announcements. Everyone wanted to get it out of the way before their momentous news got lost in the hubbub of theme dinners, office parties, and holiday bar crawls. So we had details from several big operators that we covered right here on Le ‘Booz, but all of them are worth mentioning again, just in case you missed ’em.

First, we had a wealth of details from Maddy Sweitzer-Lamme on the imminent opening of Liz Grothe’s first permanent restaurant, Scampi. After years of operating a kind of rolling, semi-private dinner party out of her apartment, after years of pop-ups and nostalgic/nerdy collaborations, Grothe announced a few months back that she’d finally picked up a permanent space and would be turning it into a restaurant celebrating both the cuisine of the Italian diaspora and whatever weird, hyper-specific obsessions with Midwestern chain restaurants or suburban comfort foods happened to be knocking around in her head. The space she picked? The old Neighborhood Ramen spot at 617 South 3rd Street in Queen Village — all of which we talked about back when I first wrote about Grothe’s big jump.

But now we know a few more things, too. Like how the menu is going to be a $115 all-inclusive prix-fixe, covering five courses, with two seatings a night — at 5:30 p.m. and 8:15 p.m. And what, exactly, she’s going to be cooking: “It’s regional Italian food with influences from everywhere Italians have gone,” Grothe told Maddy. With a spike of her own tastes and sense of humor. Think culurgiones stuffed with trout sitting in sour cream and topped with trout roe, sure. But also a classic tiramisu topped with Frosted Flakes.

And Scampi is going to be hitting the scene soon, too. Opening night is December 4th, and reservations are available right now.

Anyway, Maddy has a lot of details (including where the name came from). And you can read all about it right here.

Photograph courtesy of dancerobot

Next, I got the first details on Jesse Ito’s new restaurant, which we’re all going to have to wait a little bit longer for.

He’s calling the place dancerobot (which I love), and it’s going to be an ’80s-inspired Japanese izakaya focusing on traditional and modern Japanese bar food, Japanese-American comfort food, and brunch — which is a huge departure from the works he’s been doing for the past several years at Royal Sushi & Izakaya, but does give him the chance to make Japanese pancakes and homemade milk-bread toasts, so it’s pretty much win-win for everybody.

Dancerobot will be opening in the old Foodery space at 1710 Sansom Street with Ito’s long-time right-hand man, Justin Bacharach, leading the kitchen. The opening date is still very much up in the air, but they’re looking at spring (or maybe summer) 2025.

Up in NoLibs, Laura Swartz got to take a look at Mr. Ivy, and it is weird. I mean, cool, sure, if you’re into modernist cabaret, DJ sets, “ambient performers,” and light installations, but also a place that is leaning very hard into being as cutting-edge and provocative as possible — right down to operating on weekends only and making everyone cover up their cell phone cameras with stickers before they enter.

Still, Laura has some very Tron-meets-industrial-modernism-plus-that-one-party-scene-from-the-first-season-of-Succession (yeah, you know the one I mean) pictures from inside, plus details on the build-out and what’s going to go on there when the doors open to the public — which happened over the weekend. So check it out if you’re curious.

Finally, remember last week when I told you about the new caviar kiosk that Lauren Biederman had opened at 19th and Arch to complement the array of fancy foods she already has available at her storefront in the Italian Market? Yeah, well, that wasn’t the only new project Lauren had cooking.

She’s also got a full-on restaurant in the works. Tesiny will be an oyster bar and grill with a double bar and a cocktail program, opening in an old garage with big front windows at 719 Dickinson Street in South Philly. Biederman is hoping for an April opening.

Oh, Wait. There’s Still Some More

Cloud Cups Gelato / Photograph by Kory Aversa

Thought we were done? Nope. That’s just the places that we’ve talked about on Foobooz over the past week or so. But believe me, there’s more.

We also got word that Cloud Cups Gelato and Darnel’s Cakes had teamed up like some kind of mini-dessert Voltron to open a combined storefront at 2311 Frankford Avenue in Fishtown. This is something of a homecoming for Galen Thomas, owner of Cloud Cups, because 2311 Frankford? That’s where he had his original shop (which closed in 2022 for renovations, and so he could open his flagship store in Harrowgate).

Now, both he and Kyle Cuffie-Scott of Darnel’s are combining forces in the shop that reopened over the weekend. They’re leaning into both the season and the team-up with a “Let It Snow” vibe, offering candy cane and egg nog gelato, hot chocolate affogatos, sundaes made with Darnel’s cookies or brownies topped with gelato, cookie-gelato sandwiches dipped in sprinkles or toasted cake crumbs, and “D’s Cloud Birthday Cakes,” made with two layers of Darnel’s cake and two layers of Cloud Cups gelato, then iced, decorated, and served frozen for a wintertime birthday treat.

Speaking of desserts, it looks like Weckerley’s Ice Cream is looking to expand into Rittenhouse Square. The Business Journal is reporting that Weckerley’s current owner Cristina Torres — who took over Weckerley’s from founders Jen and Andy Satinsky in 2023 and already has locations in Fishtown and King of Prussia — has gotten approval for signage outside a space at 1600 Spruce Street but hasn’t yet completely settled on the location.

Getting signs ready? That seems like a pretty big step. So we’ll be keeping an eye on the space in the coming months to see what happens.

But if you’re looking for something with an opening date that’s a little bit closer, how ’bout this: Remember back in July when I told y’all about the folks from Bloomsday and Green Engine Coffee making plans for a “cafe and bakery offering robust sweet and savory Viennoiserie-style pastries, seasonal breakfast and lunch staples, and a specialty coffee program in Philadelphia’s Headhouse Square neighborhood?” Well, guess what? That place is called Loretta’s, and Loretta’s is ready to open the doors, and has set December 7th as their official opening day.

Ham and brie sandwich / Photograph courtesy of Loretta’s

But I’m mentioning it now because the joint is currently in soft-open mode and has been selling coffee and pastries at 410 South 2nd Street from 8 a.m. until everything sells out. And, apparently, stuff has been selling out.

In its final form, Loretta’s will be offering breakfast and lunch staples, plus pastry and coffee. We’re talking chorizo, egg, potato, and cheese hand pies, breakfast hoagies, spoon salads, meatloaf patty melts, apple galette, cinnamon buns, and homemade cosmic brownies, plus a full Green Engine-style coffee program in a 16-seat, 600-square-foot cafe in Headhouse.

Honestly, they had me at the breakfast hand pies, but I will walk a mile for a cosmic brownie, so if y’all need me, you know where to find me starting December 7th.

Okay, Last One

Amid all the other news that broke last week, I wasn’t about to let this one slip past me: Roy Rogers is opening a new store on Haddonfield Road in Cherry Hill this spring. This will be the first Roy Rogers to operate in the Philly area since the ’80s. And Victor Fiorillo already used his column space to make fun of it a little bit.

But I am NOT making fun of it. I am excited about it. Because me and Roy Rogers? We got history. My wife has an even longer love affair with a certain classic menu item from the drive-thru burger joint. And having one closer to us than the Allentown Service Plaza is absolutely something worth looking forward to in this fucked-up moment of history we find ourselves currently living through.

No matter what Victor thinks.

Now who has room for some leftovers?

The Leftovers

7 Moles spread from 2023 / Photograph courtesy of Cantina La Martina

Okay, so I know I already made one Voltron joke this week, but we’ve got two additional team-ups that are pretty Voltron-esque in the greater-than-the-sum-of-their-parts department.

First, there’s a new cheesesteak joint that just opened at the Reading Terminal Market. And while normally this wouldn’t be worth much more than a brief passing mention, this one is different because it has some serious neighborhood heavyweights behind it.

Last week, Joey Nicolosi of Tommy DiNic’s, Dave Braunstein of Pearl’s Oyster Bar, and Danny DiGiampietro of Angelo’s all got together and opened Uncle Gus’ Steaks at the RTM, in the space formerly occupied by Carmen’s Famous Italian Hoagies and Cheesesteaks. And this place is doing nothing but slinging steaks — 12-inch cheesesteaks on DiGiampietro’s homemade bread, with high-quality ingredients and produce sourced from Iovine’s. It is local, it is focused, and it is serious about its steaks.

Plus, these three guys have known each other for a long time. DiGiampietro used to run a bread route that delivered to both DiNic’s and Pearl’s at the RTM. DiGiampietro and Nicolosi grew up together in South Jersey, and Braunstein got to know DiGiampietro as a customer at his original Angelo’s in Haddonfield. Also, Dave Braunstein’s brother, Jared, manages the Angelo’s in South Philly.

Small world.

The new shop is up and running now. Hours are 10 a.m. to 6 p.m., seven days a week.

Second, over at Cantina La Martina, Dionicio Jiménez is bringing back his 7 Moles dinner for a third year, calling in seven local chefs to cook a seven-course dinner featuring seven different mole dishes. And the lineup is bonkers. Dig it: He’s got Alejandro Sánchez from Mesona, Chance Anies from Tabachoy, Jennifer Zavala from Juana Tamale, Yun Fuentes from Bolo, Ange Branca from Kampar, Eric Leveillee from Lacroix, plus chef Ed Crochet AND pastry chef Justine Macneil from Fiore, all cooking a single menu for a one-night-only riff on the classic Feast of the Seven Fishes.

There’ll also be live performances, a complimentary apple, guava, and sugar cane ponche, and a gift for everyone who shows up, courtesy of Jiménez and his wife, Mariangeli Alicea Saez. Seriously, it looks like one of those events that no one will want to miss. So if you’re down, tickets are $150 a head, not counting tax, tip, or drinks. And you can get yours here.

I wouldn’t wait too long.

Finally this week, once upon a time, we used to close out our Thanksgiving week coverage on Foobooz by posting the classic 1978 “Turkeys Away” episode of WKRP in Cincinatti — one of the single greatest half-hours of television ever broadcast.

Apparently, we’re not allowed to do that anymore. And as much as that sucks, I think y’all know that I am nothing if not a man with a healthy respect for the rules. A fine and upstanding young gentleman who would never dream of running athwart John Law.

So while I’m no longer able to simply show you the video, no one can stop me from wishing you all a happy Thanksgiving in the best way I know how. Here’s to ya, Philly. And happy Turkey Day to all.