Everything You Need to Know About the New Chef Conference

Photograph courtesy of The Chef Conference

Howdy, buckaroos! And welcome back to the Foobooz food news round-up. There’s just a couple quick things to talk about before we all get on with our weeks, so to start, let’s talk about Alain Ducasse coming to Philly.

Wait … Alain Ducasse Is Coming to Philly?

Yup. He sure is. Unfortunately not for the reasons you’re probably hoping. He’s not coming here to open a restaurant, but one of the most lauded chefs on the planet will be hitting our humble little burg as a panelist for this year’s inaugural Chef Conference, running April 12th to the 15th.

Oh, I know what you’re thinking. You’re thinking, doesn’t Philly already have a Chef Conference? And didn’t you, like, cover it for years? So how can this be the “inaugural” event?

While Philly does have a chef conference called the Philly Chef Conference (sponsored by Drexel and held there for a decade) which is happening October 13-14, 2024, this is different. Even if both of them were founded and organized by Mike Traud. And even if both of them serve as an industry-focused conference meant to draw some serious food-world firepower to Philly for a few days of eating, drinking and talking about the restaurant business.

This new Chef Conference is not associated with Drexel’s hospitality management program. It is sponsored by Visit Philadelphia and Resy (which is owned by American Express), and while it will feature the same kind of Q&A’s and panel discussions with some of the biggest names in the food industry, it also has a series of collaborative chef events happening all over the city. (No surprise here: Those can only be booked through Resy and will offer 48 hours of exclusive access to Resy’s Global Dining Access members.)

The conference itself still has a very familiar format. Starting on Friday, April 12th, there’s a double dose of panel discussions on opening and/or expanding your restaurant. Panel one: The business-side of opening a restaurant. Panel two: Menu Design 101. The discussion starts at 8 a.m. and runs until noon at the Study Hotel on 33rd Street. Tickets are $75 per person and are available here.

Saturday the 13th is when Alain Ducasse shows up. He’ll be talking with Jeff Gordinier about his (Ducasse’s) new memoir-slash-manifesto, Good Taste: A Life of Food and Passion, just a couple days ahead of its launch. This one’s $75, too, but it includes a signed copy of his book, which is going for nearly $20 retail, so this one is (relatively speaking) a bit of a steal. Get your tickets here.

Also on Saturday, Philly Mag’s own Kae Lani Palmisano will be in conversation with Dan Pashman for Dan’s Sporkful podcast. Dan has a book coming out, too, called Anything’s Pastable, and that’s what they’ll be talking about. Also probably how Dan was the guy who invented the new pasta shape, cascatelli, that got named as one of Time magazine’s best inventions of the year. Hanging with Dan and Kae Lani will run you $35 — or $59 if you want a signed book — and tickets are here. Both of the Saturday events will be at the Study Hotel.

On Sunday, another Philly Mag regular, Maddy Sweitzer-Lammé and her Tiny Table Tours, will team up with Patrick Alfiero and Melissa Pellegrino from Heavy Metal Sausage Co. for a stroll around West Passyunk — you know, Philly’s other Passyunk. Tag along and you’ll be dropping in on some of the best restaurants and bakeries on the other side of the Ave before ending up at Heavy Metal for a private charcuterie tasting. The tour starts at Second District Brewing on Bancroft Street at noon and will wrap up around 4 p.m. Tickets are $150 a head. Get yours here.

Then on Monday, we’re into the serious business of the conference. You like keynotes? There’ll be keynotes. You into panel discussions? There’s plenty of those, too. Want to hear Jamila Robinson talking with Ruth Reichl? Then this is your day. There’ll be talks about equality, being a working parent in the restaurant industry, how to handle restaurant reviewers (suggestion: with a gin-and-tonic at the end of a long stick), Mexican cuisine, the importance of dessert menus, cookbook writing and the aforementioned chat with Ruth Reichl — along with Tom Collichio, Dana Cowin, Kim Severson and more. It is just about as star-studded an event as you’re going to find in Food World, so if you want to check it out it is, again, at the Study Hotel. The festivities start at 9 a.m. and run until 5 p.m. Tickets are $300 per person and available starting …now.

As for those chef collaboration dinners, they’ve just been announced and reservations are available to the general public right now (they opened to those Global Access folks on the 13th). Here’s everything that’s on the books as of today:

Resy @ The Chef Conference: A Collaborative Dinner Series

• About: An evening of collaboration, cocktails and bites with Mr. Lyan (Ryan Chetiyawardana) and Arielle Johnson, celebrating her just-released book Flavorama: A Guide to Unlocking the Art and Science of Flavor.
• Date: Saturday, April 13, 2024
• Location: a.bar (1737 Walnut St.)
• Reservations: here

• About: A family-style menu served at lunch. This lunch collaboration is between Chef John Quintana of CO-OP Restaurant & Bar and Chef Serigne Mbaye of Dakar NOLA.
• Date: Saturday, April 13, 2024
• Location: CO-OP Restaurant & Bar (20 S. 33rd St.)
• Reservations: here

• About: In celebration of The Chef Conference, this seven-course menu is curated by Chef Matt Rodrigue of Fiorella Pasta and Chef David Viana of Lita.
• Date: Thursday, April 11, 2024
• Location: Fiorella (817 Christian St.)
• Reservations: here

• About: Chef Valerie Chang and her team from Maty’s in Miami will be coming to Philly to cook a Peruvian / Sicilian a la carte menu with Chef Michael Vincent Ferreri and his team at Irwin’s.
• Date: Saturday, April 13, 2024
• Location: Irwin’s (800 Mifflin St., 8th Floor)
• Reservations: here

• About: Collaboration between La Otra and Middle Child Clubhouse, two tri-state cocktail bars serving ingredients from around the world to their own, intimate neighborhoods. La Otra – who is the “sister-bar” to Lita, a James Beard Foundation Award Semifinalist for Best New Restaurant in 2024 – will showcase a few of their favorite drinks.
• Date: Saturday, April 13, 2024
• Location: Middle Child Clubhouse (1232 N. Front St.)
• Reservations: Walk-ins only from 5pm to 9pm.

• About: My Loup will collaborate with co-owners Joshua Pinsky and Chase Sinzer of Claud in New York City for a four-course family-style meal.
• Date: Saturday, April 13, 2024
• Location: My Loup (2005 Walnut St.)
• Reservations: here

• About: Palizzi Social Club, Don Angie and San Sabino are collaborating for one night on a five-course Italian-American dinner.
• Date: Thursday, April 11, 2024
• Location: Palizzi Social Club (1408 S. 12th St.)
• Reservations: here

There’s also been an opening night double-bill added: a panel discussion on sobriety in the bar and restaurant industry with Sean Brock, Ashley Christensen, Gregory Gourdet and Michael Solomonov, moderated by Andrew Zimmern, and a “fireside chat” between Jeff Gordinier and Phil Rosenthal (from “Somebody Feed Phil”) about the evolution of food TV. Both of these events will be happening on Sunday, April 14th at the Suzanne Roberts Theater on Broad Street. Tickets can be purchased here. There’s also two new events with the Sisterly Love Collective, an “old School vs New School” debate on panel day, a live recording of the Wine and Hip Hop podcast featuring Chad Williams at Friday Saturday Sunday (tickets here), and probably more, too. You can keep up-to-date on all the additions as the event approaches by keeping an eye on the Chef Conference website. And if anything super-cool pops up along the way, I’ll be sure to let you know.

Chef Moves

Steak frites / Photograph courtesy of FCM Hospitality

Harper’s Garden is one of those restaurants that never seems to get a lot of press. Which is weird because it’s beautiful, has an excellent bar, is just a couple blocks north of Rittenhouse Square, and eating there is like being in a greenhouse even when you’re sitting inside. It’s a place that everyone should keep in their hip pocket for those nights when you want a place to eat but can’t decide exactly what you’re after. Or when your parents come to town unexpectedly. Or when a friend gets stuck at the airport and wants to hang out while the mechanics glue the engines back on the plane or whatever.

Anyway, Harper’s Garden just announced that they’ve got a new exec in the kitchen and a new menu in the works. The chef is Isaac Carter and he comes with an impressive resume: 12 years with Todd English at the original Olives, then Olives at the Bellagio in Vegas, then Eva Longoria’s restaurant Beso and Todd English’s Pub. Then it was NYC to oversee all the restaurants at the Metropolitan Museum of Art. Then back to Massachusetts to run the kitchens at Bull Run, Cab & Mermaid and Bourbon & Bones (because, apparently, he really likes ampersands).

Sticking to the point here, Carter went to Temple. He likes Philly. So he decided to come back. And Harper’s Garden is where he landed. His new menu is just as locally sourced and farm-to-table-y as HG is known for, but he’s adding his own twist to things — doing Moroccan tofu skewers for the vegetarians, creamy mussels and New England lobster rolls as a nod to his Massachusetts roots, and steak frites because no one ever went broke serving steak frites. Simple dishes, local produce and seasonal cooking — that’s the game here. And Carter is on the line right now, so you can check out the new board whenever the urge strikes you.

Meanwhile, up in New Hope, Stella has some fresh blood in the kitchen as well. Chef Keith Bernstein comes to the Bucks County restaurant (which I did not love in its first incarnation) from some good places: El Camino Real, Lacroix (under Jean-Marie and Matt Levin), Carvel. No, seriously. Dude knows Fudgie the Whale personally.

The place has always had a great location. And a nice view out over the Delaware. But Bernstein is now bringing his own ideas to the kitchen, and slow-rolling a new menu into place over the next few weeks — everything from five-spice duck breast and chile prawns over Chinese long beans to thick-cut bacon braised in apple cider and brown sugar, topped with a peppadew chimichurri and a quail egg, served over cheddar grits. He calls that last one “Bacon and Eggs” and it’s the kind of thing that makes me start wondering if maybe it’s time to make another drive up to New Hope.

Then there’s Jean-Georges, on the top floor of the Comcast World Domination Spire. They’re also making another pivot. According to the Inquirer, they’ve brought on chef Colin Henderson (ex of Daniel Boulud’s Daniel in NYC, among other lofty postings) to make the place more approachable to the common man.

Again, I didn’t love JG’s first swing at Philly’s moneyed elite. And I wasn’t crazy for the post-lockdown, nothing-but-tasting-menus version either. And this? I don’t know … I mean, I like that they’re back to an a la carte menu for those who don’t want to drop two or three hundred bucks on a mediocre dinner with a spectacular view, but that a la carte menu is still asking almost $50 for some mozzarella ravioli with black truffle and $28 for a scallop crudo, so that’s not really my scene.

But hey, Henderson looks like he’s got some talent and, prices aside, the menu looks more interesting than it has in years, so who knows? Maybe this is the combination that will finally work here. At the very least, I have high hopes.

I’ll be here all week, folks. Don’t forget to tip your servers.

Moving on …

A Supper Club for the Suburbs

Otto’s Supper Club & Social / Photograph by Mike Prince

Ashley Power has spent a long time in and around the Philly restaurant scene. She did culinary school at Drexel, graduated, then went to work for Georges Perrier in the kitchen at Brasserie Perrier. She worked FOH for a while, became a restaurant consultant, a private chef, then started a catering company — Power Events. She’s done the full tour, except for one thing: She’s never opened a restaurant of her own.

At least until now.

Out in Eagleville, Power is getting ready to unlock the doors at Otto’s Supper Club and Social at 3140 Ridge Pike, in the former home of Kriebel’s Custom Bakery. And the story of how she came by the space is a pretty good one. I’ll let her tell it.

“I never planned on opening a restaurant. I registered the name Otto’s in 2008, and thought I would do something with it in the way of a passion project, as my husband Jeff and I always talk about opening up a little restaurant or shop one day. While picking up a cake at Kriebel’s this December, my friend and co-owner Colleen Kriebel asked if I know anyone looking for a space because she was sadly moving on. I looked around and thought it was perfect, and my whole paradigm changed on the spot. I bought the place with my credit card, signed a lease, and we began renovations from there.”

Bought the place with her credit card … I can respect that.

The 700-square-foot space will now act as a combination supper club/classroom/catering kitchen and event space. She’s planning on collaborations, pairing dinners, and plain old supper-club meals which will all require reservations, run $75 per person and focus on local produce, eclectic menus, culinary trends and basically anything that inspires Power.

Otto’s is open right now with events on the calendar and the first menu ready to go: microgreens with whipped goat cheese and asparagus, handmade spinach gnocchi with lemon olive oil, short rib Bourguignon and a blueberry buckle for dessert. Sounds like a nice spring supper, actually. So if you’re down, check out Otto’s right here and make a reservation.

In the meantime, whose got room for some leftovers?

The Leftovers

Cloud Cups’ owner and gelato artist Galen Thomas. / Photograph by Kory Aversa – Aversa PR

Today is the first day of spring. And what better way to celebrate than with free gelato?

Cloud Cups — gelato artist Galen Thomas’s ginormous new cafe, scoop shop and production facility at MaKen Studios in Kensington — is opening today and Thomas is offering a free scoop of gelato to the first 100 people who show up between 3 p.m. and 5 p.m.

The space at 3525 I Street is 2,000 square feet and will give Thomas the room to work on a hundred different flavors, plus enough production space to be able to handle nationwide shipping, citywide delivery and a line of gelato-scented candles. He’s got room to offer 36 different flavors each day in the gelato case, plus packed pints to go. He’ll kick things off with a special French Toast Bites flavor in honor of Charisse McGill, and, as a Black-owned business, he’ll be doing all kinds of collaboration flavors “to raise up and support other Black-, Brown-, female-, LGBT- and other minority-owned businesses.”

Once he gets past opening day, Thomas and his crew will be open to the public Wednesdays through Sundays, from 1 to 8 p.m. Those hours will extend as the weather grows warmer. And down the line he’s also looking at doing gelato classes, make-your-own-flavor workshops and a Cloud Cups co-working space.

If you love local merch and your wardrobe is mostly t-shirts emblazoned with your favorite restaurants, you’re going to love the new lineup Ps & Qs is dropping this Friday. They’re calling it “A Taste of Philly,” and it pays “homage to the independent ‘mom & pops’ restaurants that keep our bellies full and our hearts happy!” The t-shirt line features the people behind iconic local spots. We’re talking Rich Pagliarella of Ricci’s Hoagies, Danny DiGiampietro of Angelo’s Pizzeria, Thu Pham and Tina Huynh of Càphê Roasters, and Cristina Martinez of South Philly Barbacoa. You can check out the lookbook for this collection on the Ps & Qs Instagram.

Alex Hardy’s At The Table is kicking off a monthly late-night happy-hour program called “At The Table After Dark” and it sounds kinda awesome because it’s both a riff on industry night menus AND a late-night cocktail party.

The After Dark events will happen on the last Thursday of every month (beginning on Thursday, March 28th) and will run from 9 to 11 p.m. The kitchen will be doing discounted small plates based around their regular dinner menu, like Acadian pearl oysters for $2 a throw, mini mushroom toasts, house fries for $6 with lemon-truffle aioli, and fried chicken sliders with house hot sauce and slaw on a brioche bun for $14. This first dinner is also sponsored by Stateside Vodka, so they’ve got three custom vodka cocktails on the menu, plus two wines by the glass at $9 a pour.

Oh, and while reservations for regular service are highly recommended, the After Dark series is walk-in only. And the first 15 people through the door will get an At The Table gift bag just for showing up. Nice, right? Keep an eye on At The Table’s website for more details.

Speaking of nighttime fun in Philly, I’ve got one more cool event for you this week. The Brads from Pizza Freak Co. — Brad Daniels and Brad Kilgore — are doing their own Philly Makers Night Market at Philadelphia Distilling in Fishtown. On April 3rd, from 4 p.m. to 8 p.m. more than a dozen local brands will be coming together to show off (and offer samples of) their products.

So who’ll be there? I’m glad you asked. How about Milk Jawn, Jezabel’s Cafe (who’ll be outside, grilling for the throngs), Small Batch Kitchen, Essen Bakery, Dreamworld Bakes, Autana, Jawndiments, Aaji’s, Settantatre Pasta Co., Fishtown Pickle Project, Side Project Jerky, Mother Butter, and Merion Park Cheese. Philadelphia Distilling will be pouring cocktails. All the makers will be offering little bites to sample, big bites to buy and products for sale.

Best thing about this one? Getting in is totally free. But you DO have to register. And since Philly Distilling is capping the guest count at 250, I’d do that right now if you’re interested.