Why Crime in Philadelphia Is Plummeting

I spend a fair amount of time talking to people who live in the suburbs. One of the things they’ve told me over the last few years is how nervous they are to come into the city. Because of the stories they’ve seen, read and heard about crime in Philadelphia, they’re not only reluctant to move into town — they’re even anxious to come into Center City for dinner or a show.

I hear similar things from city residents about crime in their own neighborhoods. I understand why: During the pandemic, the crime rate — most notably the murder rate — skyrocketed in Philadelphia. It left all of us rattled, and there are still stories about mass shootings and other tragic crimes that give people pause.

Fortunately, we’re now seeing crime drop in Philadelphia, quickly and substantially. As of mid-July, homicides were down 38 percent compared to the same time last year — the lowest number of murders since 2015. In fact, according to a national analysis of data, Philadelphia has seen the largest drop in gun violence of the 50 largest U.S. cities.

That’s great news.

Crime is down nationally, but I believe one reason Philadelphia is doing particularly well is the outstanding leadership of our new police commissioner, Kevin Bethel. Commissioner Bethel is, in my estimation, one of the best police leaders out there right now.

And I’m not the only one who’s saying that. That’s also the view of legendary former police commissioner Charles Ramsey, who did such an outstanding job keeping the city safe under Mayor Michael Nutter. As Commissioner Ramsey told me in a recent conversation, “In my opinion, Kevin is one of the very best police leaders not only that Philadelphia has had, but in America.”

High praise.

Ramsey and Bethel have known each other for a long time. Bethel was a captain in the 17th District when Ramsey first worked with him. Ramsey was so impressed with Bethel that he promoted him to deputy commissioner — skipping three ranks.

“He didn’t let me down,” Ramsey told me. “He is a very talented individual.”

What makes him so good? Bethel focuses on data, Ramsey explained, relying on clear evidence when it comes to implementing strategy. “When he makes decisions, it’s based on real information, not just gut feeling or pressure from someone else. He’s about as solid as they come.”

Ramsey told me a story to illustrate his point. One day when Ramsey was commissioner, Bethel came into his office and said, “Boss, we have a problem.”

Ramsey asked what it was.

“We’re arresting too many kids in school,” Bethel replied.

Bethel shared the data he’d gathered — more than a thousand kids per year were being arrested in city schools. Fortunately, Bethel never presented Ramsey with a problem without also offering a solution.

“He developed a diversion strategy working with the chief judge of the juvenile court,” Ramsey said. After it was implemented, the number of students being arrested dropped by 84 percent. Bethel continued that work after he became head of school safety for the School District of Philadelphia a few years later, and the strategy has now become a national model.

How Is Bethel Doing It?

Ramsey hesitates to comment on the specifics of the Philadelphia Police Department’s current policing strategy. “There should only be one commissioner at a time,” he said. But residents I’ve spoken with have noted a stronger police presence in various parts of the city, and Ramsey himself pointed to the stepped-up police presence in Kensington — Bethel deployed the Police Academy’s entire graduating class this year to the neighborhood — as an example of how Bethel takes on tough problems and finds creative ways to solve them. “The fact that he took an entire academy class to add resources to that area, that says a lot right there about his commitment,” Ramsey said.

Of course, Bethel isn’t the only one who deserves credit for the city’s increasing safety. Kudos also go to Mayor Parker, whom Ramsey believes — and I agree — has done an excellent job so far. The relationship between the mayor and the police commissioner is crucial, as Ramsey well knows.

“It’s important to mention that Commissioner Bethel has got the full backing of a very, very good mayor,” said Ramsey. (Ramsey, it should be noted, advised Parker on her search for a commissioner). “I was blessed to have a good strong mayor with me in Mike Nutter, and that’s what it takes. It’s really not a one-person show.”

The year is only half over, of course, so there’s no guarantee the crime numbers will stay low, particularly since crime tends to tick up in the summer and fall.

“But it’s a very good sign to have this level of decrease in July,” Ramsey said. “I think you’re going to see the numbers get back to the level they were in 2013, 2014 and 2015, when we were well under 300 homicides per year.”

Ramsey would like to see Commissioner Bethel start to get more attention across the country for his approach and results. He believes Bethel has much to contribute to the national conversation about policing. “I want him to be more exposed nationally because a lot of the national issues affect us all. He’s just a very talented individual. He’s going to be in the conversation when you talk about some of the best that’s ever done it.”

I’d like to see Commissioner Bethel develop more of a national profile, too — as long as Philadelphia doesn’t lose the best police commissioner we’ve had in a long time.

How I Discovered Philly’s Most Successful Cookbook Author Doesn’t Actually Exist

It’s Tuesday afternoon, close to the start of service, and I’m texting with Joe Cicala, chef of Cicala at the Divine Lorraine and someone who has been around the Italian food scene in Philly for more than a decade. I tell him I have a weird question. I tell him it’s totally okay if he says no — that he will probably say no — but that I have to ask. Because Joe is a good guy, he answers almost immediately.

Tuesday, 3:28 p.m.
Jason: I’m trying to track down a cook who may (or, more likely, may not) have worked at one of your restaurants. Would’ve likely been years ago. Her name is Luisa Florence. Ring any bells?

Like 5 minutes later
Joe: Hey! Just asked Angela if she rang any bells and we couldn’t remember anyone by that name. I also checked my contacts and emails and nothing came up. Sorry about that.

Jason: No worries at all. I’m just checking everywhere I can think of. Thanks for helping out.

Joe: Anytime.

Joe isn’t the first person I’ve reached out to about this. He isn’t the 10th. I’ve been doing this for a couple days now — phone calls, emails, text messages, to chefs I know, managers, PR people I’ve asked to run down their client lists. I’ve asked all of them the same thing: if they’ve ever heard of a woman or known anyone who might have heard of a woman who matches a series of very specific criteria.

• A cook, not a chef
• Local
• Likely employed anywhere from the early ’90s to the mid-2010s
• Absolutely in an Italian (or Italian-leaning) restaurant
• Named Luisa Florence

And so far, nothing. Nothing good, anyhow. Nothing solid. But that’s okay. I’m going to keep looking. Because there are a lot of restaurants in this city, and I can’t check them all, but I can check a lot of them. And I want to be sure of one thing before I go any further.

I want to be sure that Luisa Florence isn’t real.

This Is How It Started …

I saw this thread on Twitter.

And I know — I know — that’s the stupidest way ever to start a story, but truth is important here, and that’s the truth. I was burning time on Twitter when I should’ve been doing something more productive, and I saw this thread that started:

This week, my wife and I are celebrating our anniversary. My parents ordered us a very practical, thoughtful gift on Amazon: a crockpot and a crockpot cookbook. We’re thrilled. There’s just one minor issue: I’m pretty sure the cookbook was written by an AI. …

What followed was a brief dozen-tweet exploration by Matthew Kupfer, an investigative journalist for Voice of America News. Kupfer mostly writes about Russia and the Kremlin, organized crime, corruption — heavy, serious stuff. He’s written for the Moscow Times and the Kyiv Post and the San Francisco Standard, so this, too, is a guy who probably had more important things to be doing. But instead, he, too, was on Twitter, writing about crockpots and cookbooks and the possibility (near-certainty, actually) that the one he’d gotten as an anniversary gift — The Complete Crockpot Cookbook for Beginners, 2024 edition, written by Luisa Florence — was not, in fact, written by a person at all.

You probably know this story. It was the Thing of the Day on social media a while back. News outlets of varying respectability wrote hip-shot recaps and think pieces on the day-after or the day after that. And, weirdly, Kupfer’s tweet would even end up moving the ponderous levers of capitalism ever so slightly — but all that happens later, and we’ll get to it in due course.

Point is, it was a thing. Not a huge thing, but a thing. Kupfer’s thread got about 14,000 likes and 2,800 retweets and was seen by nearly 3.5 million people. And then, like 99.9 percent of everything that happens on the internet, Kupfer’s story just kind of faded into the cultural background radiation. Sank beneath the waves of virality, subsumed by the next day’s oddity or outrage. Everyone moved on.

Except me.

About the Author

It wasn’t really the idea of an AI cookbook that hooked me when I read Kupfer’s tweets. I got hung up on the author — on the little details of Luisa Florence’s (alleged) life that crawled into my brain and just sat there, itching at me.

See, like most authors (probably all authors), Luisa had a bio. The story of her life, condensed down to fit on the back fold of a hardcover dust jacket or at the top of an Amazon page. There was a photo of her looking … I don’t know. Author-y, I guess? With her bangs and her reading glasses and her slightly out-of-focus pink scarf. But the words painted a better picture.

About the Author
Luisa Florence is 60 and lives in Philadelphia. She’s the author of various recipe books, some of which are best sellers.

Her origins are Italians, she left Tuscany when she was only 12 years old because of her parents’ jobs. Together with her mum, Luisa has learnt to love the kitchen, and within the years she developed extraordinary skills within preserves.

In her pantry, there is never a shortage of products as she says “you always have to be ready to welcome a group of friends for dinner”.

Her passion took her to work in different restaurants, acquiring even more experience.

Through the years she specialised in different cooking techniques even thanks to new technologies. Air Fryer and Ninja Foodi, Crock Pot, are perfect examples of help to prepare fast dishes, but nevertheless tasty and original. In this way, Luisa can manage her time, between home and work.

Luisa also has a great artistic sense, and her charcuterie recipes look like board masterpieces. Even the ice creams in her Ninja Creami cookbook are original, delicious and creative.

Her dream is to dedicate herself completely to the kitchen.

Her books are her way to share with a large audience all her secrets that she has learnt in all these years at the stove.

Now, if you like words the way that I like words, you know there’s a lot to love there. There’s so much about it that’s delightfully wrong or charmingly clumsy. There are mistakes in grammar and punctuation, sentences lacking a basic understanding of how words go together, a strange British accent in mum and learnt and specialised, and a kind of weird counter-personal chewiness to the language that just feels … alien. Like frantic love poetry run through a bad translation algorithm. Like how it sounds when your grandfather tries to use slang. I adore “Her origins are Italians” and her “extraordinary skills within preserves” and the phrase “nevertheless tasty and original” which I now say 10 times a day, like some kind of infectious verbal tic. But really, it was the very first sentence that caught my attention.

Luisa Florence is 60 and lives in Philadelphia.

Forever 60. Eternally 60. A perpetual grandmother, with her tasteful earrings and crepe-paper wrinkles, just sitting there, dreaming of the Piazzale Michelangelo and crockpot minestrone soup. I read that and thought to myself, If she was 60 when she published this book, she’s probably still alive. If she was ever really alive.

And if she lived in Philadelphia?

That meant I could find her.

A Conversation With Myself

Me: But she’s not real, though.

Also Me: But she might be.

Me: But she’s not.

Also Me: But she might be.

Me: Look, everyone agrees that she’s made up. EVERYONE. There’s nothing human about her. The writing is like an eighth-grader trying to talk their way into Harvard. The picture is what you’d get if you typed “My Best Friend’s Grandma” into a generative AI program. You know you can buy artificially generated author photos? You can buy entire fake authors. In bulk. It happens all the time now.

Also Me: Sure, but tell me: Is Luisa Florence more or less real than some celebrity chef you’re never going to meet? Someone who puts out a ghostwritten cookbook they never lay a finger on? Is she more or less real than Escoffier? You didn’t know him. He’s been dead for almost a hundred years, so you’re never going to know him. All you’ve ever seen of him is pictures and his recipes in Le Guide Culinaire. But you talk about that guy all the time.

Me: You’re an idiot. She’s not real.

Also Me: Yeah, but she might be.

Looking for Luisa

When I call people and ask them about Luisa, a lot of them say they don’t know her personally, but that yeah, maybe, they might’ve heard the name before.

Someone says, “She didn’t work for me, but yeah. I know the name. I think she worked at the place that used to be where Louie Louie is now.”

Penne. That place was called Penne. Luisa didn’t work there.

Someone asks about Ralph’s. No one at Ralph’s knew her. Someone else asks about Saloon. I can’t get anyone at Saloon to answer.

“Vetri,” someone else says. “She worked at Vetri, didn’t she?”

No, she didn’t.

One of my friends in PR asks Joey Baldino, because Joey has been around a while and has worked for everyone, but Joey says no. Never heard of her. Another friend trolls South Philly line crews for me, asking around, but gets nothing useful out of them, which might be because it’s South Philly and even if Luisa was literally standing right there next to the phone when the sous at Sal’s Red Gravy Heaven picked up, he wouldn’t cop to knowing her. No one would. But it might also be that I just haven’t asked in the right places yet.

I get one kitchen manager on the phone, and he says this is “the stupidest fucking question” he’s ever been asked, and I’m like, Come on … really? This is Philadelphia, asshole, and if THIS is the stupidest question anyone has ever asked you, then you gotta get out more. I mean, two days ago, one of my neighbors asked me if I thought a cat could survive jumping out of the second-floor window of her townhouse and I said yeah, sure, cats are amazing, and then she said, “But what if it was carrying a whole chicken?,” and that wasn’t even the stupidest question I’d heard THAT DAY.

But anyway, I keep calling, and I keep checking. I stare at the picture of her on my laptop, and it’s clear that the ears are lopsided, the earrings mismatched. Oh, and one of her shoulders appears to be missing, but not in a way that you notice right away. You kinda gotta look for it. And I do, because this is Luisa, right? No matter what comes of all these texts and calls and emails, this is her. Maybe the only version of her there is. Maybe just one of a billion-billion instants frozen from out of 60 years of life in Tuscany and Philly, in restaurant kitchens and her mother’s kitchen and her own kitchen. Sixty years of long shifts and bad bosses, growing old in an industry that doesn’t take well to age.

It’s her. The author photo of her shows all the hallmarks of an AI-generated picture — the shallow focus, the botched details, a kind of uncanny deadness around the eyes that I don’t think there’s a word for yet. This sense of something not-real pretending at life. But it’s Luisa.

If a machine made this, then this is the extent of her: one photo, a terrible bio, a dozen cheaply printed cookbooks churned out in rapid succession that will sit now on shelves in other people’s kitchens and be forgotten. They’ll never be beloved. No one will look back, 20 years from now, and ask where Mom got that recipe for air-fryer mozzarella sticks or crockpot chocolate peanut butter cake.

People buy cookbooks for two reasons: aspiration and utility. Aspirational cookbooks are the ones with the slick, glossy pages that make your fingertips feel slippery when you touch them. They’ve got beautiful photography, complicated recipes, words of wisdom from the chef (or the ghostwriter) about life, cooking, the view of the world from the lofty, celebrated heights they occupy. These are totems, bought by home cooks in the vain hope that some little bit of the celebrity chef’s talent will be absorbed just by flipping through the pages. You buy one of these books, and maybe you try to make one recipe — one half-assed attempt at Nobuyuki Matsuhisa’s octopus tiradito or re-creating Matty Matheson’s Double Beef Patty Melt with Gruyère and Molasses Bread where you have to use two English-muffin bottoms instead of the molasses bread because who has time to make their own goddamn molasses bread when they’re still trying to figure out how to deglaze a pan with fucking maple syrup, Matty — but really, you just stick it on a shelf in your kitchen and it sits there, like some kind of religious icon to be prayed to when the sauce breaks or the béchamel burns. The Saint of Lowered Expectations.

Utilitarian cookbooks are the opposite. These are the dog-eared, sauce-stained workhorses of the home kitchen. They’re not pretty (generally), but they exist to teach you how to do a thing as quickly and simply as possible. How to make chili. How to bake a chicken. Utilitarian cookbooks are what Luisa Florence writes. Her books were (are) an attempt at teaching people how to use their crockpots, get the most out of their Ninja Foodi air fryers, can their own vegetables. And some of those books really are best-sellers on Amazon. On the day I was looking, one of Luisa’s slow-cooker books was number one in the Black & African American Cooking category and number six in Hungarian Cooking, Food & Wine, concurrently. And those are two audiences that don’t traditionally see a lot of overlap. The shared portion of their Venn diagram is very small. So really, Luisa was bringing people together. And that would all be great, except for one thing.

Her books are really, really bad.

What Is Crock Pot

The 2023 edition of the Ultimate Crockpot Cookbook claims to contain 1,001 recipes, but really, there are 424.

There’s a recipe for bacon baked potatoes that, when followed, results in a kind of potato soup. There’s a recipe for “Collard Green Feet Saute” that, thankfully, includes no feet. There are plenty of simple, straightforward recipes that would absolutely work just fine, but there are also ones that tell you to just throw a slice of deli ham and a slice of cheddar on top of raw chicken breasts swimming in vegetable stock, turn on your crockpot, and then, six hours later, presto! Chicken cordon bleu. Like magic.

Every page in Luisa’s cookbook has four recipes, and there’s a stretch during the chapter on pork dishes where every single list of cooking directions is just some variation on Put everything in the crockpot, turn on the crockpot, cook in the crockpot for X hours, serve warm. With the exception of a recipe for marsala pork chops that includes one additional step, this goes on for 11 pages.

There’s a whole section on drinks that you can make in a crockpot, and one of them is one cup of whiskey, one cup of ginger ale, pumpkin puree, water, maple syrup, and a cinnamon stick. For the record, that’s eight shots of whiskey. Plus a half-cup of pumpkin. And I don’t know what kind of Halloween-obsessed alcoholics Luisa knows, but that recipe alone could operate as a kind of reverse Turing Test — no actual human being would ever include a recipe like that in a cookbook meant for other humans.

Simply titled “What Is Crock Pot,” Luisa’s introduction to crockpot cookery is my favorite part of the book. In it, she explains (several times) what a crockpot is made of, how electricity works, how a crockpot uses electricity to cook things very slowly, what a crockpot is made of (again), how glass works, how a crockpot is not a pressure cooker, and, finally, the complex socio-economic pressures felt by American women in the 1940s who, when moving into the workforce for the first time due to the industrial manpower shortages caused by overseas deployments during the second World War, were suddenly required to balance full-time careers, childcare and homemaking all at the same time. Luisa sums it up in one sentence:

“At that time, women were required to prepare dinner in the morning before they left for work so that when they returned in the evening, they could successfully complete the food preparation.”

And then she explains what a crockpot is made of again.

If Kindles and audiobooks have drained some of the weight from books — removing them from the world as physical objects and turning them into pure data — then large language models, machine learning and generative AI have made actual books as delicate as moth’s wings. Want to write a book? You hardly have to do anything at all. Just feed a few ideas into a computer program raised on a diet of a million other books scraped and gobbled up from the internet, and it’ll spit out a finished manuscript that has all the characteristics of a book without actually being a book, because no one will have actually written it. It will just happen. There’ll be a bunch of words, arranged into sentences, paragraphs, chapters. It will, to the best of the artificial intelligence’s ability, be about what you wanted it to be about — cowboys or monsters or aerobics or hedge-fund management. It will read like the best version of a cowboys and monsters hedge-fund aerobics book that the program can cobble together and be structured in a way that the AI’s machine-learning program has been trained to see as successful in a certain percentage of other books within its model.

And sure, it’s a little more complicated than that, but it’s not a lot more complicated than that. During the course of my search for Luisa, I reached out to an AI expert for a little perspective — some definition of who (or what, or why) Luisa actually is. Brian Sathianathan is the co-founder of Iterate.ai, an enterprise AI applications platform — which means he’s a friend of the robots, one of the people very much on the side of the Luisa Florences of the world — but he’s been in the game a long time. Dude worked on the first iPhone for Apple. He’s got patents. He’s seen the rise of this from the floor up.

“While AI-assisted books and LLM-generated content are undoubtedly changing the publishing landscape, I firmly believe that human authors still have a marketable and profitable future,” Sathianathan told me, “because AI-generated content, no matter how advanced, cannot replicate the emotional depth, nuance and authenticity that human authors bring to the table.”

He explained that the thing that differentiates — and will always differentiate — human-written books from the libraries of the machines is a connection to the human experience, something that no LLM will ever understand. “By sharing their personal stories, experiences and perspectives, authors can establish a unique voice and perspective that readers can’t find elsewhere.”

And that sounds great on paper. That’s precisely what the new gods of artificial intelligence want us all to believe. And it might — might — actually be true. But in order to be an author, one must first be an authority in something. The job title is right there in the word, and that’s basically the only qualification. You have to know something (about cowboys, aerobics, crockpots, whatever), and you have to know enough of something to fill a book.

So by that logic, an AI is actually the ideal author. Because who is more of an authority on something than the system that has digested an entire internet’s worth of information on any given topic?

“I believe in the idea that change is constant and we are meant to evolve,” Sathianathan explained. “Instead of fearing the rise of AI, we should be excited to explore its possibilities and see how it can enhance our lives. AI is a tool, just like the wheel, the internet, or any other innovation that has helped us progress. It’s not here to destroy what we’ve built, but to help us create something new and better.”

And I would argue that sautéed feet and a house full of party guests ripped on pumpkin whiskey are not the hallmarks of a new or better world, but sometimes that’s just the price you pay. There’s an idiot-savant quality to artificial intelligences at the moment. They know everything but have difficulty explaining it to people. They can fill a book, easy, but they stumble over the individual words. They bumble, they digress, they live. They’re not great at being authors yet, but they’re getting better every minute of every day. And all they do is practice.

Sathianathan insisted there is a middle ground, a hybrid model where human authors can harness the blinding powers of ravenous large-language models and trained generative programs to create things that we can’t yet even imagine: “As Nikola Tesla said, ‘The present is theirs; the future, for which I really worked, is mine.’” And that, if I’m being honest, is some of the creepiest shit I’ve ever heard. If I was making a movie, that would be the final line in the opening montage, spoken by the robot messiah right before its soulless legions marched off to conquer the world.

Customer Service

One day, Luisa is just … gone.

I was making my calls, my emails, went searching for the title of one of her air-fryer books, and I see that all of her books except one (Canning and Preserving for Beginners, published in 2020) are missing from Amazon. Her author page has been pulled down. Every place that once sold her books now has them listed as unavailable, out of stock. I look, and the only thing I can find is a physical copy of one of her crockpot books available on Ebay.

I buy it immediately.

I reach out to Amazon. I’m not expecting any kind of answer (because it’s Amazon), but someone gets back to me in minutes, schedules a call for later that afternoon, says they’ll only talk on background but might be able to get me an official statement, depending on what, exactly, I want to ask about.

I want to talk about Luisa. I want to know what happened to her, but Amazon can’t tell me. Not officially. Amazon can’t tell me why her books have been pulled, only that they have been. Only that Amazon is aware of the Matthew Kupfer tweets and the Luisa Florence situation and is very concerned with the proliferation of AI-generated content (read: books by robots) and very concerned about customer satisfaction. So I ask if there’s some kind of official policy regarding the use of AI, and I’m told that yes, there is. As of last year, in order to put a cap on the number of AI-assisted books being published via Kindle Direct Publishing — Amazon’s digital self-publishing platform — authors using Amazon’s service are no longer allowed to publish more than three different books in a single day.

Three books.

A day.

And that’s ridiculous, right? I mean, that’s not a limit; it’s just an acceptance of a problem you have no interest in solving. And the Amazon representative and I laugh about this for a few minutes — about how awful it sounds when you actually say it out loud — but later, after the call is done and I’m thinking about it, the nickel finally drops. Artificially capping the number of books that any one publishing account can upload per day at three isn’t a way to keep human authors competitive or limit the use of artificial intelligence and LLMs on the platform. Amazon knows that battle has already been lost. The limit is only there to keep the robots from publishing three hundred a day, which is one of those things that are so grim that you have to laugh just to keep from crying.

(Later, Sathianathan would explain to me that this sort of low-quality work, dumped by the ton onto self-publishing platforms, has a name: “[It’s] called ‘Content Spam.’ The problem is that AI-generated content is often created using templates and formulas, which can easily be replicated and scaled. This means that it can generate a large volume of content quickly and cheaply. But there are a few reasons why content spam is unlikely to become a major issue: algorithmic fatigue, lack of creativity, and readers’ skepticism of its quality and authenticity.”)

By the end of the next day, Ashley Vanicek, Amazon’s spokesperson, gets me the company’s official statement. It reads like this:

We aim to provide the best possible shopping, reading, and publishing experience, and we are constantly evaluating developments that impact that experience, which includes the rapid evolution and expansion of generative AI tools.

We have content guidelines governing which books can be listed for sale, and we have a robust set of methods that help us proactively detect content that violates our guidelines, whether AI-generated or not. We also remove books that do not adhere to those guidelines, including content that creates a poor customer experience. When patterns of abuse warrant it, we suspend publisher accounts to prevent repeated abuse.

Our process and guidelines will keep evolving as we see changes in AI-driven publishing to make sure we provide the best possible experience for customers.

Nowhere in a book’s description on Amazon does it have to say whether it was written using AI. Publishers are required to give that information to Amazon and Kindle Direct Publishing, but it’s only used internally. The customer never sees it.

The volume limits on new works published were put in place purely to protect customers. For Amazon, it’s a quality-control issue, not an artistic one. No one wants to tell the robots they’re bad at what they’re doing, and Amazon can’t possibly police every book on its platform. The company just wants to make sure the books aren’t so bad that people start to complain.

Finally, Amazon confirms that the specific content I’m concerned about — Luisa’s books — is no longer available anywhere on Amazon (and even in the wild, among resellers, they’re rare). Luisa has been disappeared. She’s gone. And I’m a little bit sad, actually. I miss her almost as soon as I get the news. But after all this, you have to ask yourself what gone even means under these circumstances.

What does it mean to vanish when you never really existed in the first place?

Epilogue: Somewhere in Italy

A few days after I give up my search for Luisa Florence, I find something.

On the Amazon listing page for her one remaining book — the canning book from 2020, which exists now solely as a fixed point in the digital landscape, not as a thing that you can actually buy — there’s a publisher listed: Zoe Publishing Ltd.

I’d looked for Zoe Publishing earlier. Ever the hoarder of unremarkable things, I still have a yellow Post-it note on my desk with that name scribbled on it, with a question mark and some other queries I had for Vanicek, the Amazon spokesperson.

Here’s the thing, though. I didn’t ask her. I forgot. And while I’m sure I’d googled the name (once again trusting the artificial intelligence that commands search algorithms), I’m also sure I didn’t find anything. I would have told you if I had.

Now, though, I punch the name in, and I get a UK.gov website that appears to be some sort of massive repository of information on every business legally operating within the United Kingdom. It’s a cold, sterile, towering example of bureaucratic brutalism — massive, ruthlessly organized, cross-referenced and efficient. And Zoe Publishing Ltd is listed among its files.

Zoe Publishing Ltd is — or was — a private limited company, incorporated on the 21st of July, 2020 (just a couple months before Luisa’s first books were released), then dissolved on December 19th, 2023. It’s listed as primarily being concerned with the publishing and retail sale of books, both through mail order and over the internet, and it has an office address listed on Great West Road in Brentford, U.K. The company has zero employees, no outstanding debt or properties, and just one officer: Luigi Sorgia, born September 1972, in Italy.

Yeah, his origins are Italians.

Online, I can’t find the company, only the shrapnel of its dissolution. A few books on day-trading, online schooling, slow-cooker keto recipes, canning and preserving. The occasional publication date (always within the brief window of Zoe Publishing’s existence). On Amazon, there are some publishers with similar names (Zion Zoe Publications, Zoe Shakh Press, Zoe Rosie Publication), but Luigi Sorgia is attached to none of them that I can find. He had just the one company, and now not even that.

But he is a person. An actual, physical human. And he either invented Luisa, or he knew her, once upon a time. He may be the only one who really knows who — or what — she is.

So maybe I’m not ready to give up my search for Luisa Florence just yet.

 

Published as “Looking for Luisa” in the July 2024 issue of Philadelphia magazine.

Where to Celebrate the Paris Olympics Around Philly

The Olympics kick off in Paris on Friday, July 26th and run through August 11th with so much to see —  and plenty of Philly athletes on Team USA. From themed food specials to watch parties and to photo ops and more, here are the best places to celebrate the Summer Olympics around Philadelphia.

Games On! at Dilworth Park

For the first weekend of the Olympics, FrayLife is coming to Dilworth Park with an air-conditioned hub for watching the Games and a schedule of activities for you to channel your inner Olympian. There’ll be everything from a breakdancing clinic to an old-school field day with tug-of-war and dizzy bat! Plus, music, a bar, face-painting and lots more. And the hub opens early (with coffee) for watch parties, because time zones. See the full schedule here.
July 26th-28th, Dilworth Park, 1 South 15th Street.

Medal Bar

Heading down the Shore? Ocean Casino Resort has an elaborate Olympics-themed pop-up bar running all summer long. Medal Bar features lots of screens for watching the Games, photo ops like a medal podium and plenty of red, white and blue decor. And, of course, there are themed cocktails — with names like “Morning in Paris” and “Winning is a Big Dill” (a pickle-juice martini). Oh, and the “Gold Medal” cocktail actually comes with a gold medal. (It’s not real, of course — you have to be an Olympian for that.)
Runs through September 2nd, Ocean Casino Resort, 500 Boardwalk, Atlantic City.

Olympic Games Paris 2024 Hub at the Comcast Center

Comcast is the exclusive U.S. broadcaster of the Olympics, with the events airing on NBC and streaming on Peacock (7,000 hours of live events, according to our guide!). So the Comcast campus is transforming into a hub for the public to watch on a giant screen, and enjoy photo ops and other activations throughout the games.

Beginning July 26th, fans can pose for photos with a 20-foot-long display of the Olympic Rings as well as their Eiffel Tower replica that’s been counting down till the Olympics all season long. Both of those activations will be on the Comcast Center plaza throughout the games. They will also stream live action on a giant screen on the plaza every weekday from July 26th through August 9th. Miss some of the action? The Comcast Experience Wall will feature highlights every day from 7 a.m. to 10 p.m. Some of the restaurants at the Comcast Center — like the French-inspired Café Click — are also planning some special French-themed treats. Check out their Instagram as they announce more.
July 26th-August 11th, Comcast Center, 1701 JFK Boulevard.

Wine Flights at Panorama

This Old City wine bar is featuring two different wine flights to celebrate the Olympics. The $38 “Olympic Flight to France” honors the Games’ host nation with a five-label, all-French flight of wines ranging from a biodynamic Alsatian Riesling blend to a Château Toulifaut merlot. The second flight, called “We Are the Champions,” is inspired by some Olympic hopefuls’ home countries. That one is $36, and includes five wines ranging from a South African sangiovese to an Argentinian cab/malbec. Cheers!
July 26th-August 11th, Panorama, 14 Front Street.

Tasting Menu at Townsend

With all eyes on Paris, it’s this East Passyunk’s French restaurant’s time to shine. So, they’re offering a special “hyper-seasonal” tasting menu created by executive chef Alex Nissley, only available for the duration of the Olympics. The $95 prix-fixe showcases “the epitome of French gastronomy,” with dishes like  confit rabbit tortellini and a Valrhona chocolate soufflé.
July 26th-August 11th, Townsend, 1623 East Passyunk Avenue.

Firework Cocktail at Patchwork

Cheer on Team USA (or the host country, actually … same colors) with a red, white and blue slushy Firecracker cocktail inspired by the eponymous popsicle. The $16 drink’s tricolor blend? Vodka, Meyer lemon, cherry, and blue Curaçao.
July 26th-August 11th, Patchwork, 1620 Chancellor Street.

Food and Drink Specials at Libertee Grounds

Sadly, putt-putt is not an Olympic sport. But this mini-golf restaurant is still getting in on the fun. They’ve got 15 TVs throughout the space so you won’t miss the action while you’re dining on French-inspired steak frites. After  your round, cool off with “Red, White & Boozy” jello shots: layered red, white and blue Jello shots made with vanilla vodka, blue raspberry and strawberry jellos and condensed milk.
July 26th-August 11th, Libertee Grounds, 1600 West Girard Avenue.

“If You Ain’t First, You’re Last” Ale at Evil Genius

Leave it to Evil Genius to come up with a beer tie-in for every occasion. The Olympics are no different: They’ve got this limited-edition “red, blonde, and blue” ale brewed with raspberry and blueberry flavors exclusively at their Fishtown taproom ($13.25 for a 32-ounce crowler). They’ll be showing the Games every day at the taproom, where you can also enjoy a pint of their celebratory ale in person. And if you’re still looking for a way to channel that competitive spirit once the Olympics are through, they’ve got the Summer Beerlympics planned for Saturday, August 17th. Form a four-person team and compete in lawn games like giant beer pong, cornhole and shuffleboard. Each winning player gets a $50 gift card.
Evil Genius, 1727 North Front Street.

Olympic Ring Cocktails at Craft Hall

Another great place to watch the Games, Craft Hall has five Olympics-inspired cocktails — one for each ring — with names like “100 Meter Dash,” “Butterfly Stroke,” and “Finish Line,” no less. Check out the menu here.
July 26th-August 11th, Craft Hall, 901 North Delaware Avenue. 

Olympic Collection at August Moon

Rep Team USA with coastal stripes, flag graphics, and sporty silhouettes in this limited-edition patriotic collection from the South Philly boutique.
August Moon, 1729 East Passyunk Avenue.

Olympic Collection by Boathouse Sports

One of this year’s Best of Philly winners, Philly-based Boathouse Sports always crafts high-quality athletic apparel with cool, old-school vibes. And their Olympics collection is no exception, with nods to both Team USA and host city Paris. Our favorite? The classic Stevenson jacket with an Olympics twist.
Available online.

Glow Like an Olympian

When the Olympics kick off in Paris, Olympic athletes will receive goody bags of skin-care products from none other than Philadelphia’s Danuta Mieloch. We love her Danucera line at Rescue Spa, and now it’s going to be keeping Olympians looking their best. Want to get a little gold-medal glow? The Summer Olympic gift bags include Danucera’s Cerabalm, D22 Tonic, and Master Mask — all available at Rescue Spa’s Rittenhouse location.
Rescue Spa, 1811 Walnut Street.

Meet the Duo Behind Milk Jawn’s Expanding Ice Cream Empire

Behind the Line is Foobooz’s interview series with the people who make up Philly’s dynamic bar and restaurant scene. For the complete archives, go here.

If you go to Milk Jawn’s East Passyunk scoop shop on a hot summer night, chances are there’ll be a line out the door. You’ll find families, groups of friends, and couples (including the occasional first date that’s going well enough for dessert) ordering scoops piled high on a house-made waffle cone. With inventive flavors like lemon curd with blueberry-basil swirl and Earl Grey with honeycomb, and crowd-pleasers like chocolate peanut butter and malted-milk toffee crunch, the 2021 Best of Philly winner is always worth the wait.

Milk Jawn’s focus has been on original flavors made with fresh, seasonal ingredients since its inception in 2020, when Amy Wilson and Ryan Miller teamed up to turn the ice cream Wilson had been whipping up in her home kitchen into a business. Miller brought his 20 years of culinary experience working in Philly restaurants to the table, and together he and Wilson developed the flavors customers have come to know and love. They started out delivering ice cream to people’s homes and selling at farmers markets — Milk Jawn continues to do both today — before opening their Passyunk scoop shop in August 2022 with a production facility around the corner.

As the shop approaches its two-year anniversary, Milk Jawn is on the cusp of another milestone: its second brick-and-mortar location in Northern Liberties at 942 North Second Street, the former home of Just Cravings. Wilson and Miller are opening their new Milk Jawn location this Friday, July 26th at 6 p.m. To celebrate, they’ll be offering free ice cream to the first 100 customers.

Here, they share the secret to their success, their go-to flavors, and what Milk Jawn’s future could look like.

How did Milk Jawn come to be?

Amy: I just started making ice cream as a hobby in my home kitchen. I don’t have a culinary background beyond having a huge sweet tooth, but I’ve been baking and making candy since I was pretty small because I just love it.

I stayed home with my kids to raise them while my husband worked, and then I did a bunch of smaller jobs here and there, like working as a freelance writer — and then I felt like I needed a career. Milk Jawn just sort of naturally grew from that. Since I don’t have any culinary experience, I pulled in Ryan, and we were able to put our heads together. It feels like a really great partnership.

Ryan: Amy and I met through her husband, and we’ve been friends for over 20 years. One day, Amy’s husband said, “Hey man, you’ve got to try Amy’s ice cream. She makes the best ice cream.” I tried it, and it was amazing, so we decided to start a business together.

I’ve been a chef my whole career. Because I had another job, I would work on recipes with Amy in her house, and then I’d have to run off and go to my paying job. Then, COVID happened and I lost my job. Everything shut down, so Amy and I were able to really ramp things up and work on recipes.

Amy: A lot of people think that we started Milk Jawn because of COVID, but we actually started planning the business in 2019. We used the time during the pandemic to work on our recipes and deliver ice cream to people in their houses.

When we started, we had no expectations. We just wanted to test things out and see what was going to happen and if this whole ice cream adventure was going to work. But once we started, it became really apparent that we needed a storefront because it’s so much work to run around town and sell ice cream here and there. Having a permanent place pretty quickly became the goal.

What made you choose Northern Liberties for your second location?

Ryan: We just wanted to offer good ice cream on the other side of the city, and there aren’t many ice cream shops over in Northern Liberties.

Amy: We also wanted a space that’s similar to the Passyunk location in a very walkable neighborhood full of families, and where there wasn’t enough ice cream to fill that need. It worked out perfectly that we came upon that space in Northern Liberties just as Just Cravings was closing.

From the beginning, we’ve heard from people telling us, “Come to my neighborhood! Come to my neighborhood!” We have a lot of customers who travel from Northern Liberties to Passyunk for Milk Jawn, so people have been very excited. It’s just a way for more people to get their hands on our ice cream.

What’s been your biggest takeaway from running the business?

Amy: I learned early on to start building a network of people. We were lucky because there were all these pop-ups that started happening in the pandemic and so many people doing these grassroots culinary experiences, so we just talked to each other and our networks grew. And then I figured out how to find the people you need to talk to who can give you information.

Ryan: A lot of the business owners in the area are very open to helping somebody else get what they need.

Amy: Yeah, this city is awesome. I don’t know how it is in other cities, but when we first started, people reached out to us, and they were like, “How can we help? What do you need? Do you want to trade food?” And then the business improvement districts [organizations in and around Philly that endeavor to support local businesses and communities] are super helpful, too. It’s just been really amazing.

What does Milk Jawn’s future look like? Do you see more locations in Philly or beyond?

Amy: We’re taking things one shop at a time and seeing where we want to go from there. I think, eventually, we want to add catering too, because we get a lot of inquiries for weddings and parties. I think it would be really fun. Maybe the next step would be adding a truck or something like that.

What would you say is the secret to Milk Jawn’s success?

Amy: We’re kind of fanatics about flavor. We workshop flavors for a long time before we introduce them because we want to put out the best product we can.

Ryan: We don’t want to just throw things at our ice cream. We try stuff, and if it doesn’t work, we won’t do it. The main objective is not to have too many ingredients in our flavors that would make them confusing. Also, we wanted to create flavors that would make people want to sit down and eat a whole pint. There’s some crazy ice cream out there, and it’s cool to taste, but, you know, you’re going to have one spoon and say, “Oh, that was wild.” You’re not going to eat a whole pint of macaroni-cheese ice cream.

Speaking of flavors, which ones are you most proud of developing at Milk Jawn?

Amy: Probably the Earl Grey with honeycomb. It’s both kind of unusual and very universally liked. We won an award for it at the North American Ice Cream Association convention in 2021. It was first in the Northeast and second in the country for Best New Flavor, which was pretty awesome because we didn’t even have a storefront at that time — we were just this little pop-up ice cream shop, going around scooping ice cream at Herman’s Coffee and stuff.

Also, flavors like our lemon curd with blueberry-basil swirl that are different than what you might find somewhere else and that are so flavorful — they end up really blowing people’s minds.

On the topic of blowing people’s minds, I have to ask about the chocolate taco. It’s become such a popular item with Milk Jawn customers (myself included). How did it come about?

Ryan: We started making it in October 2023 after Choco Tacos were discontinued in 2022, although we call our version “chocolate tacos,” to be clear. We just saw a void for that need. It was such a nostalgic dessert.

Amy: The funny thing is that we had the idea even before that. Our production facility is in a former Mexican restaurant, and on one of the awnings it still says, “Taqueria.” So as soon as we moved in, we were like, “Oh, we should do an ice-cream taco. That would be amazing.”

When you just want a scoop of ice cream, what do you each go for?

Ryan: I’m personally a coffee nut, so I love the cold brew and caramelized cacao nibs, and the white coffee. I just think they’re phenomenal flavors.

Amy: Chocolate peanut butter. I’m a huge chocolate peanut butter fan.

Ryan: Yeah, Amy’s always telling me, “Add more peanut butter! It’s not enough!”

This interview has been edited for clarity and length.

Here’s Every Restaurant Serving at the 2024 Best of Philly Soirée Presented by Wells Fargo

Philadelphia magazine’s Best of Philly Soirée presented by Wells Fargo is only two weeks away, and this year’s bash is going to be one helluva celebration. Why? Well, it’s the 50th anniversary of the Best of Philly!

Since 1974 we’ve been crowning Philly’s finest in an annual guide of the best music icons, community leaders, local celebrities, artists, business owners, chefs — everybody who’s anybody. And this soirée is bringing them all together for a special night that’s been 50 years in the making.

Join us Wednesday, August 7th, at the Philadelphia Museum of Art, where we’ll be toasting with refreshing wines, cocktails and Stella Artois, and sampling an array of mouthwatering dishes from this year’s winners as well as winners from previous years. We’ll be serving up tomato pie from Liberty Kitchen PHL, pan-fried chicken dumplings from Dim Sum House by Jane G’s, Japanese A5 Wagyu fried rice from Kampar, potato risotto with Kaluga caviar and chive from Lacroix, Best of Philly brownies from Second Daughter Baking Company and so much more. That’s just a small taste of the evening’s menu!

General admission starts at 6:30 p.m., but if you want to start the party an hour earlier, grab a VIP ticket. Other VIP ticket perks include access to a private VIP floor throughout the night, a full bar and exclusive tasting dishes, complimentary valet parking and more. You can get your tickets here.

Still need convincing? Here are all of the restaurants that will be serving up delicious bites throughout the night.

Restaurants and chefs joining us for Philadelphia magazine’s Best of Philly Soirée Presented by Wells Fargo
a.kitchen
Amada
Ambra
AMINA
Bánh Mì & Bottles
Bastia
Bloomsday
Bobby Chez Famous Crabcakes
BOLO
Breezy’s Deli and Market
Cantina la Martina
Care Package Bakes
Center City Pretzel Co.
Darnel’s
Delco Steaks’ Cheesesteak Trolley
Dim Sum House by Jane G’s
DOLCE Italian – Philadelphia
El Merkury
Fishtown Pickle Project
Fork
Friday Saturday Sunday
FUEGO by Jezabel’s
Hey Sugar!
High Street
Hi-Lo Taco
Jerry’s Bar
Kampar
Lacroix
Le Cavalier
Levain Bakery
Liberty Kitchen PHL
Lilah Events
Loch Bar Philadelphia
Madison K Cookies
Nourish
Pizzata Pizzeria
Revolution Taco
Rosemary
Saami Somi
Second Daughter Baking Company
Southwark
The Dandelion Pub
The Prime Rib
Village Whiskey
Vista Peru
White Yak

It’s not often that you get this much culinary talent in one room! If you want to try foods from the best of the best across the region, get your tickets today. We look forward to celebrating 50 years of the Best of Philly with you.

This Cherry Blossom-Filled Wedding Nodded to the Bride’s Chinese Heritage

The love story of emergency medicine resident physician Dee Luo and urology resident physician Bofeng Chen began in 2014, when they were both med students and chairing the same coed fraternity at Penn. Sparks flew during their interactions, and the couple soon went on a first date, to Han Dynasty — a restaurant that just shy of a decade later would be essential to their wedding.

That arrived in April 2023, two years after Bofeng popped the question at a park near the pair’s Fitler Square residence. (They now live in New York.) The affair, photographed by Grace Winter for Asya Photography, featured an aesthetic that was heavily influenced by Dee’s Chinese heritage; she was born in Wuhan, China, and he in Bucharest, Romania.

The couple’s venue, Power Plant Productions — an industrial photo studio and event space in Old City — was dressed up with 23 porcelain vases (some family heirlooms) and dozens of cherry-blossom branches from Dee’s family home in Missouri.

The asymmetrical arch by Forte Florals popped against the flowy all-white window draping.

Before reading their vows, Dee and Bofeng tied a red ribbon around red wine cups and toasted each other, in a tradition that signifies unity, longevity and cooperation.

The tablescapes were pretty in pink, with cheery linens and florals plus vibrant pops of blue from the vases.

Other touches included bottles of anniversary wines for attendees to sign, to be opened by the couple to commemorate their milestone years; a photo of the duo along with every place setting; and a Federal Donuts wall that was equal parts sentimental and delicious.

“Bofeng convinced me he would always love me by bringing over doughnuts after someone broke into my dorm,” Dee says of the choice to include her favorite dessert in their festivities. Guests were treated to extra desserts they could take home to savor later. Another party favor: Dee’s mom assembled cherry-blossom-inspired tins with rose tea buds inside.

At the reception, the groom and bridesmaids — who had been on the dance team with Dee in college — put together a surprise flash mob to BTS’s “Dynamite.”

And the full-circle Han Dynasty connection? It was only natural for the couple to throw their after-party at the establishment where they’d had their first date. With the nightcaps, the restaurant served spicy noodles — a callback to the dish Bofeng pretended he could handle on said date. “The party kept going until the a.m.!” Dee remembers.

THE DETAILS
Photographer: Grace Winter for Asya Photography | Venue: Power Plant Productions | Event Coordination: Chris Meck of Power Plant Events | Florals: Kate Keihl of Forte Florals | Catering & Cake: O’Neill’s Catering | Rings: Brilliant Earth | Hair: Marisa Campagna and Joy DeLucia of Flawless Finish | Invitations: Zola | Officiant: Tommy Hoopes (friend) | Music: DJ Kevin Kong | Choreographer: Fred Astaire Studios | Doughnut Wall: Federal Donuts | After-Party Venue: Han Dynasty

Published as “Dee & Bofeng” in the Summer/Fall 2024 issue of Philadelphia Wedding.

Get more great content from Philadelphia Wedding:
FACEBOOK | INSTAGRAM | NEWSLETTER

It Sounds Like Mayor Parker’s Return-to-Office Plan Isn’t Going So Well

Check phillymag.com each morning Monday through Thursday for the latest edition of Philly Today. And if you have a news tip for our hardworking Philadelphia Magazine reporters, please direct it here. You can also use that form to send us reader mail. We love reader mail!

It Sounds Like Philadelphia Mayor Cherelle Parker’s Return to the Office Plan Isn’t Going So Well

Philadelphia Mayor Cherelle Parker really, really wanted all city workers to get back to the office. She made the demand months ago, setting a July 15th deadline. She survived a legal challenge that could have had a judge issue a preliminary injunction against her. And so, last week, thousands of city employees who started working from home back in The COVID Days did indeed return to the office.

Things aren’t going so well.

“It’s been pure chaos,” one city worker, who asked to remain anonymous since Parker has made it pretty clear that she doesn’t want her people speaking publicly, told me on Tuesday morning. Another said they are considering looking for another job, one that allows her to work remotely. Not only do many city employees feel that it’s unfair and unnecessary to force them to return to work — they would argue that they were doing a perfectly good job from home — they also say that the transition just hasn’t been handled correctly.

WHYY got the jump on the story yesterday, reporting all kinds of problems facing employees who are suddenly back in the office, with said offices lacking space and desks and other basic necessities that workers need to, you know, work. “This entire thing is kind of a slap in the face to workers,” one anonymous city employee told WHYY.

And today, the Inquirer landed a report in which the paper spoke with (again, anonymous) employees from nine city departments. Those employees described downright dirty conditions and, again, a lack of space for all bodies. “You made us come back in the first place, and then you weren’t even prepared for us to come back,” an employee told the Inquirer. Another described the whole thing as “soul sucking.”

“This is not a one-day process,” a Parker administration higher-up told the paper. “It’s ongoing. And we will continue in the direction of creating an enjoyable work experience or an experience that is informed by our employees, even if we don’t agree on the location.”

Amusingly, the Parker team welcomed city employees back with free Chickie’s & Pete’s Crabfries but then reportedly didn’t have enough to feed everybody. Womp womp.

SEPTA Continues to Join the 21st Century

Starting this week, you’ll be able to pay your SEPTA fare using your iPhone or Apple Watch without unlocking or waking your device. Slowly but surely, as the old SEPTA motto went, we’re getting there. Details here.

By the Numbers

+130: Betting odds now available on Arizona senator Mark Kelly getting the nod from Kamala Harris to join the ticket. (For those of you not into gambling, that means that if you bet $100 on Kelly and she picks him, you win $130.) As for Pennsylvania guv Josh Shapiro? He and Kelly were tied at +250 yesterday. And that’s still where Shapiro is at today. Meaning the oddsmakers favor Kelly over Shapiro at this point. That may be a good thing. Sure, Shapiro could make an excellent vice president. But we need him in Pennsylvania. And the fact is, he’s probably just as likely if not more to deliver Pennsylvania to Harris as governor instead of as the VP candidate. Shapiro has plenty of time to run for national office. Back in February, I spoke with Shapiro about that prospect.

63: Age of Jack Morey of Morey’s Pier fame in Wildwood at the time of his death this week. I had the pleasure of speaking with Morey back in 2017, when he explained to me why he loved his job so damn much.

12: Additional chicken finger joints that the Louisiana-based chain Raising Cane’s plans to open in the Philadelphia area. Thanks, but the best chicken fingers around are at this spot in Delco.

Local Talent

If you’re a fan of Sheryl Lee Ralph from Abbott Elementary, I should tell you that she’s co-starring with none other than Susan Sarandon, Megan Mullally and Bette Midler in a new movie, The Fabulous Four. Basically, Bette Midler’s character is getting married in Key West and her old friends travel there to be bridesmaids. Sheryl Lee Ralph actually wasn’t supposed to be in this movie at all. Sissy Spacek had signed on but then backed out for scheduling reasons. The film opens in the Philly area this Thursday.

Make sure you pick up a copy of the brand new August issue of Philly Mag. (You can find it at Barnes & Noble and Whole Foods.) Yes, because it’s the 50th anniversary edition of Best of Philly. But also because my featured interview in that issue is with Preston and Steve of WMMR’s The Preston & Steve Show fame. It’s a funny one. (You can read the online version here.) And for more laughs, tune in to the show on Wednesday morning at 9 a.m. to hear me yuk it up with them about the interview and Best of Philly.

Bloomsday and Green Engine Coffee Announce New Headhouse Square Cafe

Howdy, buckaroos! And welcome back to the weekly Foobooz food news round-up. I know that most of you have probably been focused on the other news happening recently, but we’ve got a couple of new openings on the horizon, some great Summer Olympics specials, and, of course, some ice cream news. Let’s get right into it, shall we?

Breakfast Plans In Headhouse Square

Here’s something I’m super psyched about.

Kelsey Bush and Zach Morris, the team behind Bloomsday and Green Engine Coffee, just announced late last week that they have a third concept in the works, scheduled to open this fall on the same block as Bloomsday in Headhouse Square.

Loretta’s is the name. And I’ll let them describe the concept to you.

“Loretta’s is a cafe rooted in specialty coffee, a robust sweet and savory pastry program, and seasonal lunch and breakfast staples. … Acclaimed specialty coffee service meets a lauded pastry program at this new spot, named for owner Kelsey Bush’s grandma. [Loretta’s] pays homage in both its concept and retro design to all the ‘steel magnolias’ who have paved the way for femininity, both traditional and new, within the hospitality industry.”

And while I’m just as excited as the next guy about retro design and femininity, what really has me checking the calendar is the proposed menu: egg-and-cheese hand pies, viennoiserie-style pastries, seasonal galettes (both sweet and savory), American cinnamon buns with cream-cheese frosting and sandwiches mounted on house-made focaccia.

410 South 2nd Street will be the eventual address. And while there aren’t a ton of details yet, I know y’all are going to want to keep an eye on this one. Which, conveniently, you can do right here.

Fall can’t come soon enough. But in the meantime …

Celebrating the Summer Olympics, Philly Style

Greased pole climbing, doing laps in a dumpster pool, the 100-yard SEPTA dash — these are Philly’s Olympic events. But with the 2024 Games rapidly approaching, we thought it would be nice to shout out a couple places celebrating the XXXIII Olympiad in a somewhat classier fashion.

Take, for example, Panorama, the restaurant and wine bar at the Penn’s View Hotel. They’re already legit famous for their custom-built wine system that features 120 taps, each pouring from a different bottle of wine, and now they’re putting that system to good use by offering two different wine flights to celebrate the Games. First, in honor of the host country, they’ve got a five-label, all-French flight featuring everything from a biodynamic Alsatian riesling blend to a 2019 Château Toulifaut merlot. That’ll run you $38. And then, just to give that system a bit of a workout, they’re doing a second flight called “We Are The Champions,” inspired by the home countries of various medal hopefuls. So that means a Spanish tempranillo paired with an Argentinian cab/malbec and a South African Sangiovese. Again, five glasses in the flight, $36 all-in. And for those of you who are still thirsty afterward, Panorama is popping the corks on two special French champagnes for the event: a Grand Cru~Oger Blanc de Blanc Klepka Sausse for $45 and a Methode Traditionnelle Famille Heraud Champerriere Blanc for just $19.

Over at the Hyatt Centric, Patchwork has a Firecracker cocktail on the board, mixing vodka, Meyer lemon, cherry and blue Curacao for a riff on the classic rocket pop. Pair that with a burger or a roast pork sandwich for $29, and there’ll be no question about who you’re pulling for in Paris.

Meanwhile, the team at Townsend is really leaning into the French-ness of the whole affair with a “hyper-seasonal” chef’s tasting menu celebrating the pinnacle of French gastronomy. At $95 a head, the highlights of the menu are the confit rabbit tortellini with sauce lapin and maitakes; roasted duck breast with potato pavé; and the Valrhone chocolate souffle with amaretto creme anglaise. The menu will be available nightly from Friday, July 26th, to Sunday, August 11th.

I’m sure there will be more celebrations once we get past of the opening ceremonies. I’ll keep an eye out and let you know about anything particularly spectacular.

But for now, what’s next?

How ‘Bout Some Free Ice Cream?

It feels like forever ago that I told y’all about the plans for Milk Jawn to expand into No Libs. And while it sucks a little bit that they missed the worst of the heat wave, the good news is that the second location of the beloved local ice cream joint will be opening this Friday at 6 p.m. at 946 North 2nd Street.

Even better? They’re celebrating by giving away free ice cream.

The first 100 people in line get a free ice cream cup. That’s the deal. Doors open at right at 6 p.m. and I’m guessing there’s going to be a line, so plan accordingly.

After the initial rush, the new shop will be open Thursday through Sunday, from noon to 11 p.m., serving up the same flavors that made the original spot famous: cold brew and caramelized cacao nibs, chocolate-hazelnut crunch, lemon curd with blueberry-basil swirl, old favorites like chocolate peanut butter, and vegan mango sticky rice.

The original Milk Jawn isn’t going anywhere. The new one will likely be expanding its hours once the rush of being in a new neighborhood subsides and the crew gets their bearings. And before you know it, the seasons will be changing, and the shops will be offering the caramel apple pie and Earl Grey with honeycomb — two flavors that make fall in Philly my favorite season.

Now who has room for some leftovers?

The Leftovers

Speaking of favorite seasons, one of the best things about summer in Philly is the corn pizza at Olce Pizza Grille out in Skippack. That’s just a fact. It’s inarguable.

As a matter of fact, corn in general is one of the best things about Philly summers. On the cob, on a pizza, in pasta — however it comes, I’m a fan.

So it’s not really surprising that the “Cornucopia” dinner at Urban Farmer caught my eye. Scheduled for Thursday, August 15th, it is basically seven courses that are all about corn. From baby corn elote to sweet corn ravioli, charred corn panzanella to golden tilefish with corn maque choux and corn-sugar caramelized skin, corn is the focus of every single course, right down to the dessert — buttered popcorn ice cream with blackberries and corn sugar merengue.

Tickets will run you $120, and dinner starts promptly at 6 p.m., with communal seating in the Verdant Room, away from the regular dining floor. And if you’re down for it, there are also corn-based cocktails to pair with dinner, like a buttered-corn old fashioned ($20) or cold brew and corn liquor topped with whipped cream. You can get more details (and your tickets) right here.

Northern Liberties Night Market is on Wednesday night. Twenty-six food trucks (including some of our personal favorites), all getting together for one summer night on 2nd Street? Yeah, it’s a good time. It starts at 5 p.m., runs until 10 p.m., and you can get all the details here. If you miss this one, the next Night Market will be in September, so start making plans now.

Essex Squeeze, which got its start at the Essex Market in NYC, has kicked off its national expansion by opening its first non-New York location in Northern Liberties. The place does fresh-squeezed juices, shots, smoothies, lemonades, toasts and bowls. It’s a big menu (about 40 items long) squeezed (get it?) into a very small space — just 200 square feet at 1030 North 2nd Street. Healthy food at affordable prices is their thing. That, plus endless customization of their juices, smoothies and bowls. And they’ll be offering exactly that, seven days a week, from 8 a.m. to 7 p.m. (10 a.m. to 6 p.m. on Sundays). And if that sounds like your jam, I’ve got good news for you: This isn’t the only Philly location they’ve got in the works.

After 27 years serving Greek food in Washington Square West, it looks like Effie’s is closing up shop for good. The Business Journal is reporting that the BYO is up for sale, and that owner Effie Bouikidis plans to turn out the lights sometime in the next couple weeks.

Finally this week, it looks like Federal Donuts is expanding the menu at all of their shops by offering doughnut holes for the first time ever (on the regular menu, anyway). They come in four varieties: the three house flavors (strawberry lavender, cookies and cream, cinnamon brown sugar), plus a new powdered variety. They come 10 holes to a large plastic cup, one flavor per cup — and a big ol’ cup of holes will run you just $5.

So now at least we all know what we’re doing for breakfast tomorrow, right?

Preston and Steve from WMMR’s Morning Show Tell All

The owners of this magazine generally dissuade us from touching on topics like, say, dildos. But they’re making an exception this month so that we can interview Preston Elliot and Steve Morrison, the co-stars of WMMR’s indefatigable show bearing their names. The pair have been on the Philly airwaves together in one form or another since 1998, and next year marks their 20th at the station. In this interview with Preston and Steve, they explain the secrets of their success and why their silly and sophomoric humor works so well after all these years.

Hi, guys. I know you just came off the air from your morning broadcast. What were the scintillating topics of conversation?

Preston: The big thing was that we had Nikki Glaser on. We all love her.

Steve: The last time we had Nikki on, we were having dildo races! And she just happened to have a vibrator on her, so she became a last-minute entry into our race.

My mother will be so happy to read this.

Steve: We also discussed the etiquette of multi-person brawls.

Preston: And me trying to replace “I have to do that” with “I get to do that” in my life. If you find yourself with something you’re not looking forward to doing, rather than telling yourself you have to do this, you reframe it in a way that you get to do something.

That sounds like absolute bullshit.

Preston: I strive to make it work but, generally, find that it’s a bridge too far. I’m working more on being in the moment, and that’s going well. But the “get to do this” thing, I’m having trouble.

Steve: We were also talking about Stonehenge and science.

So a celebrity interview, science, self-help mantras, and fight manners. Just another day in the life at the Preston & Steve show. You’re typically on the air for more than five hours each morning. How much of the content do you know the day before?

Steve: At any given moment, we have a list of 50 to 60 things in our queue that we might address, see what works, and usually the discussion goes so off the rails that Alex Haley couldn’t find the roots of where we started. Those are the best days.

Preston: Other than the interviews, things just kind of unfold as they do.

’MMR is, first and foremost, a rock station, as it has been since 1968. I know a little bit about the types of music you both like — I would encourage our readers to look up videos of you impressively drumming along to Rush songs, Preston. And it would be easy to sit here and blah blah blah about our favorite bands. But what I really want to know about is your guilty-pleasure music.

Preston: Oh man. Oof. [long pause] All right. All right. You really want me to let it all hang out there, Victor?

You know it!

Preston: I will admit to going through a Spice Girls phase. They were cute and fun and catchy, and I actually loved some of that music.

Steve, have you lost all respect for Preston now?

Steve: I went to see the Spice World movie when it came out!

I never know when you’re joking.

Steve: I will only say this: I was definitely an early Debbie Gibson adopter.

Preston: Wow.

See, we’re only minutes in and you’re already learning about each other. I was going to ask you to do this next year, because that marks the 20th anniversary of the show moving from Y100 to WMMR and really taking off, but then, well, Rob McElhenney couldn’t do this at the last minute.

Preston: Yeah, thanks for the sloppy seconds, Victor. [laughs]

But I think you’re a perfect fit for this, the 50th anniversary issue of Best of Philly. Because you’ve been on Philly radio for more than half that time, and you truly embody what being the Best of Philly is. If you didn’t, you wouldn’t be so successful for this long.

Preston: Well, thank you! We’ve had a tremendous­ amount of success, and with the most recent round of ratings­ numbers that have come in, our support is as high as it’s ever been. It blows us away.

My sense from attending your events and hearing your fans call in is that part of your success comes from this unusual two-generation fan base.

Steve: It’s the most anomalous thing. It’s almost a laughable concept that you’d be wanting to listen to what your parents listened to — and still listen to — but that’s exactly what has happened. We just did our annual blood drive, and this woman comes up to me with a picture of her and her baby daughter with me from 18 years ago. Now her daughter is donating blood with her. We like to joke and say that we’re so uniformly stupid that we’re easily accessed by anyone.

When did you realize you had gone from a fledgling show on Philly radio to a local institution?

Preston: Before social media was big, back when people would send lots of chain emails, this list winds up in my inbox of the 40 things you do that prove you’re a real Philadelphian. You know, you say “wooder.” You’ve watched Rocky too many times. That kind of thing. And down near the bottom of the list: Listen to the Preston & Steve show every day. And I was like, wow, we’ve dug into the marrow here. We found our way into the hearts of Philadelphians.

How would you define your roles and those of the other cast members?
Steve: Preston is the driver, and he’s imbued with this gift where you immediately feel like he’s your buddy. He relates to the audience. And my job is to interrupt Preston and make him laugh.

Preston: Casey organizes and helps run the show, but he’s a wild card, because he has no filter. Nick has so much information in his head, and both he and Casey have such good knowledge of sports, so they keep Steve and me up to speed. And Nick has a great laugh, which is important. Kathy is wonderful. She only engages when she is legitimately interested in what we’re talking about. She doesn’t just jump in whenever. She’s also a priss and a prude but dirty as hell at the same time. Feminine. But then, locker­ room talk.

And Marisa keeps all of you grounded in what’s happening in Philly, because she goes to all the restaurants, all the parties. When I came on your show earlier this year to talk about our 50 Best Restaurants, she said she’d been to 38. No one does that!

Preston: She knows the vibe of the city far more than the rest of us. She goes to all the “scenes.”

Steve: Basically, what you need to know about Marisa is she’s the only one who will agree to attend Dîner en Blanc.

Love a little Dîner en Blanc jab every now and then. Okay, my son walked in with a piece of paper with a question on it for you: “Are the shart-outs electronically produced or are you doing them live on the air?”

[Both laugh]

For the sake of the reader who might not be a regular listener, you must explain.

Preston: Years ago, shout-outs became a thing on the radio, where a host would give a shout-out to a listener. It was being beaten to death. So repetitive and boring. But then the movie Along Came Polly with Ben Stiller and Philip Seymour Hoffman came out, and that’s the first time I had heard the word shart, which, for your readers, is the sound you make when you think you have to fart but a little poop comes out.

Steve: It’s a very wet fart. And we make some of those sounds on the air live and some are also recordings of Casey’s friend’s actual farts or sharts.

I feel so enlightened having this knowledge.

Preston: So people will email us, saying there is somebody they want to congratulate, a birthday, whatever, or it might be the last day of chemotherapy for someone. And, so, we give them a shart-out.

It’s so stupid. But it works. It’s a way you connect with the community.

Steve: People love farts. We’ve been laughing at farts since infancy. And let me tell you something I’ve learned over the years. A lot of people will say that what we do is guy humor. Women aren’t going to like this! Completely. Wrong. Women love us.

We are the respite, a safe haven. And do you know how many times we’ve been thanked for that? There are no soapboxes here. And we’re not trying to offend anybody.” — Steve Morrison

Was there some FM morning show that inspired you 30 years ago to create this?

Preston: Honestly, I hated morning shows. And I certainly didn’t want to do a morning show, because you have to wake up too early in the fucking morning.

Steve: I feel like, in a lot of ways, our show is a parody of the morning-drive radio show, the way that David Letterman was a parody of daytime talk shows when he first aired in the mornings. And there’s just this unique mix in each show. We had Ken Burns in to talk about one of his great documentaries, and then we also had a porn star in the room that day. And everyone got along so wonderfully. And the next time Ken came on the show, he asked, “Where’s the stripper?!” Life is sort of this Whitman’s sampler of things, and I think we try to represent that in the show.

One other key to your show seems to be that you guys don’t do “heavy.” No murders. You don’t debate election outcomes. You don’t get into insurrections.

Preston: We have a news break at the beginning of the day that will talk about anything big going on, but no, we definitely do not break it down or get into big discussions.

You absolutely avoid divisive issues except maybe for people liking or not liking Taylor Swift.

Steve: You know, Victor, it would be safer to talk about politics than not liking Taylor Swift. If you wanna bring the hurt, you get nasty about Taylor Swift! But seriously, we are the respite, a safe haven. And do you know how many times we’ve been thanked for that? There are no soapboxes here. And we’re not trying to offend anybody.

Except my mom with the dildo races.

Preston: Sorry about that! One thing we really pride ourselves on is this: Never. Be. Mean. There’s just no reason for it.

There have been some major staffing shake-ups and changes at WMMR in the past couple of years that I know you can’t discuss in detail — you are, after all, employees — but your fans have certainly been discussing them and majorly trashing the big corporation that owns the station, Beasley Media Group. Can you answer this question? Has your job become harder working for a company like Beasley?

Preston: Honestly, no. Not for the Preston & Steve show. We’ve had a certain amount of success and are trusted by whoever has owned this company over the years to just do what we do, how we wanna do it.

Steve: But it’s certainly hard to see your co-workers let go, corporate cuts and so forth.

One longtime trademark of your show was Jackass-style stunts. You used to do them all the time. Virtually never nowadays. Did your bosses put a stop to that?

Preston: There were so, so many stunts. Truly a plethora, featuring cannons, detonations, all kinds of things. Things where we were praying that someone didn’t, you know, die.

Steve: But because of the amount of legalese now and the overly litigious nature of things, it’s hard to pull them off today. Lawyers!

I remember Terry Gross telling me about her Fresh Air interviews that didn’t go so well: Bill O’Reilly walking out in the middle of the interview, Gene Simmons being the misogynistic scumbag that he is. Any interviews like these come to mind?

Preston: Wayne Brady was an absolute frigging jerk, totally disinterested in us and annoyed by our questions. I thought maybe it was us, but then a year later, a friend in radio brought him up out of the blue and said, “Wayne Brady is a dick.” So I guess it wasn’t us!

Steve: And Wallace Shawn from The Princess Bride and My Dinner With Andre. He was so lame.

Preston: So lame!

Steve: I was like, how can you be this boring and unfunny?! You’re Wallace Shawn!

If somebody wants to bet me $1,000 that you’ll still be on the air in 2031 after your latest contract extension ends, do I take that bet?

Preston: I’m still having fun and definitely don’t see 2030 as being the last year.

Steve: I’m the oldest of the group, and I’ll be doing this as long as I am even fairly sentient. It’s just a wonderful way to spend your morning. I don’t want to sound like a Hallmark card here, but my wife, Clare, and I are really humbled by the fact that the people of Philadelphia have given us the life and the livelihood that we have. And then to see 1,100 people coming to give blood at our blood drive or seeing people donate two million pounds of food at our big Camp Out for Hunger event for Philabundance each November, it’s truly, truly moving. We’re not going anywhere.

 

Five Notorious Stunts From the Preston & Steve Archives

Granny in a wood chipper? Flying sex dolls?

Nacho Cannon

The target? A Preston & Steve intern. The weapon of choice? A cannon filled with nachos. “The problem was, we didn’t realize just how powerful this cannon was,” says Preston. “It was really crazy,” adds Steve. “It’s amazing no one ever died.”

The Wood Chipper

You wanted to win Eagles playoff tickets? You had to show up with collateral, something important to you. Answer a trivia question right? You win the tickets. Wrong? Into the wood chipper your item goes. “One woman brought her grandmother’s ashes,” says Preston. “It was awful,” Steve adds. “There were human remains flying all over the place. I got so many ashes in my mouth.”

Kill Casey

The team spent a month trying to find new ways to kill Casey Boy. “We dragged him behind a horse at full gallop and shot him with thousands of paintballs,” recalls Steve. “He just wouldn’t die.”

The Cardboard Classic

“Just the right amount of reckless abandon and fun” is how Steve sums up this annual event in the Poconos in which listeners design outlandish sleds from cardboard (the sleds often sport beer taps and fireworks) and then launch themselves down a mountain. “That photo of us in front of the raging fire was the first and last time we executed our brilliant idea of finishing the event with a huge ceremonial cardboard-sled bonfire,” recalls Steve. Preston points out that the event also features semi-nudity and “snow rash,” two things that sound particularly unpleasant together.

The Sex Doll

What would happen if you attached a Go-Pro’d, GPS’d sex doll to an extra-large helium balloon and released it? Sometimes, it got caught in trees near office buildings. “Another time, it wandered a little too close to the airport and over active traffic. Our station manager got an angry call,” Steve says.

 

This Preston and Steve interview was published as “The Radio Stars” in the August 2024 issue of Philadelphia magazine.

Hype Builds Around Josh Shapiro as Kamala Harris Ponders Running Mate

Check phillymag.com each morning Monday through Thursday for the latest edition of Philly Today. And if you have a news tip for our hardworking Philly Mag reporters, please direct it here. You can also use that form to send us reader mail. We love reader mail!

Hype Builds Around Josh Shapiro as Kamala Harris Ponders Vice-President Pick

Will he or won’t he? Leading into the weekend, the question on everybody’s mind was most definitely will Joe Biden drop out of the race or will Joe Biden stay in? But by the end of the weekend, with Joe Biden officially pulling out of the race on Sunday and endorsing VP Kamala Harris as his successor on the Democratic ticket, the question became: Who will Kamala Harris choose as her candidate for vice-president? And there’s a fair amount of smart money out there that the answer is Pennsylvania Governor Josh Shapiro.

Not just smart money but actual money. Yes, you can bet on who Kamala Harris will pick as her vice presidential candidate. And online betting website Bet Online puts Josh Shapiro and North Carolina Governor Roy Cooper as the most likely picks, followed by, in this order, Arizona Senator Mark Kelly and Kentucky Governor Andy Beshear. Less likely candidates? Secretary of Transportation Pete Buttigieg and Michigan Governor Gretchen Whitmer. Those of you pulling for an Oprah run? She’s the biggest longshot.

In a story filed on Monday morning, 6ABC cites unnamed sources as saying that Harris called Shapiro on Sunday after Biden made his announcement. No word on what the content of that conversation was.

Pennsylvania Speaker of the House Joanna McClinton, a Democratic party superdelegate who will be at the Democratic National Convention in August, tells Philly Mag that Shapiro is the ideal choice for vice president.

“Pennsylvania is such a pivotal swing state,” McClinton says. “And keep in mind that he has won three times, including during the devastation of 2016, when he won by a larger margin than Hillary Clinton lost. He continues to win in rural areas, and for governor, he defeated [Donald Trump’s] handpicked Republican opponent.” (Shapiro won twice for Pennsylvania Attorney General, beginning in 2016, and followed that with the win for governor last November.)

As for Kamala Harris as the presidential pick, it’s fair to say McClinton is pleased.

“She is an excellent choice, the woman who can turn the page in American history by becoming the first woman to be our president,” McClinton says. “She’s the children of two immigrants, the epitome of the American Dream. She’s made history with every single one of her elections … What better person is there to defeat a misogynistic convicted felon who led a deadly insurrection and made every effort — both personal and professional — to disdain women than a woman named Kamala Harris?”

“Everybody Was Pissed”

That’s what city workers told WHYY about their first mandated week back in the office.

By the Numbers

$127.4 million: Price Krispy Kreme just got when selling its majority stake in Philly’s Insomnia Cookies.

9,000: Approximate number of low-wage workers in Pennsylvania who are owed lots of money in wage-theft cases. A total of something like $18 million. And, apparently, some of them might not even know about it. Juliana Feliciano Reyes from the Inquirer explains.

0: Amount of patience Kylie Kelce has for your pregnancy speculation.

0: Chances that jailing Johnny Doc will solve Philly’s corruption problem. Wanna know what will? Read this.

Best of Philly Has Arrived

Every year, the writers and editors at Philly Mag get together to determine the people, places, and things that are the Best of Philly. We’ve been doing this for 50 years, if you can believe that. And we have a slew of new winners plus a celebration of winners from the past. You can view the online version here. And look for the gorgeous new cover at your neighborhood Barnes & Noble and Whole Foods stores starting this week. Here’s a peek:

Local Talent

You love to shop for local produce, so why not spend your money on local bands? This week, World Cafe Live hosts Beta Hi-Fi, a free musical festival featuring all local bands. If you’re looking for other ideas for fun things to do this week, we’ve got you covered.