The local, seasonal eatery Southwark has been on our radar for several years. After hearing so many good things about it, we finally had the chance to dine there and experience it for ourselves, thanks to a generous engagement gift from Picky's family. (By the way, Messy and Picky are now officially engaged! More on that later.) Picky has become friends with Sheri and Kip, the owners of Southwark, through working at The Farmstand — making the outing all the more special, as we were able to support their hard work.
We walked inside the cozy spot and were greeted by a lovely dark wood bar with Kip serving up drinks. We made our way to the dining room which seats about 30 (with room for another 25 or so in the garden when it's nice).
Freshly made potato bread with little strips of parmesan and rosemary baked in made its way to our table with two pearl-onion-sized spheres of butter. Since Southwark is very conducive to drinking, we figured we might as well live it up and order drinks. We kept it old school with a Tom Collins for Messy and an Old Fashioned for Picky. We chatted with our supremely helpful server and ordered up a good amount of grub off of their menu. (We went in the fall so what you see might be different.)
Messy started off with the soup du jour: pureed late summer vegetables with cold olive sour cream. It was delicious.
Messy, not having too many non-meat options, decided to order up a series of small plates instead of the one vegetarian entree. We shared the heirloom tomato and buffalo mozzarella caprese with purple and green basil, another one of the daily specials, which are dictated by what's available from the farms in the region.
We split the grilled peach salad – charred red onion, baby greens, mascarpone, honey-mint dressing. Cut into wedges and reformed into a whole with mascarpone stone – ingenious! Messy ordered up a Domaine Lafage "Novellum" chardonnay (2007 Côtes Calalanes, France) after finishing her Tom Collins. Picky stuck to the rye and ordered up another Old Fashioned.
A surprise came out as a secondi: seared salmon with a watermelon and ahi tuna ceviche. Picky has become a big fan of ceviche as of late. Light and juicy, it gave away perfectly while slicing into the crispy, seared skin of the salmon.
Messy's main course was the goat cheese – baked Shellbark Hollows Farms goat cheese with herb and parmesan crust, poached apple, pepper-rosemary lavash, buckwheat honey. It was absolutely delectable, but clearly insufficient as a main course. This is not Southwark's fault — Messy shouldn't have shared her other small plates.
Picky's entree was the probably the best plate of food he's had this year. Barbequed smoked pork belly, baked beans, wilted collards, and Birchrun blue cheese sauce. The on-the-bone slab of bacon (let's face it: that's what it is, folks) was tender and intensely flavorful. The pork was not masked by the BBQ, but thoughtfully enhanced. Picky dutifully dipped into the Birchrun blue cheese sauce with each bite and did his best to keep Messy's fork from stealing scoops of sauce. The beans were undercooked, but after talking to some friends, that seems to be the current style, for some reason. They did provide some contrast to the tender pork, but Picky wasn't expecting an almost-crunchy bean. Of course, when Messy pointed out the near-crunchiness, Picky informed her that for non-vegetarians, "the beans really aren't the point."
And for dessert — yes, we had room for desert — we got one apiece. Chocolate Pot de Crème topped with whipped cream for Picky, whose sweet tooth can't resist a rich chocolatey finale to a meal. It didn't disappoint. More of a cold ganache than a custard, but Picky wasn't complaining.
Messy's chocolate shortbread mint chocolate chip ice cream sandwich with fresh spearmint ground into the ice cream was shockingly flavorful and fresh. The homemade mint ice cream was unlike any either of us has had. Bits of real spearmint (not some flavoring) spiced up each mouthful. If only a six-pack of these were available to take home, we'd eat them every night.
Southwark is just plain classy. It's classy when you first walk in. It's classy after a few drinks. It's classy when you roll your full self out of there. Our meal was fantastic and so was our server (we're so sorry we forgot his name — we did have a few drinks!) which makes the experience so much better.
Southwark
701 S. 4th St
Philadelphia, PA 19147
215.238.1888
Food: Tu – Th: 5.30p – 10.30p
F – Sa: 5.30p – 11.30p
Su: 11a – 5p
Bar: Tu – Sa: 5p – 2a
M: Closed
