Review: Chicago-style pizza at Hook & Master marks the return of Jose Garces and a corner bar

Steven Seibel was just talking about how peas are “such an underrated pizza topping,” a little known truth he proves beyond doubt with his carbonara-style take on a Chicago tavern pizza at Hook & Master, where the crackery crust is topped with smoky nuggets of Nueske’s bacon, confit garlic cream, grated egg yolks, and the sweet green pop of fresh peas.

It’s one of those startlingly good creations — the earthy sweetness of cornmeal in the crust setting off the delicate toppings — that reassures me there are still plenty of unique styles to stand out in Philly’s crowded pizza scene.

Seibel, 35, had also been talking about the surreal sensation of being plucked from relative chef obscurity for this project by Jose Garces through a random hair stylist connection. One day Pawel Jan Gorzelewski was cutting Garces’ hair and bragging about the pizza made by his neighbor — Seibel — out of his South Philly house during a pandemic pop-up. The next thing Seibel knew, he was serving heat-charred Brooklyn-style pies from the 1970s wall oven in his home kitchen to the seemingly voracious Iron Chef.

“I’m just like, ‘Holy, cow!’ These beautiful pies start coming to the table and I could see the passion in his eyes,” said Garces. He’d been looking for someone to run a hybrid concept he’d been mulling for years: a pizzeria with stylistic nods to his native Chicago paired with seafood small plates and a tiki bar.

» READ MORE: Jose Garces taps into his Chicago pizza roots.

“Initially, I was like, ‘I don’t get it,’ ” says Seibel, who’s more likely to be drinking a Miller High Life than a Tygershark, the tropical whiskey sour laced with Maggie’s Farm Falernum liqueur that’s the best seller at Hook & Master, which has bars on both floors of its 60-seat corner building.

To date, Seibel’s experience had largely been in corporate dining and nonprofits like the Broad Street Ministry, where for eight years he helped reimagine the possibilities of cooking scratch meals to feed the homeless. To be chosen with such a dearth of restaurant experience to helm such a high-profile project, Jose Garces’ much-awaited return to Philly’s dining scene, was not unlike being plucked off a pickup basketball court to become the point guard for the 76ers.

“I was shocked,” said Seibel, recalling the lingering surprise that Garces even showed up at his house. “But once that wore off, I always knew I had the talent to do this.”

And then another story line walked in. Just as Seibel was waxing poetic in our phone interview over the floury ash of Utah red wheat that forms a roasty powder beneath his Brooklyn-style crusts, he was interrupted by a woman who’d walked into the bar with wide-eyed amazement.

Yesenia Cintron, 34, was looking for a bittersweet piece of personal history. Her grandparents had owned this bar at Second and Master Streets in the 1990s when it was called Pinuelas. The Olde Kensington neighborhood was still predominantly Latino then, and her abuela, Elena Irizarry, was known for giving out Puerto Rican pernil and rice and beans to their neighbors for free on Sundays. That all came to a horrific end in 1996 when Irrizary was shot and killed behind the bar by armed robbers — a murder that remains unsolved.

And yet, Cintron, now a health-care administrator, had returned because “I also have so many good memories here.” She and her sisters, who’d spent countless hours in a playroom at the top of a spiral staircase over the kitchen, once even contemplated buying this building to reclaim this corner for her family, which had sold it.

As she toured the newly renovated building with her father, Ernesto Gonzalez Jr., on the phone in her hand, she could not stop beaming at the colorful makeover of the space. Most recently the Liquid Room, it’s now an intimate bi-level lair of tropical energy and nautical themes, with a giant muraled octopus rising from the waves across the bar’s exterior, and inside a graffiti-style portrait of Bill Murray’s title character from The Life Aquatic with Steve Zissou, by Philadelphia artist Nero. The Wes Anderson movie was one of Garces’ prime inspirations for this unusual concept.

“I can’t stop smiling, I’m not going to lie,” said Cintron, who lives in Bucks County. “This is amazing.”

Her unexpected visit was a potent reminder of the complex personal histories that linger inside this city’s old buildings, especially in neighborhoods undergoing as dramatic a gentrification shift as this one just west of Fishtown. When I reviewed the Mexican restaurant across the street in 2009, Que Chula Es Puebla was the only building left standing on its entire city block. It’s now surrounded by the massive Dwell Luxury apartment development with rents over $3,000 a month.

“It’s complicated for the older generations,” Cintron conceded. “But I’m all for it. I’m absolutely bringing my husband.”

The sense of rebirth and creativity surrounding this project is palpable, from the building itself to Jose Garces’ career. This is the first original brick-and-mortar restaurant from him in seven years, since the financial issues that forced the bankruptcy sale of much of his company in 2018.

The seafood-driven small plates and salads that complement the pizza menu are hardly new territory — longtime fans familiar with the Garces playbook will recognize tender grilled octopus with paprika oil and chickpeas, the kanpachi crudo, and the fresh ahi tuna with citrus and black olive aioli. But there is a distinctively quirky vision here that manages to bring these disparate concepts into magnetic harmony.

The cocktail program designed by Brooklyn-based consultant and author Shannon Mustipher is technically more rum-centric than faithful to tiki classics, says bar manager Pete Adams. But the drinks add a spirited, fresh juice blast splash of playfulness and energy to these long and narrow rooms, as diners sip updated riffs on Mai Tais, Junglebirds and Swizzles, as well as the nutmeg-dusted Parasol, (the first banana daiquiri I could stand to drink) infused with house-fermented banana puree.

Garces, who’s also been in a major mentoring mode of late with the chef-in-residency series that helped reboot his Volvér at the Kimmel Center, has landed a keeper at Hook & Master with Seibel. The rest of the menu is a nice light and flavorful departure from the usual pizzeria formula. But it is Seibel’s talent for playing with pizza’s six essential ingredients — flour, water, yeast, salt, oil, and cheese — that truly elevates Hook & Master as a worthy destination.

Garces has given Seibel a major challenge to produce three distinct styles of pies, and the chef has succeeded soundly on at least two of them. His classic Brooklyn-style is among the best around, its well-developed dough full of yeasty depth, with the perfect amount of char-bubbled spotting and chew around the edges, with an ideal balance of flavors in its center of molten sweet mozz mottled with bright red sauce. It’s a zesty springboard for savory toppings like the house sausage with long-hot relish, or Garces’ “23″ ode to Michael Jordan with sausage, pepperoni, and mushrooms.

I was especially impressed with the even thinner rounds of tavern-style pies that Garces says are the most common style in Chicago. The crunchy-edged rounds are party cut into squares that, delicately laden with unusual toppings like that carbonara, or octopus (for the “Pulpo Fiction”), or the spit-roasted chicken Alfredo with broccolini, were impossible to stop eating.

I experienced the opposite effect with the densely disappointing pan pies inspired by Garces’ nostalgia for Pequod’s in Chicago. Its towering crust, hefty girth, and mile-high toppings may be tempting. Garces says one guest even piled boquerones, prawns, and seasonal crab on top for a $85 build-their-own pizza splurge.

But be forewarned: The leaden core of doughy cheese inside these Chicago giants ground my appetite to a halt on two occasions, the skyscraper crush of ingredients never quite adding up.

That adjustments may still need to be made at a new restaurant trying to master another city’s specialty is no surprise. But there are already so many good things happening at Hook & Master, which has brought bright new life to a Philly corner and promising new chapters for both a veteran chef and his talented protégé, that it’s already a success.

The Inquirer is not currently giving bell ratings to restaurants due to the pandemic.

1361 N. Second St., 267-761-5172; hookandmasterphl.com

Dinner Wednesday through Sunday, 4-10 p.m.

Pizzas, $18-$28, with additional toppings, $2.50-$6.50.

Street parking only.

Downstairs dining room and patio are wheelchair accessible.