What does it take to get 4 bells from Craig LaBan? | Let’s Eat

If you checked out Craig LaBan’s review of the newly relocated Townsend, you may have wondered: Why didn’t Tod Wentz’s French gem get LaBan’s top, “four-bell” rating? Scroll down to where LaBan explains. But first: The craft-brewing gods at Tired Hands Brewing Co. have joined the suburban migration into the city, opening a bar-restaurant in Fishtown. Also this week: Some new dim sum in Rittenhouse, and a word of a Chester County hangout that, um, bears mention.

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— Michael Klein

Tired Hands Brewing draws lines of craft-beer enthusiasts when it releases one of its out-there canned beers in Ardmore. Similarly, crowds are now forming in Fishtown, where Jean Broillet IV and crew are in their first week at St. Oner’s, their coolly elegant bar-restaurant in a walk-up at 2218 Frankford Ave. It’s across the street from Tired Hands’ seasonal beer garden. At only about 35 seats — about half at the bar — reservations might be a good idea.

They’re clearly having fun. The name is a play on “stoners.” The priced-to-sell menu from chef Bill Braun is a tasty goof, as he dug into the Chinese restaurant playbook, added ingredients from local providers such as Primal Supply, and came up with such dishes as clams and XO sauce over bucatini; “leftover” lo mein, whose chilled noodles and veggies are topped with ginger scallion sauce; and mapo tofu noodle made with house-extruded rigatoni, mushroom, and tofu (best to add pork). Don’t miss the dan dan noodles with Szechuan chicken liver sauce. Just one dessert: white chocolate ice cream with orange-ourison granita and what Braun calls “fortune cookie shatter.”

You have fun. How about funky? Check out the restrooms and give a listen. Broillet, an audiophile and tinkerer, hooked up a synthesizer that generates pulses that loop back into an oscillator, which feeds a Krell patch, which booms out the randomness through speakers on the ceiling. In effect, you the user create the music.

St. Oner’s, open daily at 4 p.m., is a one-stop shop, beverage-wise. They’re importing nine beers from the TH breweries in Ardmore, as well as the Awake Minds coffee that they roast, the kombucha that they brew (under the 333 brand), and the wine that they barrel. Only the spirits are from outside. You can get cans to go, as well.

Andy’s Chicken | Jenkintown

Korean fried chicken shop opens its third outlet, at 709 West Ave.

La Canasta | South Philadelphia

It’s just like Mexico at this homey basket-taco specialist (hence the name) at Fourth and Ritner Streets in Whitman (2341 S. Fourth St.).

Melt Shop | Langhorne

Sandwich chain lands at Lincoln Plaza (2490 E. Lincoln Highway). First person in line at the opening on Feb. 29 will get free grilled cheese for a year.

St. Oner’s | Fishtown

See above.

No reported closings this week.

Kensington Quarters, 1310 Frankford Ave., 5-7 p.m. Sunday-Friday

The bar at this lovely, meat-centric splurge in Fishtown is full of happy hour bargains: $7 cocktails, a $5 beer of the day, a $6 red and white wine of the day. KQ’s luscious burger, which usually sells for $20, is just $12. Seven bucks gets you mushroom toast, and five will get you chopped salad, fried scrapple, or pimento cheese and ham toast. Check out the charcuterie plate above, with duck rillette, assorted meats such as coppa, pork hunter sausage, beef pepperoni, and guanciale, accompanied by pickles, a few hot peppers, mustard, and bread. That’s also just $5.

Dim Sum House, 1930 Chestnut St.

A late-2019 kitchen fire prompted mother-son restaurant duo Jane Guo and Jackson Fu to rethink Jane G’s, their Szechuan restaurant at 20th and Chestnut Streets. It’s now back with a name and menu resembling the Shanghai/Cantonese/dim-sum approach they take at their Dim Sum House in University City. Same sleek, wide-open dining room with dark tabletops, white chairs, and black banquettes.

One difference: You order at the table with a checklist, a process that will start soon in University City. New dishes include honey vinegar spare ribs ($12), garlic seaweed salad ($11), and vegetable soup dumplings ($6.50). The big wow is Norwegian whole king crab done three ways; its market price is about $450 and it must be ordered in advance.

Hours: 11:30 a.m.- 10 p.m. Monday-Thursday, 11:30 a.m.-11 p.m. Friday, 11 a.m.-11 p.m. Saturday, and 11 a.m.-10 p.m. Sunday.

Stove & Tap, 245 Lancaster Ave., Malvern

Something-for-everyone menu. Solid drinks. Bubba the bear (in taxidermy form) at the door to scare/impress the kids. Stove & Tap — Justin Weathers and chef Joe Monnich’s popular bar-restaurant in Lansdale — has much to recommend in its second location, which replaced a Carrabba’s Italian Grill in the front of Lincoln Court Shopping Center earlier this winter.

Unlike Lansdale’s narrow footprint, the Chester County branch sprawls out, setting the bar on one side opposite a clubby, family friendly dining room that has almost a ski-lodge feel. There’s an all-weather patio, too.

Fried cheese curds with marinara ($10), deviled crab dip ($14), and the house fries ($12, topped with brisket, cheese curds, beer cheese sauce, gravy) are among the starter picks. Smoked chicken pot pie ($16), amped with bacon and oyster mushrooms, as well as old-school fried chicken ($22), served with Parker House rolls, are popular entrées.

Twelve beers on draft and 10 signature cocktails ($10 and $11), including a maple old-fashioned made with bourbon, maple syrup, bitters, and orange.

Tip: Do not skip the honey roasted carrots.

Hours: 11:30 a.m.-10 p.m. Monday-Saturday, 10 a.m.-10 p.m. Sunday.

Just for the Flower Show: Stefano Biasini, the gelato master at Gran Caffe L’Aquila, created an olive gelato inspired by the Riviera Holiday theme.

2020 James Beard Awards: Vetri and Kalaya are among this year’s semifinalists from Philly.

Students get schooled on fine dining: High school juniors and seniors learned the etiquette of a business lunch. Spoiler: they couldn’t use their phones.

Reader: You just gave Townsend three bells. I didn’t read anything in the review which explained why it didn’t get four, and am curious, what kept it from the fourth bell?

Craig LaBan: Thank you for reading! And you’re correct, I really did enjoy the superb new edition of Townsend, reviewed following its move to Rittenhouse from East Passyunk. But please don’t be mistaken: a three-bell (“excellent”) review is an expression of genuine enthusiasm on my part — a rating that still holds some ringing value. And indeed, Townsend clearly displayed excellence with its food, service and drinks. But again, why not four bells? In some ways, the answer is subtle: Townsend feels like it’s still making itself at home in its new surroundings, fine-tuning its mission and menu to suit its evolving clientele. I’m eager to see what’s next for this kitchen.

But the fact is very few restaurants achieve four bells, even if they’re executing their concept seamlessly. The four-bell rating, currently assigned to only seven restaurants, is intended as an aspirational achievement that acknowledges special places that set some regional standards — a notion that can vary greatly from one place to another.

But this question is worth considering, especially for people who may be unfamiliar with my Liberty Bell system, in part because I almost never talk about ratings within reviews themselves. I don’t because I view the text of a review and the rating as separate but complementary. If you want to know the details of what it’s like to dine somewhere, the backstory or how to navigate a menu, the in-depth review is there for that and more. The rating exists as an added service to readers that quickly delivers a bottom line, reflecting both my overall enthusiasm and where that restaurant sits within the wider context of our dining scene. I never write a review to fit a predetermined rating. If I’m on the fence at all over the course of my process, the rating comes last.

What sets one rating tier apart from another is often intuitive at the end of my process of multiple meals (paid for by The Inquirer) and follow-up phone interviews. But there’s a fundamental distinction to my approach to ratings: It’s built around high expectations and an uninflated grading system, rather than a less ambitious standard where every restaurant starts with a perfect “4” and then slides downward as flaws in the meal appear. My operating assumption, in this very competitive dining scene, is that I’m already considering a group of restaurants that meet a certain level of quality. The real question is, then, “how good are they?”

To get a sense of that preselection process, take a look my recent piece (the Uh-Oh Collective) about some places I set aside after a scouting meal and decided not to formally review. But my purpose with uninflated grades is to assure that high-bell compliments still mean something. And three-bell restaurants are still an exclusive group, ranging from 10 to 14 restaurants each year of the total reviewed, or just over 20%. The largest category of two-bell (“very good”) restaurants are also still intended as solid recommendations.

But I’ve always been stingy with crowning new members of the four-bell elite — which are places that capture a moment in time, a unique magic at the table, and have proven it over years of consistency with a continued growth that shows they’re still evolving as living restaurants. There is no checklist of criteria involved — I just know it when I feel it. That club currently includes Zahav, Vetri, Vernick Food & Drink, Vedge, Laurel, Royal Sushi, and Bibou.

Is there room for another? Absolutely. It’s been over a year since the last entry (Royal Sushi). And there are a number of ascendant kitchens I’ve been keeping tabs on with the notion they might someday be ready to take that next step. Of course, I won’t know it until I experience it, and so I eat onward, hopefully. You never know when it might happen.