Skip to content
Link copied to clipboard

Restaurant notes: New chef at Devil's Den

Paul Trowbridge, last at Moriarty's, takes over.

  1. Family health issues have forced Alex Ureña to bow out of the kitchen at South Philly's Devil's Den and return to New York. (Ureña came to Philly in mid-2009 to be sous chef at R2L, but he and management parted company just before the opening.) Now at Devil's Den's stove is Paul Trowbridge, who'd been at Moriarty's since 2005, after a few years in Montgomery Conuty at such now-gone establishments as Alison's Cafe, Alison at Blue Bell, and Blue Horse. Here's the new menu and beer list at Devil's Den. Moriarty's, meanwhile, now has the services of Hector Moya.

  2. Moon Krapugthong, owner of Chabaa Thai in Manayunk, has brought in chef Haruo Ige for a month-long residency in which he'll add dishes from his home of Okinawa, Japan, including a Japanese-Thai twist on sushi and sake pairings with each dish. 

  3. Chubby Balboa's, the sports bar that's been "thisclose" to opening for months in Glen Mills' Concordville Town Center, is looking at a mid-January opening. "Construction delays" is the stated reason.

  4. Steven Cook and Michael Solomonov of Zahav, Percy Street, and Xochitl have dubbed their partnership Cook + Solo Restaurants. (You do know what would happen if Han Chiang of Han Dynasty joined...)

  5. Five Guys fans: Note that corporate just told me that its location in Plymouth Square at Butler and Ridge Pikes, in the Conshohocken area, will open Dec. 14 and that the location at 1109 Walnut St. will open Dec. 22.