London Grill Spring Menu

London Grill
2301 Fairmount Ave.
Philadelphia, PA 19130
Phone: 215.978.4545
http://www.londongrill.com/

London Grill has updated their menu.

A spring selection of beers is available and a few dishes were sampled: lamb risotto, gnocci, and brick chicken with appetizers of mac and cheese and truffle parmesan fries.

The meal was standard fare and everything was cooked well.

Graffiti Bar (Sampan, Philadelphia, PA)

Graffiti Bar
124 S 13th Street
Philadelphia, PA 19107
215-732-3501
http://sampanphilly.com/graffiti-bar/

As the weather is now nicer with the arrival of spring, I've been checking out more outdoor bars to enjoy the weather before summer arrives and it gets too gross and hot out.

Today, I checked out Graffiti Bar at Sampan.  Its located at the rear of Sampan, accessible through a fun, slightly sketchy, alley way.  It claims to seat 30 in the patio but 30 would feel like a squeeze.  The space was surprisingly packed for 5 pm on a Wednesday.

There is a cocktail and beer of the day for each happy hour along with the standard happy hour drink menu and happy hour food menu that has the standard Sampan Asian inspired food.  The cocktail of the day was decent and enjoyable and the beer of the day was just your standard Heineken.

Food items sampled for happy hour included: bahn mi (mediocre); Korean fried chicken (just bad, I was hoping for chicken wings korean style, not skewers of chicken meat); pork bao (this was the highlight); and lastly some kim chi fried rice with shrimp and an egg over easy (this was quite good as well)

Graffiti bar meets the bare minimum for an outdoor space in center city with fair drink specials.  The food is a little disappointing but lets face it, happy hour is more drink than food focused.  I would come back but Graffiti bar is not high on my list of repeat outdoor bars.

Rittenhouse Tavern

Rittenhouse Tavern
251 S 18th Street
Philadelphia, PA 19103
215-732-2412
http://rittenhousetavern.com

This visit was only for cocktails with an appetizer but the restaurant is in a very great location and the interior is quite stunning.  A little on the pricey side but it may fit the bill for a nice dinner.

The cocktails were well done.  I had the scotch cocktail which consisted of scotch, maple syrup, and ginger ale.  We sampled the ceviche and the server provided some complimentary chocolate fudge with sea salt and chili flakes.

Drury Beer Garden (Opa)

Drury Beer Garden (Opa)
1309 Sansom Street
Philadelphia, PA 19107

Drury Beer Garden is accessible through Opa.

It's a nice, but small beer garden with a pingpong table, a nice selection of beers, wine and some outdoor snacks.  Worth checking out for outdoor drinking but it does get crowded.

Bufad Pizza (Spring Garden, Philadelphia)

Bufad
1240 Spring Garden St.
Philadelphia, PA 19123
(215) 238-9311
http://www.bufadpizza.com

Bufad is a new pizza place in the spring garden area of Philadelphia.  The restaurant is cozy and on the small side.  We made the trek over on a Friday night for dinner and were greeted with a 45 min wait.  As the owners also own Prohibition Tap Room we killed some time there and came back.  As it took such a long time we were comped a few items by the gracious staff.  They were definitely accommodating and made a very sincere effort to make us happy.

We sampled three pizzas and three appetizers and were quite impressed with the food.  It is definitely a recommended venue in center city.  It is also a good BYOB for all of you BYOB aficionados.

Barclay Prime Happy Hour

Barclay Prime
237 S. 18th St.
Philadelphia, PA 19103
http://www.barclayprime.com/

Barclay Prime offers a surprisingly well priced happy hour in the Rittenhouse area.  I was very surprised to learn that there are 6 dollar cocktails and 6 dollar happy hour snacks available in a section of Barclay Prime for Happy Hour on weekdays.

Informed by a friend, I checked out the offering on a Friday with a party and we enjoyed ourselves immensely.  It was rather quiet and I would consider the happy hour a hidden gem in the city.  It was a good opportunity to try a little bit of everything.