Square 1682
17.Jan.11
121 S. 17th St., Philadelphia, PA
Yes, it’s the most wonderful time of the year; it’s Restaurant Week. OK, it’s not all that wonderful. In fact, as I reflect on it, I have had disappointing or merely meh meals at places like Table 31 and Meritage during Restaurant Week, so perhaps I need to re-think the allure.
Anywho, we decided to try Square 1682 since it had received some good reviews and because when I walk by it almost weekly, it always seemed interesting inside. And, true that — I liked the interior (even if the lighting was too dim for my iPhone pictures to turn out) and the design touches, with squares everywhere and interior floor plans on mugs and bread plates, were well done.
I started with a very tasty signature cocktail, the Indian Summer, composed of Blue Coat Gin, Pimms (yay!), pineapple juice, cardamom, and nutmeg. The spices were barely noticeable, which I was fine with, but present enough that a seemingly summery cocktail had some autumnal underpinning.
I decided for my first course to fight the cold outside with the roasted squash soup with root vegetables and brown butter balsamic. Now, when I read root vegetables I thought they’d be thoroughly pureed like the squash: not so. Instead, the soup was an oddly chunky melange of soup with chunks of whatever root vegetables I think were lying around. There was also a layer of something on top that was a sodden, once-solid of undetermined origin that might have been a crouton or a matzo in a previous life. Again, I had no idea. The taste of the soup was fine, but the textural issues were jarring.
Second course was a pork chop with brussel sprouts and parsnip puree. Yes, it’s root vegetable season; I get it. Anyway, the pork itself was good though uneventful — not particularly seasoned interestingly, nor particularly juicy. The brussel sprouts were a disappointment: rather than leaving them whole, they were essentially shredded into unrecognizability and cooked to dry them into crispy wisps whose flavor resembled phyllo more than anything else. And the puree? Meh to the extreme, if that’s possible.
Dessert was the apple cider fritter with vanilla ice cream. Good. I had dreamed of an attempt at a dessert-y soup dumpling where the fritter would burst in one’s mouth with cider, but that didn’t happen (not that it needed to).
So, dinner was just fine. The food was disappointing perhaps just because of my expectations, but I don’t think they were necessarily out of bounds. My fellow diners seemed to enjoy their meals, which is good. Service was fine, though our waiter seemed nervous and that also didn’t provide me with much confidence in what would transpire. At their normal prices (especially their high drink and wine list prices), I don’t think I need to return to this place anytime soon.
