Restaurant Week 2023 Review
Each year, Philly hosts their Restaurant Week, where many restaurants offer price fix menus from September 10- 23. This time around, we were fortunate enough to try two different restaurant week menus from La Famiglia and Rex at the Royal. Here is our honest review!
📍La Famiglia Ristorante
8 S Front St, Philadelphia, PA 19106
With a long history, La Famiglia’s food, ambiance, and service makes you feel like you’re in an authentic restaurant in Italy. The Sena Family’s passion for cuisine dates back to 1947 when Carlo Sena got into cooking in postwar Naples. The family carried this tradition into the United States and opened La Famiglia in 1976 in a Colonial tea warehouse. With hard work, Carlo turned La Famiglia into a reputable Italian restaurant, inspired by Napoletano cuisine. From my experience dining here, everything about it is traditional, but elevated. The dishes tasted like a home cooked meal, but gourmet at the same time. Their menu for restaurant week is $45 per person with 3 courses, and I’d say they were generous with their portions compared to others.
For the first course, we ordered burrata ravioli, oysters, white wine clams, and mozzarella alla milanese. Alla milanese is essentially fried mozzarella and prosciutto. Our second courses included salmon with a white wine sauce, veal with prosciutto and mozzarella, and “pollo tri-colore,” which is chicken breast topped with mozzarella and tomato in a white wine and garlic sauce. I had the “risotto alla famiglia,” which had saffron, baby shrimp, cherry tomatoes, shallots and parmesan. The risotto was so comforting and a great representation of a homemade Fall dish. Fundamentally, these dishes are simple, but the small additions of ingredients elevated each dish to be a unique take on traditional Italian food. For dessert or “dolce,” we were given an assortment of 3 cakes: Italian cheesecake, chocolate cake, and tiramisu. Although cheesecake in combination with other cakes can be typically heavy, all three were very light and airy. A perfect way to finish the meal.
La Famiglia was definitely a great choice for restaurant week. Next time I’m craving a soothing Italian meal, I know where to go. Benissimo, grazie!
For more info:
🔗: https://lafamiglia.com/
Restaurant Week Menu: https://centercityphila.org/uploads/attachments/clksc81r39uzpypqdwuvakh4n-lafamiglia.pdf
📍Rex at the Royal
1524 South St, Philadelphia, PA 19146
Located in South Philly, Rex at the Royal is a Southern inspired restaurant with a modern approach. With dim lighting, stain glass windows, and candle chandeliers, the ambiance exudes a sense of mysteriousness. They made their restaurant week menu a great deal at $45 a person for three courses, while some of their regular menu dishes starting at $30 and above. I was excited to try this restaurant, especially after seeing that they were listed in the top 25 restaurants participating in restaurant week in a recent Philadelphia Inquirer article. Rex at the Royal doesn’t include your standard Southern basics like Gumbo and Jambalaya, but has more nuanced dishes with unique components.
To start, we ordered oysters from the East and West coast, served with pickled red chili and cucumber mignonette. The fried green tomatoes and crispy pork belly was our favorite appetizer, paired with house pimento cheese and blackened shrimp chili remoulade. For being a meat dish, the combination of green tomatoes and salad underneath made the taste surprisingly refreshing. For entrees, we had the pan fried catfish, shrimp & grits, and the grilled-free range chicken. The pan fried catfish was a highlight; prepared with bacon, andouille sausage, tomatoes, and asparagus in a creole catfish sauce. The blend of flavors between the catfish and the sauce was incredible. You could tell there’s precision with the choice of ingredients, which I could pick up on the different notes. As a side, we had the warm biscuits with honey butter and jam. Although they were simple Southern-style biscuits, I think this may have the best part of the whole meal. Lastly for dessert, we ordered both the key lime pie and bread pudding, topped with ice cream and caramel drizzle. This was my first time trying bread pudding and it was to die for.
The one negative of our dining experience at Rex and the Royal was the service; it was slow and we were there for 3 hours. There was roughly an hour wait during each course. When this happens, we always take into consideration how busy the restaurant is, however by the end of the meal, we were one of the only tables left. I’d still say the outstanding flavors made up for it and would love to dine here again regardless.
I believe a modern Southern restaurant with Gatsby-like ambiance is a brilliant idea. Out of the places visited during restaurant week, I would say Rex at the Royal serves one-of-a-kind dishes that can’t be found anywhere else.
For more info:
🔗: https://www.rexphl.com/
Restaurant Week Menu: https://centercityphila.org/uploads/attachments/cllntdiheb0x4m8qdalniflq1-rex1.pdf
Editing contributed by Zach Hamilton.
