Saturday, February 6, 2010

Kosher Super Bowl Sunday


I will have to miss the Super Bowl this year. A good friend and neighbor with no sports consciousness has scheduled her daughter's wedding for tomorrow evening. So I won't heading heading to the Expresso Cafe and Sushi on Castor Ave. and enjoying a great dinner while I watch the game on Sharon's wide-screen TV. Instead, I'll be schlepping to Lakewood for another boring chicken dinner and checking the game every 5 minutes on my Blackberry -- as the sister of a New Orleans residents, I'm pulling for the Saints.

I really regret this. The Expresso Cafe is my favorite spot in Philadelphia. It is always clean, the food is fresh and Sharon Abergel, who owns the place with his wife Liat, is a welcoming host. The only problem I ever have is sometimes they run out of my favorite dish -- Portabella Mushrooms with Mozzarella. Express Cafe is all dairy, but they have such a wide variety of offerings that even my kids like it here. The vegetable soup is a favorite with everyone. The salads are so large I usually end up taking the extras home.

I recently scheduled a business meeting at the cafe, and my guest emailed me the next day to say he was still thinking of the portobella mushrooms. When the mushrooms are not available, I also love the Carpacho -- eggplants, feta cheese and pesto in filo dough.

The cafe is also the only place in town where you can get a late breakfast. I've met my girlfriends there on a Sunday morning for bagels, lox, omelets and my favorite, shakshuka - a spicey Israeli omelet with peppers and tomatoes. If Sharon would open at 8 on Sunday morning so we could have a regular breakfast, we would be thrilled.

But, as someone reminded me, the guy has to sleep. Unlike every other kosher place on Castor Ave., the cafe is open until 10:30 every night but Friday. He also opens after Shabbat and stays open until 11. Even Starbucks doesn't keep those hours.

So that's what I'll be missing tomorrow night in the boondocks of Lakewood.



No comments:

Post a Comment