We had a great group of people, and on a chilly October day,
twelve of them rode on their bicycles through the hilly area to take the tour. The
rest of us are from various suburbs around Philadelphia who decided to catch
the second to last weekend tour. Our
guide, Benni, was great, a bubbly 20-something who kept everything light and on
track throughout the tour. After all a
girl who names her dog Burger… yes, Burger can’t be all bad.
You cannot judge books or people by their cover. Our
erstwhile guide, when not taking hungry tourists through the quaint, upscale
town is a research scientist who spends time in Africa studying behavior of
monkeys. Really? I think when she told us, all our jaws dropped. Who would have guessed?
Every place we stopped was great, the food was awesome and
the people we encountered very friendly, and since all of them were family
owned small businesses, they were noticeably proud of their accomplishments.
Alright so a quick rundown of the places we visited.
Marchiano’s Bakery. They served us their world famous tomato
pie and their famous pepperoni and cheese specialty bread. If you have never
had tomato pie, it is basically a pizza with no cheese. Apparently they became famous not only because
of their food, but because Frank Sinatra would send his driver to buy their
food and share them with his friends, who then told their friends, and so
on. But with a patron such as Ole’
Blue-Eyes himself, the Chairman of the Board, how can you go wrong?
On our walk over we walked along the Tow Path, where famed
New England writer, Edgar Allen Poe once said of Roxborough, a neighbor of
Manayunk:
“Now, the Wissahiccon is of so remarkable a loveliness,
that, were it flowing in England, it would be the theme of every bard, and the
common topic of every tongue, if, indeed, its banks were not parcelled off in
lots, at an exorbitant price, as building-sites for the villas of the opulent.
Yet it is only within a very few years that any one has more than heard of the
Wissahiccon, while the broader and more navigable water into which it flows,
has been long celebrated as one of the finest specimens of American
river-scenery.”
Then Benni regaled us with the story of how Manayunk got its
name. Which is as you can guess, Native American. However the pronunciation of
the name was of great concern to those who named it, Man-Ee-Unk is how it is
pronounced now. But there was a time when it was debated that the pronunciation
was Man-Junk…Man junk. Yeah.
The next place we gnoshed at was Sorrentino’s Deli where we
had cheese steaks. No not the weird cheese steaks at chain restaurants, with
their hard rolls and peppers. No these were 100% rib-eye steak cooked on the
flat top and just before done, real American cheese. I heard the gasps, “What
no Whiz?” It’s a Philly thing that cheese steaks are topped with cheese whiz.
However Sorrentino’s doesn’t believe that cheese whiz is actually cheese, but
more of an oily government experiment.
After a few minutes where everyone ate in silence, savoring
the heavenly goodness that is an authentic cheese steak, we made our way to
Pretzel Park. This park is where the
city of Philadelphia placed an iron sculpture of a pretzel at the entrance to
the grassy lawn. We arrived at a time when the community was celebrating their
family zombie-Halloween bonanza. Alright
maybe not that exciting, but families were out taking their children trick or
treating and the community turned out for it. They even had a zombie “Thriller”
dance-off to entertain everyone.
Alright now we come to my favorite place, Lucky’s Last
Chance, a bar and grill that won the 2013 burger bash with a mouthwatering
delight. A peanut-butter and jelly,
bacon cheese burger that sounds weird, but to oh my gosh, it was absolutely one
of the best burgers I have ever had in my life. If you are in the Philly area, or plan on
visiting in the future, you have to make time to come to Lucky’s and try this gastronomical
goodness. Seriously. I mean it.
From there we travel down the street to Volo coffeehouse to
have some of the smoothest coffee I have ever had. There literally was no
bitterness to it at all. Starbucks wishes their coffee was this good.
And we finished it up at Sweet Elizabeth’s where we had
red-velvet cupcakes made with real butter and cream and, wait for it…beet
juice. Yep, beet juice, the way they were first made. Probably one of the moistest
cupcakes I have ever had.
That was the tour, and seriously I am glad it finished there
because I really couldn’t eat any more. Yes I have a few pictures, and I am
trying to figure out how to get them into this to show off some of the places
and food.
Bottom line, if you can take the tour, do it. It was fun and
the food was great.
