New restaurants at the Jersey Shore | Let’s Eat

Sand, surf, and something to eat: What more do you need at the Jersey Shore? This week, as we launch our Down the Shore newsletter, we run down the new restaurants to check out and the best breweries and brewpubs. Also this week, we take a trip to the Poconos to visit Pennsylvania’s only sake brewer, and I have exclusive word of the new brewery taking over for Dock Street in West Philadelphia.

But first, a quiz:

What’s the cash toll at the Egg Harbor toll plaza on the Atlantic City Expressway?

A) $1

B) $3

C) $4.25

D) $4.40

Click here for the answer. And stay tuned for our new Down the Shore newsletter, hitting an inbox near you every Thursday, starting May 26. (Be sure to sign up!)

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— Mike Klein

What’s new, restaurant-wise, at the Jersey Shore this summer? For starters, Bobby Flay is coming back with burgers. Gordon Ramsay has a third restaurant on the way. So many eateries have changed hands, too. I run down the newcomers, from Brigantine (The Pub at St. George) to the Wildwoods (The Cove) and Cape May (Grana), with a few stops on the mainland recommended by locals. Pay close attention to Ventnor, where brothers Joseph Tucker (left, in photo above) and Robert Liccio of Catch in Longport are in the first days of The Dorset, with an all-day breakfast-and-brunch menu in the former Annette’s. Tucker’s long-ago Passyunk Avenue joint, Joseph’s, is on ample display here in the form of his chicken-cutlet sandwiches, notably one topped with fresh mozz and his vodka cream sauce. I’ll call this hot grill summer.

Beer? My colleague Tommy Rowan rounded up the best brews around the beach towns lying between Atlantic City and Cape May. From resort-esque taprooms to dog-friendly brewpubs, here’s a list of the region’s best places to grab a brew.

A Memorial Day Weekend tradition has returned. Chickie’s & Pete’s will pay Atlantic City Expressway tolls for an hour’s worth of Shore-bound motorists on Friday, after a party that afternoon at the Farley rest stop. Free Crabfries, in other words.

Up and down the Shore, businesses rise and fall like the tides. For every pizza institution slinging hot slices for decades, there’s a new dreamer out there, writes my colleague Jason Nark. He dropped in on Carl Messick, a longtime chef in Cape May, who’s just opened Grana, his very own 68-seat BYOB. Why? “This kind of fell in my lap.”

You’ll find Pennsylvania’s only sake brewer high up in the hills in Delaware Water Gap. My colleague Jenn Ladd tracked down the well-traveled Jay Cooper, who runs Sango Kura, which started as an izakaya in a former Greek diner next to his parents’ bakery. Sango Kura released its first sakes in late 2019 — just in time for the pandemic, which may have spelled disaster if not for the throngs of Philadelphians and New Yorkers who retreated to the Poconos for bowls of ramen and sips of sake.

Dock Street Brewery’s West Philadelphia location marks its last call this weekend. This will make way for the space’s new occupant, Carbon Copy, a brewery and pub from Kyle Wolak (left, above) and Brendon Boudwin who worked at Tired Hands but quit in 2020.

They will brighten the interior of the old firehouse at 50th and Baltimore and open around Labor Day with beers and what they call “easy pub food” created around the wood-burning pizza oven. They don’t want to pigeonhole themselves as a “brewery” or “taproom” — rather, as beer and wine makers. (Wine will be made in their Kensington warehouse.)

Before striking out on their own to create Carbon Copy, they sought counsel and employment from brewery veterans — Wolak with Ken Corell at Human Robot, Boudwin with Stew Keener at Bar Hygge. When Dock Street founder Rosemarie Certo told Keener that she was thinking of moving on from the location, Keener suggested that Boudwin take a look. “The size of the place is nice and intimate,” Boudwin, 33, said. “That way, we can build a neighborhood bar on top of the beers.”

The idea of filling a landmark was intriguing. “We were really excited to carry the torch as the next generation,” Wolak, 32, said. “I mean, they’ve been there for 15 years and they were the first proper microbrewery in the Philadelphia area [when Dock Street opened in the mid-1980s]. The opportunity to be able to carry it on and breathe new life into the space is really interesting and exciting for us.”

And the name: “We were always kind of worried about maybe people considering us to be a carbon copy of another brewery, or trying to jump on the latest trend of what’s popular” Wolak said. “It’s a tongue-in-cheek reminder to ourselves not to be a carbon copy of someone else and just find what we want to do, focus on that, and let our interests and the interests of the community dictate our path, not the trend of the moment.”

The old Ristorante San Marco in Spring House, just outside of Ambler, has just opened as Tresini, a polished but rustic Italian bar-restaurant. This project is a complete renovation (down to the stone walls) of the 1860s schoolhouse.

It’s also the solo debut of Brad Daniels, a longtime vet of the Vetri orbit who rose to chef de cuisine at Osteria before a family move out to Colorado in 2017. Then came the call, and he returned to Montgomery County in 2019 — only to weather delay after delay during the pandemic. He and two partners (John Krinis and a third man, who is avoiding the limelight) had the concept: house-made pastas and a tight menu with as much local sourcing as possible, plus a neighborhood-friendly bar serving Italian and California wine list and cocktails.

They needed a name.

Three guys planning a restaurant in uncertain times? Tresini, it would be. It’s a bastardized construction of tre asini — Italian for “three donkeys.” At least they kept their sense of humor.

Tresini, 504 N. Bethlehem Pike, Ambler. Hours: 3:30-9 p.m. Tuesday and Wednesday, 3:30-10 p.m. Thursday-Saturday.

Avocados will be smashed for the Metropolitan Area Neighborhood Nutrition Alliance’s eighth annual Guac Off, from 6-9 p.m. Thursday, May 26 at Morgan’s Pier. Among the competing restaurants are Buena Onda, Cantina Feliz, Cafe Ynez, Distrito, Juno Mexican Grill, Morgan’s Pier, Paladar Latin Kitchen & Rum Bar, Rosy’s Taco Bar, Sor Ynez, Revolution Taco, Taqueria Amor, Jose Pistola’s, Sancho Pistola’s, and Pistolas Del Sur. Two winners will be selected, one chosen by judges and the other by popular vote. Tickets ($40) via MANNA’s website.

Center City District SIPS, the downtown Wednesday happy-hour promo, restarts for the season on June 1.

Set your DVR: The Julia Child bio-film Julia will premiere for television on CNN on Monday, May 30 at 8 p.m. and 10 p.m.

Mexican Food Factory in Marlton, damaged in March by an errant car, is looking at a June reopening.

Elwood, the cozy Fishtown BYOB, now has outdoor dining — three years after it opened and six years after co-owner Jenny Ko submitted the drawings for a couple of dozen seats. In their announcement, Ko and chef/co-owner Adam Diltz are being diplomatic about their zoning ordeal.

Seasonality is everything. Reader @kishtazag was blown away by the white asparagus with egg, hollandaise, crispy shallot, and scallion oil from 1911 BYOB, the new Passyunk Avenue home of chefs Jon Raffa and Mike Gingras. (More on 1911 soon.) Just up the street at River Twice, chef Abby Dahan impressed reader @extrenergy at a March 16 collab dinner with chef-owner Randy Rucker. They dish is the farro verde: tahini, autumn olives, green garlic, asparagus, lots of herbs, and flowers.

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