October 25, 2007 Issue
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Classified Chestnut Hill Local Don't Miss an Issue, Tell us what you see or Winner of Two |
Ansill: hats off to classy ‘small plates’ restaurant
The first time I met (or tried to meet) David Ansill, now the chef-owner of Ansill, 3rd and Bainbridge Streets, was about eight years ago, when he was the chef at Lucy’s Hat Shop at 3rd and Market Streets. (It’s called that because many years ago the building did house an actual hat business called Lucy’s Hat Shop.) This will sound phony, but I swear that for the only time in my 25 years of writing restaurant articles, I was not able to interview a chef because I was not able to fit into the kitchen. (And I’m not exactly a contestant on The Biggest Loser. I only weigh 150 pounds.) I had heard about Ansill’s talent, and after my wife and I had dinner at Lucy’s Hat Shop, I wanted to ask Ansill a few questions. I was told he was too busy preparing food to leave the kitchen, but I was allowed to go into the kitchen to talk to him. Unfortunately, it was the smallest kitchen I have ever seen; Ansill was unable to move because of a cook standing to his right, and I was standing on the cook’s right, but that was right next to the door to the kitchen. I was not allowed to stay there because that would have prevented anyone from entering or exiting the kitchen, so my only option was to leave. The overall experience was not particularly pleasant (not just because of the closet that masqueraded as a kitchen), so I never did follow up with phone calls, but we had occasion to savor Ansill’s cooking a couple of years later when he opened his own restaurant, a tiny BYOB in the Italian Market area called Pif. Then, early last year Ansill opened his eponymous restaurant at 3rd and Bainbridge Streets, which had housed Judy’s Cafe for many years. (He continued to operate Pif as well for several months, but it eventually proved to be too much, so he closed Pif.) David has proven that you can go home again, despite what novelist Thomas Wolfe said, because by a coincidence, Judy’s Cafe was also the site of Ansill’s first cooking job in 1986, about the time he graduated from the Restaurant School of Philadelphia. “My barber was the barber for a chef here named Tony’s,” said David, “and that’s how I came to work here. It turned out to be the best job I ever had. It was so much fun here, so this place definitely has great memories for me.” It’s a real stretch, but you might even say there’s a Chestnut Hill angle here because the property that is now Ansill, which housed Judy’s Cafe from 1974 to 2005, contained a place called Holy Tomato before 1974, which was owned by David Carroll, who was once co-owner of Cafette, the charming BYOB in Chestnut Hill, along with former wife, Jan Carroll, who still runs it. Got all that? There may be a quiz later in the article. (It may be apocryphal, but there’s also a great story about how Judy’s Cafe got its name. According to my almost impeccable sources, the owners of Judy’s, Eileen Plato and Judy Gelfand, wanted to name the restaurant after one of them (I guess Eileen’s and Judy’s Cafe would have been too complicated a name), but they could not agree on which name to put up in lights. So they flipped a coin. I will leave it up to you, gentle reader, to guess who won the coin flip.) Returning to its current owner, Elkins Park native Ansill, 49, who opened the place almost two years ago as a tribute to his father (there’s a table with a plaque that reads “Reserved for Leonard Ansill”), calls it “a European snack ‘n’ wine bar for food-conscious adults.” Ansill‘s menu consists of relatively small plates of dishes David discovered in travels around the world. “These are the things that made me love cooking in the first place,” he said. For example, David’s current menu includes items you will not see on many other menus, such as bone marrow crostini, venison tartare, lamb’s tongue, shirred duck eggs with a custardy consistency and boar prosciutto. As you can see, he has a fondness for gamy meats and was offering fois gras until last month, when animal rights protesters convinced him to take it off the menu. (Fois gras is the engorged liver of a duck or goose which became enlarged by force-feeding. It produces a delicate, sweet flavor, but animal rights advocates insist it is even more cruel than most other forms of factory farming, which are cruel enough.) Ansill seats about 55 plus 18 at the beautiful long mahogany bar. The contemporary decor includes dangling cone-shaped light fixtures, blond wood tables with no linens and warm colors. Almost all dishes at Ansill are between $5 and $15 and are carefully rendered. (Remember, there are no entrees per se, but some of the dishes are much larger than others.) One dish that blew us away was the brushetta topped with figs and shaved goat cheese ($6). It was artfully presented, and the combination of textures and flavors was glorious. Sweetbreads (the thymus gland of a cow) are rarely found on menus these days, probably because they have a liver-ish consistency that turns many people off. David’s version ($15) was quite crispy, bold and savory, however, and made even more palatable by the accompanying mushrooms and red wine sauce. Also delightful was the earthy, pillowy pappardelle pasta with meltingly soft snails and truffle butter ($12). For cheese buffs like us, there are several options such as the tangy goat cheese from Spain, creamy cow cheese from the U.S. and fruity sheep’s cheese from France, among others ($7 for each, or $18 for a sampler of six). David’s wife, Catherine, a native of France, makes some of the desserts such as a fabulous chocolate fondant with kahlua, cognac and chocolate ganache ($7); a pistachio cake, preserves and assorted pastries. The only negatives were the fact that a bottle of Moscato d’Asti, a sweet dessert wine, was not served nearly cold enough (there is quite a varied list of wines and craft beers); there was no salt and pepper on the table, and the background music, which would sometimes consist of wonderful blues and soul music played at a reasonable volume, would suddenly erupt into head-banging music at an ear-splitting volume. Bizarre. Everything else is so civilized. I checked out Ansill on phillyblog.com and got a kick out of this entry: “My wife and I went (to Ansill) last night, and everything was great ... We had the carafe of the house wine for $15. We got about three glasses out of it, so I don’t think that was such a bad price. I think people should try this place before Philadelphia magazine reviews it, and it fills up with suburbanites.” (Are suburbanites carrying some kind of communicable disease?) On Tuesdays customers are allowed to BYO, and on Sundays there is a three-course, $40 dinner offered, with two or three choices for each course, as well as BYO. “I’m doing these things,” David explained, “mainly for my old customers at Pif who gave me a chance. I’m grateful to them.” Ansill is open seven days a week for dinner only. For more information, call 215-627-2485 or visit www.ansillfoodandwine.com.
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