Eating my Feelings
A food writer says goodbye to her adopted hometown.
I CALLED IT THE PHILLY PANTRY PROJECT, a way to turn the monumental task of eating down the contents of my cupboards, freezer and refrigerator into a game. Points were allocated according to the number of items used up in any given meal. Two points for falafel made with the last of the dried chickpeas and tahini. Five points for minestrone with canned tomatoes, orzo, beans and spices. Four points for bulgogi with the last of the brown rice, kimchi and gochujang, and that frozen marinade I had made for a recipe-testing project I worked on.
While finishing up the food in your house is always a bit of a project before a move, it’s a larger task in my house. I make my living writing about food and testing recipes, so my grocery stockpile borders on hoarding. Besides that, there were so many other things I hoped to eat before departure, and saying goodbye to Philly was tough to swallow all on its own.
I’ve lived in the Philadelphia area since 2000. I’ve spent the majority of the past two decades biking from 13th and Tasker to Reading Terminal Market, where I had my first full-time job at the Fair Food Farmstand, then to Philabundance, where I had my second, and to restaurants all over to write about them, and also to wait tables to help turn writing into a career.
There were so many other things I hoped to eat before departure, and saying goodbye to Philly was tough to swallow all on its own.
In five days, movers will arrive to pack up my South Philly life and take it to Oregon, specifically the Willamette Valley, Pinot Noir country, where my partner has accepted an entry-level winemaking job. Instead of a view of the one beleaguered street tree on our block, the windows of our Oregon rental look out on a hazelnut grove, Mount Hood in the distance. In place of a row house backyard, we’ll have one with fruit trees, a neighbor with chickens and a horse in the paddock across the way.
While I’m looking forward to a new adventure, imagining the idyllic charm of small-town Oregon life and the things it offers— drive-in movies, Tuesday nights at the bowling alley—my heart keens at leaving.
I first visited Philly, my adopted hometown, as my mom’s date to a fancy wedding when I was in high school. I don’t really remember the wedding, but I do remember emerging from the hotel lobby onto the bustle of the Ben Franklin Parkway, seeing the Art Museum in one direction and City Hall in the other. Washington DC, the city closest to where I grew up in Maryland, can feel so buttoned up. Philly, in comparison, has always felt unpretentious, down to earth and even friendly. Philly doesn’t take itself too seriously.
I will miss the murals, and the mosaics of Isaiah Zagar, the way one can be riding along—on a bike or in a car—and catch a glimpse of a mirror-spangled, colorful expanse. Twinkling.
I will miss my community; a network of friends, former coworkers, cooks and creatives hustling up new flavors of ice cream and new restaurants. Food has provided the arena wherein I built these relationships. I’ll miss the way that a trip to the Head-house Farmers’ Market is as much a social occasion as it is a shopping trip.
Because missing these people is too big a thing to manage right now, until we climb into the car and make our departure, every meal represents—even more urgently than the need to empty the pantry—an opportunity to steel myself against the heartbreak of goodbye by indulging in the other thing I’ll miss: Philly’s incredible food.
If I had attempted to get through a bucket list, it would have been so long that it would have required I spend another year here, at minimum. I’d have kicked it off with a bacon, egg and cheese–stuffed pretzel from Miller’s Twist in Reading Terminal, a throwback to many an early morning there. I’d follow that up with a pastry at Hungry Pigeon, a pork sandwich from DiNic’s, a So Long Sal! sandwich at Middle Child and another helping of Bakmi Ayam Jamur (Indonesian-style noodles) at D’Jakarta Cafe. Milk tea at Saté Kampar, a scone at High Point, a Fountain Porter burger and one of every pasta dish at Res Ipsa. Same at A Mano. I’d have tacos at South Philly Barbacoa, chocolate soufflé at Townsend, a cocktail at Hop Sing Laundromat, some dumplings at Dim Sum Garden, a Stargazy pie and probably some pizza, too.
I could go on, but the list is endless and there remain boxes to be packed. The days ahead will slip from one to the next, a fog of everything that needs to get done, goodbyes to be said and a final send-off: Tacconelli’s pizza and a Pat’s cheesesteak, because I don’t know how to say goodbye, but I do know that I should eat these things while I have a chance.
In a few weeks, once at least some of the boxes are unpacked, we’ll have some of the Oregon people over, new coworkers and neighbors and, hopefully, friends. We’ve already decided that we’ll be feeding them hoagies. If anyone asks where I’m from, I won’t hesitate. I’m from Philly.
