A new restaurant called Coquette Bistro and Raw Bar has opened at the (heretofore jinxed) space at 5th & Bainbridge . Owned and operated by Cary Neff, who also runs Sansom Street Oyster House, it looks and tastes very promising. He's completely gutted the place, ripped down the curtains which were hiding the tall windows, laid down tile in a black and white theme, and put in a metal-front bar. Style-wise, it's impressive, down to the fire extinguishers. Sometimes a tarted-up place hides a mediocre kitchen, but not in this case. (In any case, you could get away with that in Rittenhouse, but not in this neighborhood.)
I had dinner with a friend there the other night. We got half a dozen oysters, a tomato salad, the lamb Milanese, and monk fish. Everything was very well done, but the oysters were great and the salad and the lamb were excellent. The breads were outstanding. With coffee and homemade sorbet for dessert and a complimentary glass of wine each, the bill came to $70. It's really a bistro menu, though, so we could have gotten away for a lot less and still had a great meal. The liquor license is still in the works, so that means it's still BYOB for now, which makes it a pretty good deal.
Cary says they're spending the month of August working out the kinks and soliciting feedback from people. He even reads the food blogs, and takes the comments seriously. After labor day they're going to roll out a Sunday brunch; right now it's just dinner six days a week, closed Mondays. No reservations.
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