Today began at 9:30 AM a block away from our apartment building. “Why so early on a Saturday?” you may ask. Don’t worry, I only woke up at 9:25. But more importantly…
SIG had organized our next intern event of the year as the official Junk food tour of Philly! This private tour is relatively new, but incredibly well-run. The 15 of us, along with two SIG HR members, hopped into a first class coach bus where we met our tour guide. At our seats, we found a Whole Foods bag and some plastic eating implements. Let me explain.
The tour, over the next 5 hours, was to take us around Philadelphia’s various boroughs. We would explore historical, cultural, and most importantly, culinary highlights of the city — making six feasting stops along the way. Now “junk food” doesn’t mean french fries, pretzels, chips, and popcorn. It means strombolis, hoagies, eggplant parmigiano, briskets, pizza, italian ice, and of course, the Philly cheesesteak. At each location, we may select one of four options, skip all the lines, and most importantly eat all the food for free.
We settled into our seats and allowed our septuagenarian tour guide to proudly explain the development of Philadelphia into the marvelous cultural hub it is today. His pride for the city brought an exuberant entertainment aspect to the tour. The driver sped toward the city outskirts, where we reached our first destination: a “hole in the wall” pizza joint where we had our first meal: breakfast strombolis. Delizioso!
These were full-size strombolis, so we took our time digesting them. By that point, we had arrived at the next stop… another Italian restaurant crammed in the middle of an open meat market. Here, we enjoyed a variety of subs.
Getting pretty full, we weren’t too eager to head to the next location. Unfortunately, it was close by — yet another pizza place (coincidence? Philly’s just too Italian). Here we actually got pizzas… a few too many pies. Luckily, the tour also allows you to take items home if you don’t finish. Food for the rest of the weekend!
We finally had a break after our pizza adventure with a stop at Pop’s Homemade Italian Ice, supposedly the oldest Ice place in Philly (started by the current Pop’s grandfather). The ice there was AMAZING, totally beats out Rita’s. I recommend the mango or dark cherry. It also cleansed our palette, for the tour was still not over.
Next stop: a sub place by the Delaware River. By this point, even the iron stomachs of the group had given up any expectation of completing the next meal. As soon as we received our subs, we threw them in the bag; enjoying the waterside breeze and listening to some history of the city’s growth.
Finally, we went to Jim’s Steaks for some good old Philly cheese steak… or in my case, cheese fries. None of us even contemplated eating these and they were tossed in our bags as we argued over who got first use of the bathrooms when we got back. We headed back to Penn campus and hobbled out of the bus, stuffed to the brim and with bags full of Philly’s finest. Did I say food for the weekend? I meant for the rest of the week…
So there you have it, Saturday a la SIG.
My Summer at SIG 