Fishtown Specialty

Todd Carmichael has coffee in his roots. Well before founding La Colombe in Philly, a boutique coffee company and café that has sparked a sort of coffee revolution, with its canned draft lattes and pure black varieties, he lived in Seattle where he worked at a café that later became Starbucks. The businessman and traveler partnered with JP Iberti to start La Colombe with the goal of bringing sustainable, good coffee to the masses. In Philly, you can sip their brews at their locations in Fishtown, Rittenhouse Square (their first brick-and-mortar shop), Dilworth Plaza, and Independence Mall.

What’s a Philly-style bagel? According to bakers Collin Shapiro and Jonathon Zilber, it’s boiling the dough in beer-spiked water. The resulting bagel is crispy on the outside and pillow-y on the inside with a delicate malty flavor. For purists, have your sesame, poppy, garlic, onion, salt, everything, or plain bagel simply toasted with spread (smoked salmon is a favorite). For the adventurous, there are bagel sandwiches—from hummus and veggie to BLT.

If you had to describe an ice cream shop as “cute as a button” this would be it: Here, in a pocket of Fishtown, husband-and-wife duo Andy and Jen Satinsky lovingly churn out French-style ice cream one batch at a time. The organic cream comes from Seven Stars Farm in Chester County and the eggs from nearby Sandy Ridge—plus they’ll incorporate fresh and in-season ingredients, so no two batches are totally alike. This summer, standouts included blueberry breakfast (cinnamon toast oat ice cream plus blueberry swirl) and summer jam, a chocolate ice cream with marshmallow fluff. The ice cream sandwiches, like blueberry on a cardamom graham cracker are pretty epic, too.