PHILADELPHIA — Often, we try to locate a decent diner early in any multiday stay. On our own, we stay at Hampton or Comfort inns that include a regrettably starchy breakfast. You still need a diner. For conferences, like the one of last weekend, you reside on-site. The Sofitel here had a terrific and expensive restaurant. No mini-coffee maker in the room but complementary morning coffee and tea downstairs was welcome and unusual in this class of hotel. We still needed a diner.<\/p>\n
My Beloved spotted it on our first walk through the hotel’s neighborhood: Little Pete’s, 219 S. 17th St. at Chancellor, 24\/7. On our first full day, we had wonderful short-order-grill omelets — cheddar, mushrooms and peppers for her, feta and spinach for me — with decent hash browns and an unexpected treat, rye toast. This was not breakfast or even a weekday brunch but a late lunch (mid-afternoon) that we do so often, at home or on the road, that we have named this very early dinner as “linner.”<\/p>\n
We ate at Little Pete’s two more times. Once comprised salads and sandwiches late in the evening because linner at 3 will leave you hungrier than a dessert will take care of at 9. And we had a breakfast-time breakfast, though they already had run out of oatmeal, which M.B. was counting on. Cash-only, and Little Pete’s is not listed in any of the tourism guides — it’s a local joint.<\/p>\n
Price is part of it, but convenience matters more. Travel also forces an economy of time, along with realizing while fine dining is a delight of travel, it can deaden the senses. If you’re spending 50 minutes looking at guidebooks, chatting up the concierge or Googling on the lobby PC to choose a place where you’ll be eating — for 70 minutes — that can start to feel depraved, especially if done more than once a day.<\/p>\n
A decent all-night diner — though more than once we’ve used a Panera Bakery Caf\u00e9 instead of the ol’ greasy spoon, and Whole Foods Market was a revelation last fall, being a pricey grocery but a moderately priced cafe full of healthy food — helps the traveler better place priorities. Economy of time: Add up all the travel expenses and divide into the number of hours you’re away. Time is what you’ve saved for all year, and yet you need sleep and other down time. A taxi thus can make economic since (though in Philly the inexpensive train\/subway can be faster by missing traffic). And the diner cuts out the recurrent discussion, “Italian or pizza?” “Chinese or Thai?” that not only blows minutes but makes hungry people cranky.<\/p>\n
-30-<\/p>\n","protected":false},"excerpt":{"rendered":"
PHILADELPHIA — Often, we try to locate a decent diner early in any multiday stay. On our own, we stay at Hampton or Comfort inns that include a regrettably starchy breakfast. You still need a diner. For conferences, like the one of last weekend, you reside on-site. The Sofitel here had a terrific and expensive […]<\/p>\n","protected":false},"author":1,"featured_media":0,"comment_status":"open","ping_status":"open","sticky":false,"template":"","format":"standard","meta":{"_jetpack_memberships_contains_paid_content":false,"footnotes":"","jetpack_publicize_message":"","jetpack_publicize_feature_enabled":true,"jetpack_social_post_already_shared":false,"jetpack_social_options":{"image_generator_settings":{"template":"highway","default_image_id":0,"font":"","enabled":false},"version":2}},"categories":[17],"tags":[],"class_list":["post-332","post","type-post","status-publish","format-standard","hentry","category-philadelphia-2007"],"jetpack_publicize_connections":[],"jetpack_featured_media_url":"","jetpack_sharing_enabled":true,"jetpack-related-posts":[{"id":211,"url":"https:\/\/benpollock.com\/brick\/2006\/06\/211\/","url_meta":{"origin":332,"position":0},"title":"Coursing into Boston","author":"Ben S. Pollock","date":"June 29, 2006","format":false,"excerpt":"BOSTON -- My first longhand note this morning: Just because I'm an early riser doesn't mean I'm a morning person.\" Getting into downtown Boston and only five minutes late for my 2 p.m. meeting of the columnists board was not quite as hard as we were warned by several sources\u2026","rel":"","context":"In "Boston Blotter"","block_context":{"text":"Boston Blotter","link":"https:\/\/benpollock.com\/brick\/category\/nsnc\/boston-2006\/"},"img":{"alt_text":"","src":"","width":0,"height":0},"classes":[]},{"id":328,"url":"https:\/\/benpollock.com\/brick\/2007\/06\/down-to-the-wire\/","url_meta":{"origin":332,"position":1},"title":"Down to the Wire","author":"Ben S. Pollock","date":"June 23, 2007","format":false,"excerpt":"PHILADELPHIA -- The final sessions of the 2007 conference of the National Society of Newspaper Columnists were the most traditional. In panel discussion format, largely avoided until this morning, perennial subjects were again addressed: techniques, ethics, books and technology. This will be brief, a note or two on each. After\u2026","rel":"","context":"In "Philadelphia Phreedom"","block_context":{"text":"Philadelphia Phreedom","link":"https:\/\/benpollock.com\/brick\/category\/nsnc\/philadelphia-2007\/"},"img":{"alt_text":"","src":"","width":0,"height":0},"classes":[]},{"id":326,"url":"https:\/\/benpollock.com\/brick\/2007\/06\/philadelphia-phreedom\/","url_meta":{"origin":332,"position":2},"title":"Philadelphia Phreedom","author":"Ben S. Pollock","date":"June 21, 2007","format":false,"excerpt":"PHILADELPHIA -- The annual conference of the National Society of Newspaper Columnists begins Friday at 8 a.m. Well, Thursday evening is the informal mixer that has become more organized over the years. Most conferees have arrived, as have some speakers, including Dave Barry. Little thus can be reported yet. The\u2026","rel":"","context":"In "Philadelphia Phreedom"","block_context":{"text":"Philadelphia Phreedom","link":"https:\/\/benpollock.com\/brick\/category\/nsnc\/philadelphia-2007\/"},"img":{"alt_text":"","src":"","width":0,"height":0},"classes":[]},{"id":299,"url":"https:\/\/benpollock.com\/brick\/2007\/03\/in-our-midsts\/","url_meta":{"origin":332,"position":3},"title":"In Our Midsts","author":"Ben S. Pollock","date":"March 19, 2007","format":false,"excerpt":"OKLAHOMA CITY -- Assorted thoughts. The professionals among the conferees and the speakers all were pessimistic about the future of the newspaper business. It was just a matter of degree. The most hopeful see journalism shifting mostly to the Internet with a minority paper presence. The dourest -- and they\u2026","rel":"","context":"In "\"Never met a blog I didn't like\""","block_context":{"text":"\"Never met a blog I didn't like\"","link":"https:\/\/benpollock.com\/brick\/category\/nsnc\/oklahoma-city-2007\/"},"img":{"alt_text":"","src":"","width":0,"height":0},"classes":[]},{"id":331,"url":"https:\/\/benpollock.com\/brick\/2007\/06\/word-pictures-picture-words\/","url_meta":{"origin":332,"position":4},"title":"Word Pictures. Picture Words","author":"Ben S. Pollock","date":"June 27, 2007","format":false,"excerpt":"PHILADELPHIA -- The Philadelphia Museum of Art had a special exhibit of the calligraphy of the 17th-century Japanese artist Ike Taiga, as well as his wife, Mamie. As is customary, he illustrated the words with scenes of woods, mountains and a few people here and there. Often Taiga and Tokuyama\u2026","rel":"","context":"In "Philadelphia Phreedom"","block_context":{"text":"Philadelphia Phreedom","link":"https:\/\/benpollock.com\/brick\/category\/nsnc\/philadelphia-2007\/"},"img":{"alt_text":"","src":"","width":0,"height":0},"classes":[]},{"id":7257,"url":"https:\/\/benpollock.com\/brick\/2022\/03\/slaw-down\/","url_meta":{"origin":332,"position":5},"title":"Slaw Down","author":"Ben S. Pollock","date":"March 6, 2022","format":false,"excerpt":"This recipe for coleslaw took decades to nail down. Not full time, had other things to do. It starts with Porta's barbecue on Jenny Lind near my junior high school, Ramsey, in central Fort Smith, Arkansas. There were several Porta brothers, Art's only served BBQ and sides, intended for take-out\u2026","rel":"","context":"In "Sides"","block_context":{"text":"Sides","link":"https:\/\/benpollock.com\/brick\/category\/kook-cooks\/sides\/"},"img":{"alt_text":"Large steel bowl of shredded cabbage","src":"https:\/\/i0.wp.com\/benpollock.com\/brick\/wp-content\/uploads\/Shredded-Cabbage-wikimedia-commons-1920x1080-1.jpg?resize=350%2C200&ssl=1","width":350,"height":200,"srcset":"https:\/\/i0.wp.com\/benpollock.com\/brick\/wp-content\/uploads\/Shredded-Cabbage-wikimedia-commons-1920x1080-1.jpg?resize=350%2C200&ssl=1 1x, https:\/\/i0.wp.com\/benpollock.com\/brick\/wp-content\/uploads\/Shredded-Cabbage-wikimedia-commons-1920x1080-1.jpg?resize=525%2C300&ssl=1 1.5x, https:\/\/i0.wp.com\/benpollock.com\/brick\/wp-content\/uploads\/Shredded-Cabbage-wikimedia-commons-1920x1080-1.jpg?resize=700%2C400&ssl=1 2x, https:\/\/i0.wp.com\/benpollock.com\/brick\/wp-content\/uploads\/Shredded-Cabbage-wikimedia-commons-1920x1080-1.jpg?resize=1050%2C600&ssl=1 3x, https:\/\/i0.wp.com\/benpollock.com\/brick\/wp-content\/uploads\/Shredded-Cabbage-wikimedia-commons-1920x1080-1.jpg?resize=1400%2C800&ssl=1 4x"},"classes":[]}],"_links":{"self":[{"href":"https:\/\/benpollock.com\/brick\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/posts\/332","targetHints":{"allow":["GET"]}}],"collection":[{"href":"https:\/\/benpollock.com\/brick\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/posts"}],"about":[{"href":"https:\/\/benpollock.com\/brick\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/types\/post"}],"author":[{"embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/benpollock.com\/brick\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/users\/1"}],"replies":[{"embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/benpollock.com\/brick\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/comments?post=332"}],"version-history":[{"count":2,"href":"https:\/\/benpollock.com\/brick\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/posts\/332\/revisions"}],"predecessor-version":[{"id":1519,"href":"https:\/\/benpollock.com\/brick\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/posts\/332\/revisions\/1519"}],"wp:attachment":[{"href":"https:\/\/benpollock.com\/brick\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/media?parent=332"}],"wp:term":[{"taxonomy":"category","embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/benpollock.com\/brick\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/categories?post=332"},{"taxonomy":"post_tag","embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/benpollock.com\/brick\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/tags?post=332"}],"curies":[{"name":"wp","href":"https:\/\/api.w.org\/{rel}","templated":true}]}}