Matzo balls can be a canvas for experimentation. (This one, smoky from beef schmaltz, is from Rooster Soup Company in Philadelphia.) Image by Liza Schoenfein

By Liza Schoenfein April 25, 2017

The accolades keep coming for Philadelphia’s CookNSolo, the restaurant group of chef Michael Solomonov and business partner Steve Cook that includes the acclaimed Zahav, Abe Fisher and Federal Donuts.

In the May issue of GQ magazine, one of the team’s newer spots, Rooster Soup Co., whose chef is Erin O’Shea, is dubbed one of the year’s top 10 new restaurants.

Calling Solomonov a “superstar chef,” Brett Martin wrote, “Rooster Soup Co. offers loving re-imaginings of East Coast Jewish-inflected diner favorites.” He lists among them chicken schnitzel, chicken pot pie and smoked matzo ball soup.

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As we noted in early March, that soup is one of the dishes that repurposes byproducts from other foods made within the restaurant group; in this case, bones from the chickens fried at Federal Donuts are used to make the chicken stock and beef “schmaltz” from the short ribs at Abe Fisher supply the fat.

Martin also noted that all profits from the restaurant go to Broad Street Ministry’s Hospitality Collaborative, a local nonprofit that offers food and other social services to Philadelphia’s poor and homeless population.

“Here is definitive proof that a higher mission doesn’t require diminished deliciousness,” he wrote.

Liza Schoenfein is food editor at the Forward. Contact her at [email protected] or on Twitter, @LifeDeathDinner

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