When Drew DiTomo was cooking Italian at Marc Vetri's Amis, we knew where to find him during lunch: at the bar, ordering tripa alla Romana and feeling grateful for soulful, unpretentious food. These days, DiTomo has moved a few miles northeast to Kensington, where he and partners Colin McFadden, Marty West, and Keith Shore have taken over the space that housed Memphis Taproom for decades. What they've built at Meetinghouse—which opened in August 2023—is something rarer than it should be: a neighborhood bar that takes its food and drink as seriously as any chef-driven restaurant in the city, without pretense or apology.
The bones of the place are authentically Philly. The dining room is dim and candlelit. The bar is worn in the right ways. The beer is house-brewed to spec by Tonewood in Oaklyn, available in pale, dark, or hoppy versions that pair thoughtfully with what's on the plate. But nothing here is basic, as New York Times critic Nikita Richardson noted when Meetinghouse landed on their 50 best restaurants in America list. That roast beef sandwich—piled high and cut clean, served with horseradish that announces itself—isn't just a sandwich. The towering green salad with Dijon vinaigrette isn't filler. Even the crab dip and baked clams read as deliberate choices, not afterthoughts.
What Inquirer critic Craig LaBan called "a commitment to craft that elevates the mundane to the memorable" is the through-line here. At every turn, potentially overlooked classics are celebrated through meticulous execution. The pork and beans arrive with the kind of depth that suggests hours of attention. The chocolate pot de crème is silky enough to make you pause mid-spoonful. This is food that respects its own lineage—the working-class Philly traditions it draws from—while refusing to be casual about technique or ingredient quality.
What makes Meetinghouse matter right now is that it's proof something has shifted in how we think about good food. It doesn't need to be rarified or difficult to access. It doesn't need a tasting menu or molecular gastronomy or a name you can't pronounce. It needs cooks who care, owners who won't compromise, and a neighborhood that's ready to embrace a bar that happens to be genuinely excellent. Meetinghouse is all three.