Fork

After reading numerous rave reviews about Fork I was excited to have a great meal. I was sorely disappointed. I was expecting simple food made with fresh quality ingredients. This is what i got, but with disastrous execution. The appetizers were all terrible, and the entrees possibly worse.
My party was seated on the most uncomfortable bench seats.
We ordered four appetizers: mixed bucks county farm greens, crispy duck confit, little neck clams, and baby back ribs. The farm greens consisted of giant pieces of red leaf lettuce drowned in tasteless vinaigrette, an overcooked hard-boiled egg, and some nicoise olives. The crispy duck confit was possibly the worst dish of the night. It was incredibly dry and so salty I could only take one bite. This was served with a side of frisee, drowned in a terrible vinaigrette and what was supposed to be roasted grapes. They were fresh red grapes just sitting on the plate. Maybe I should consider myself lucky no one actually attempted to cook them. The little neck clams were rubbery and overcooked. The clams were served with grilled bread for dipping. It was charred black. The baby back ribs, which had a wonderful texture, were unfortunately saturated in a sickly sweet sticky molasses glaze and served with an unmemorable slaw.
At this point, I am not looking forward to the main courses, but I will humor you anyway. My table ordered the Black Cod, Seared Duck, and Hanger Steak the Black Cod came out looking gorgeous. Unfortunately the skin on the underside was completely burnt black, so any bite tasted like burnt grill. The perfectly seared duck breast was saturated in another sickly candy sweet glaze. The hangar steak came out looking like a masticated mess minus the seasoning.
The chef had gorgeous quality ingredients and destroyed them.
The wine was good, and our server accommodating. That is the only good thing I could say about Fork.

Beautiful space, efficient personable service, excellent food. I actually live next door and take great comfort in the fact that one of the city's best restaurants is my cafeteria. Relaxed yet sophistcated and refined without trying too hard. Fork offers some classic preparations, some modern interpretations but always serves delicious food. The owner is there (it seems) 24/7 and it shows. Litle touches, like hand whipped cream in the HUGE Irish Coffee round out this perfect Philadelphioa dining experience.

I was really exceited about going to Fork after hearing many great things about the food. As you can tell from the title of this review, I was very disappointed with my eating experience. I ordered the pork chop and it was extremely overcooked and dry. I would have sent it back, but we were not seated until 9:30 for an 8:30 reservation. I was shocked by the lack of quality control...if that were my kitchen I would have never let that piece of meat be served to a customer. My date had the scallops with risotto. The scallops were cooked well, but the risotto was gummy, undercooked, salty and almost inedible. Again, a quality control problem. We also had some appetizers and desserts, none of which were very memorable (I can't even remember what we had). I would not reccomend going here for dinner. If anything go for drinks - the dirty martinis are excellent.

I had a really great salad to start that had arugula, goat cheese and I can't recall what else but whatever it was it workedit was simply delicious! So my expectations were high which is why the penne pasta may have been such a big dissapointment. It had fried eggplant, leeks, motzarella and a few other ingredients but it was quite bland despite all the ingredients-the flavors did not really show up in the dish like you would expect. Had a delicious dessert-the flourless chocolate cake which was out of this world. And the service was lovely. I'd go back because I think I just ordered the wrong thing. I sat at the bar and everyone's food around me looked delicious.

My first time and Fork and I would never go back. Both my friend and I ordered the same thing (a simple sandwich) and each time it came to the table wrong. When we finally gave up and asked to see the manager, she told our server that she was too busy helping other customers. Our server apologized and explained that their staff in the back do not speak English well and sometimes they have issues with reading/understanding the recipes... If you are like me and do not wish to take a chance biting into a piece of ham becuase their cooks don't understnad English, do not go to this place...